Historical evolution of noncontractual and criminal civil liability in our Law

Abstract

The notion and elements of criminal and civil liability is a matter full of discussions regarding its istorical origin, its rational foundation and theoretical structure. The extensive existing doctrinal iterature reveals the validity that it still maintains, as well as the problematization that exists in this regard. This paper does not intend to exhaust, much less dogmatize, the various points of view that have been developed. The idea is to analyze the fundamental aspects of extracontractual criminal and civil liability from the most remote antecedents to the most current ones, which constitute the basis of our current legislation. In this sense, the evolutionary analysis will be correlated with the evolution of Spanish Law itself, since in the 18th and 19th centuries it was Castilian and then Indian law that was applied in these lands. That law is a conglomerate of Roman, Germanic and canonical principles and concepts, not always interconnected and not all collected from direct sources. Responsibility, like the rest of the legal institutions, is a historical product and for this reason it is essential to know its past at the time of its full understanding in the present.