A scrutiny of the sources on Roman law shows that the Roman jurist were ready to make bold exceptions to
commonly accepted rules in order to foster the constitution of dowries and the recuperation after divorce. This
guideline called favor dotis by Ulpian is the main subject of Stagls dissertation. His first aim is to prove that the
favor dotis is true classical Roman law and not the product of a corruption of classical texts by Justinian. He
archieves this aim by showing the favor dotis authenticity with the help juridical sources. According to Stagl, the
favor dotis stems from Augustus and not Justinian. The second part of Stagls dissertation is dedicated to the
analysis of the application of favor dotis by the Roman lawyers. One of the most striking examples of this maxim
is that the lawyers were ready to accept true third party contracts which they rejected decidedly under ordinary
circumstances. The last chapter is consecrated to the question how the roman lawyers dealt with such anomalies as
the favor dotis regarding the system of Roman law. Stagl points out that the consequences of this maxim cannot be
handled with the ordinary terms and ideas of Roman law. As he points out, there is no term to describe the double
ownership of the dowry by husband and wife. The lawyers themeselves were conscious of this fact and held the
opinion that the favor dotis was rather an institution of public law and not private law. This intrusion of public law
into the sphere of private law is eventually explained by Stagl with the help of ius singulare, a category which is
completely neglected by the modern scholars. Paulus says that ius singulare is a kind of law that is not in harmony
with reason and consequently not product of the lawyers but the emperors which introduced it for reasons of public
benefit. According to the Roman jurists, this kind of law must not be used as a model for the ordinary law (ius
commune). It is the aim of ius singulare to enclose such phenomena as the favor dotis in a kind of watertight
compartment were it can do no harm to the ordinary law. By doing so the jurists wanted to prevent the irrational
and political law of the emperors to adulterate their own creation of rational private law.