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ADOPTION
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Claudius Nero. Here we have the introduction of another family - the Claudii ... Nero was the great nephew of
his predecessor Claudius, who had adopted him in the year A.D. 50' (Septimus Buss).
Adoption was of two kinds: adoption proper, and adrogation.
Adoption proper. It must be remembered that the father in Roman law had absolute control over his family,
possessing the same rights over his children as over his slaves. By this patria potestas the son was deprived of the
right to own property, and the father could inflict any punishment he thought fit, even to the extent of the death
penalty. He could also sell his son into bondage. According to the law of the XII Tables, however, a father forfeited
his potestas if he sold his son three times. For this reason, in the case of adoption, a legal ceremony took place in
which the father went through the process of selling his son three times, and the son passed over completely to the
potestas of the adopter. In later times the cumbersome ceremony was substituted by a simple declaration before the
Praetor or Governor.
Adrogation. When the person to be adopted was his own master, he was adopted by the form called adrogation
(from the word for `ask', since in this case the adopter, the adopted, and the people were `asked', rogatur). The law
demanded that the adopter should be at least eighteen years older than the adopted:
`Adoption imitates nature, and it seems unnatural that a son should be older than his father' (Justinian).
`Adoption was called in law a capitas diminutio, which so far annihilated the pre-existing personality who
underwent it, that during many centuries it operated as an extinction of debts' (W. E. Ball).
The effect of adoption was fourfold:
(1) A CHANGE OF FAMILY. The adopted person was transferred from one gens to another.
(2) A CHANGE OF NAME. The adopted person acquired a new name: for he assumed the name of his adopter, and
modified his own by the termination ianus. Thus when Caius Octavius of the Octavian gens was adopted by
Julius Caesar, he became Caius Julius Caesar Octavianus.
(3) A CHANGE OF HOME, and
(4) NEW RESPONSIBILITIES AND PRIVILEGES. While the adopted person suffered many `losses', these were more
than counterbalanced by his `gains', for he received a new capacity to inherit. In the case of the adopter
dying intestate, the adopted son acquired the right of succession.
Paul alludes to the patria potestas, the absolute power of the father in the family, in the fourth Chapter of
Galatians where he speaks of `the child differing nothing from a slave' and goes on to say `Thou art no longer a
slave, but a son' (Gal. 4:7). Paul also alludes to tutelage in Galatians 3 and 4, where we have such phrases as `kept
in ward', `tutor to bring us to Christ', `under guardians and stewards', and `children held in bondage' (Gal. 3:23 to
4:3).
So far as the ceremony was concerned, the difference between the transferring of a son into slavery, and his
becoming a member of the family was very slight. In the one case the adopter said: `I claim this man as my slave';
in the other, `I claim this man as my son'. The form was almost the same; it was the spirit that differed.
If the adopter died and the adopted son claimed the inheritance, the latter had to testify to the fact that he was the
adopted heir. Furthermore -
`the law requires corroborative evidence. One of the seven witnesses is called. "I was present", he says, "at the
ceremony. It was I who held the scales and struck them with the ingot of brass. It was an adoption. I heard the
words of the vindication, and I say this person was claimed by the deceased, not as a slave, but as a son"` (W. E.
Ball).
Bearing all these facts in mind, can we not feel something of the thrill with which the Roman Christian would
read the words of Romans: