A
legal maxim is an established principle or proposition. The
Latin term, apparently a variant on
maxima, is not to be found in
Roman law with any meaning exactly analogous to that of a legal maxim in the Medieval or modern sense of the word, but the treatises of many of the Roman jurists on
Regular definitiones, and
Sententiae juris are, in some measure, collections of maxims. Most of the Latin maxims developed in the
Medieval era in European countries that used Latin as their language for law and courts.