In the West it is conspicuously the other way about. The tendency is from the first to bring the entire living body of law into a general code, ordered for ever and exhaustively complete, containing in advance the decision of every conceivable future problem.[71] All Western law bears the stamp of the future, all Classical the stamp of the moment. IV But this, it may be said, is contradicted by the fact that there actually were Classical law-works compiled by professional jurists for permanent use. Undoubtedly so. But we must remember that we are completely ignorant of Early Classical law (1100-700) and it is pretty certain that the customary law of the country-side and the nascent town was never noted down as that of the Gothic age was set forth in the _Sachsenspiegel_ or that of the Early Arabian in the _Syrian Law-book_.[72] The earliest stratification that we can now detect consists of the collections (from 700 B.C.) ascribed to mythical or semi-mythical personages like Lycurgus, Zaleucus, Charondas, and Dracon,[73] and certain Roman kings.[74] That these existed the form of the saga shows, but of their real authors, the actual process of their codification, and their original contents even the Greeks of the Persian War period were ignorant. A second stratification, corresponding to Justinian’s code and to the “Reception” of Roman Law in Germany, is connected with the names of Solon (600), Pittacus (550), and others. Here the laws have already attained to a structure and are inspired by the city; they are described as “politeiai,” “nomoi,” in contrast to old “thesmai” and “rhetrai.”[75] In reality, therefore, we only know the history of _late_ Classical law. Now, why these sudden codifications? A mere look at these names shows that at bottom they were not processes of putting down the results of pure experience, but _decisions of political power problems_.