The <i>Tabula Contrebiensis</i>: Roman Law in Spain in the Early First Century B.C.

Abstract

In December 1979, a Latin inscription on bronze came into the hands of Professor Guillermo Fatás of the department of Ancient History in the University of Zaragoza. It had been found by an unauthorized excavator on the site of the excavations on the hill known as Cabezo de las Minas, just outside the village of Botorrita, some 20 kilometres south of Zaragoza, on the banks of the river Huerva. The tablet, 438 mm. from side to side and 208 mm. from top to bottom, had clearly been attached to a wall or some other substantial object by means of six holes, three along the upper and three along the lower edge, and has been preserved in its entirety. However, the bronze is badly warped, and although the back of the tablet is quite smooth, the inscribed face has suffered considerable damage, apparently from fire and corrosion. After preliminary cleaning, Fatás published, with exemplary speed, a notice of the find in the Boletin de la Real Academia de la Historia CLXXVI (1979), 421–38, and then, after further treatment by the archaeological laboratory in the Museo Arqueologico de Barcelona, a monograph on the inscription in 1980.