Greek Business Law
A Handbook for Businesses and Legal Practitioners
1
1. Introduction: General System of Law
At the time the Greek State came into existence in the early 1830s, the sources
of Greek law were the Byzantine-Roman law, as it had been codified in Justin-
ian law, and the customary law that had been shaped on the basis of institu-
tions and concepts of ancient Greek law (e.g. freedomof will, equity, good faith,
rule of reason). Following the formation of the Greek State, Greek lawhas devel-
oped along the continental civil law tradition that has been primarily shaped by
French and German law, and has been driven by the primacy of legislation. Cus-
toms are of a supplementary use in contemporary Greek law and do not func-
tion
contra legem
. Judicial precedents and legal theory are not considered to be
sources of law and their influence on the interpretation and the application of
law is of secondary importance.
The cornerstone of the Greek legal system is the Greek Constitution which,
in-
ter alia
, sets out the guidelines of statutory law, provides for individual political
and social rights, and assigns the monitoring of the constitutionality of laws to
the judiciary. Unlike the Anglo-American legal tradition, a fundamental distinc-
tion is drawn between Greek public and private law, which largely depends on
whether or not at least one of the parties involved in a legal relationship acts in
a public authority capacity.
As far as Greek private law is concerned, a distinction is made between civil law
and commercial law. Greek civil law is outlined in the Greek Civil Code which
follows, by and large, the German Civil Code. However, the Greek legal tradi-
tion has not been ignored as several general clauses echoing this tradition have
found their way into the Greek Civil Code. By contrast, Greek commercial law,
which is a separate branch of Greek law, has had a stronger French influence
through the Napoleonic Commercial Code of 1807, which was adopted by the
Greek legal system at the time of the creation of the Greek State. However, al-
though certain articles of the original text of the Napoleonic Commercial Code
still remain in force, Greek commercial law has been heavily amended over
the years and the influence of the German legal tradition has become salient.
Be that as it may, the provisions of the Civil Code remain of great relevance to
Greek commercial law insofar as they still regulate, in part or in whole, numer-
ous commercial arrangements.
