The consent of the father or, if he was dead, of near relatives was emphatically declared necessary by the Christian emperors for a marriage and the woman had practically no will of her own although, if several suitors were proposed to her, she might be requested to name which one she preferred.[275] Marriage with a Jew was treated as adultery.[276] Women who belonged to heretical sects were to have no privileges.[277] Justinus and Justinian abrogated the old law which forbade senators to marry freedwomen or any woman who had herself or whose parents had followed the stage.  Actresses were now permitted, on giving up their profession, to claim all the rights of other free women; and a senator could marry such or even a freedwoman without prejudice.[278]

[Sidenote:  Changes in the laws of inheritance.]

Under the old law, as we have seen, a son and a daughter had equal rights to intestate succession; but beyond the relationship of daughter to father or sister to brother women had no rights to intestate succession unless there were no agnates, that is, male relatives on the father’s side.  Thus, an aunt would not be called to the estate of a nephew who died childless, but the uncle was regularly admitted.  So, too, a nephew was admitted to the intestate succession of an uncle, who died without issue, but the niece was shut out.  All this was changed by Justinian, who gave women the same rights of inheritance as men under such conditions.[279] If the children were unorthodox, they were to have absolutely no share of either parent’s goods.[280]

[Sidenote:  Women as guardians.]

[Sidenote:  In suits.]

The Christian emperors permitted widows to be guardians over their children if they promised on oath not to marry again and gave security against fraud.[281] Justinian forbade women to act by themselves in any legal matters.[282]

[Sidenote:  Bills of attainder.]

Arcadius and Honorius (397 A.D.) enacted some particularly savage bills of attainder, which were in painful contrast to the clemency of their pagan predecessors.  Those guilty of high treason were decapitated and their goods escheated to the crown.  “To the sons of such a man [i.e., one condemned for high treason],” write these amiable Christians,[283] “we allow their lives out of special royal mercy—­for they ought really to be put to death along with their fathers—­but they are to receive no inheritances.  Let them be paupers forever; let the infamy of their father ever follow them; they may never aspire to office; in their lasting poverty let death be a relief and life a punishment.  Finally, any one who tries to intercede for these with us is also to be infamous."[284] However, to the daughters of the condemned these emperors graciously granted one fourth of their mother’s but not any of their father’s goods.  In the case of crimes other than high treason the children or grandchildren were allowed one half of the estate.[285] Constantine decreed that a wife’s property was not to be affected by the condemnation of her husband.[286]