Roman-Dutch law (
Dutch:
Rooms-Hollands recht,
Afrikaans:
Romeins-Hollandse reg) is an un
codified,
scholarship-driven,
judge-made legal system based on
Roman law as applied in the
Netherlands in the 17th and 18th centuries. As such, it is a variety of the European continental
civil law or
ius commune. While Roman-Dutch law was superseded by Napoleonic codal law in the
Netherlands proper as early as the beginning of the 19th century, Roman-Dutch law is still applied by the courts of
South Africa (and its neighbours
Lesotho,
Swaziland,
Namibia,
Botswana and
Zimbabwe),
Guyana,
Indonesia,
East Timor, and
Sri Lanka. It was largely drawn upon by
Scots law. It also had some negligible impact on
New York state, especially in introducing the office of prosecutor (
schout-fiscaal).