Tables, on the nearest agnate.

1 Agnates, as we have observed in the first book, are those cognates
who trace their relationship through males, or, in other words, who are
cognate through their respective fathers. Thus, brothers by the same
father are agnates, whether by the same mother or not, and are called
'consanguinei'; an uncle is agnate to his brother's son, and vice
versa; and the children of brothers by the same father, who are called
'consobrini, are one another's agnates, so that it is easy to arrive at
various degrees of agnation. Children who are born after their father's
decease acquire the rights of kinship exactly as if they had been born
before that event. But the law does not give the inheritance to all the
agnates, but only to those who were nearest in degree at the moment when
it was first certain that the deceased died intestate.

2 The relation of agnation can also be established by adoption, for
instance, between a man's own sons and those whom he has adopted, all
of whom are properly called consanguinei in relation to one another.
So, too, if your brother, or your paternal uncle, or even a more remote
agnate, adopts any one, that person undoubtedly becomes one of your
agnates.

3 Male agnates have reciprocal rights of succession, however remote the
degree of relationship: but the rule as regards females, on the other
hand, was that they could not succeed as agnates to any one more
remotely related to them than a brother, while they themselves could
be succeeded by their male agnates, however distant the connexion: thus
you, if a male, could take the inheritance of a daughter either of your
brother or of your paternal uncle, or of your paternal aunt, but she
could not take yours; the reason of this distinction being the seeming
expediency of successions devolving as much as possible on males. But as
it was most unjust that such females should be as completely excluded
as if they were strangers, the praetor admits them to the possession of
goods promised in that part of the edict in which mere natural kinship
is recognised as a title to succession, under which they take provided
there is no agnate, or other cognate of a nearer degree of relationship.
Now these distinctions were in no way due to the statute of the Twelve
Tables, which, with the simplicity proper to all legislation, conferred
reciprocal rights of succession on all agnates alike, whether males
or females, and excluded no degree by