In the early days Roman law was not any more sophisticated than their Greek neighbors' For instance, the Twelve Tables (Rome, 450 B C) and roughly contemporary code of the Greek city of Gortyn have comparable rules of inheritance

If someone provides for his estate or guardianship by will, let this be legally valid If someone dies without a will, and he has no suus heres (direct descendant), let the nearest "agnate" [relative traced only through male lines] have the property If there is no agnate, let the members of the clan have the property (Twelve Tables 53-5)

When a man or woman dies, if there are children or grand-children or great-grand-children, they get the property If there are no such people, then the brothers (or their descendents) get it And if there are none of these either, the sisters (or...