_Celtic Period._--The remotest times to which history gives us access with reference to the law and institutions formerly existing in the country which is now called France are those in which the dominant race at least was Celtic. On the whole, our knowledge is small of the law and institutions of these Celts, or Gauls, whose tribes constituted independent Gaul. For their reconstruction, modern scholars draw upon two sources; firstly, there is the information furnished by the classical writers and by Caesar and Strabo in particular, which is trustworthy but somewhat scanty; the other source, which is not so pure, consists in the accounts found in those legal works of the middle ages written in the neo-Celtic dialects, the most important and the greater number of which belong to Ireland. A reconstruction from them is always hazardous, however delicate and scientific be the criticism which is brought to bear on it, as in the case of d'Arbois de Jubainville, for example. Moreover, in the historical evolution of French institutions those of the Celts or Gauls are of little importance. Not one of them can be shown to have survived in later law. What has survived of the Celtic race is the blood and temperament, still found in a great many Frenchmen, certain traits which the ancients remarked in the Gauls being still recognizable: _bellum gerere et argute loqui_. _Roman Period._--It was the Roman conquest and rule which really formed Gaul, for she was Romanized to the point of losing almost completely that which persists most stubbornly in a conquered nation, namely, the language; the Breton-speaking population came to France later, from Britain. The institutions of Roman Gaul became identical with those of the Roman empire, provincial and municipal government undergoing the same evolution as in the other parts of the empire. It was under Roman supremacy too, as M. d'Arbois de Jubainville has shown, that the ownership of land became personal and free in Gaul. The law for the Gallo-Romans was that which was administered by the _conventus_ of the magistrate; there are only a few peculiarities, mere Gallicisms, resulting from conventions or usage, which are pointed out by Roman jurisconsults of the classical age. The administrative reforms of Diocletian and Constantine applied to Gaul as to the rest of the empire. Gaul under this rule consisted of seventeen provinces, divided between two dioceses, ten in the diocese of the Gauls, under the authority of the praetorian prefect, who resided at Treves; and the other seven in the _dioecesis septem provinciarum_, under the authority of a _vicarius_. The Gallo-Romans became Christian with the other subjects of the empire; the Church extended thither her powerful organization modelled on the administrative organization, each _civitas_ having a bishop, just as it had a _curia_ and municipal magistrates. But, although endowed with privileges by the Christian emperors, the Church