or Saliens, Law, (Lex Salica), an ancient and fundamental law of the kingdom of France, usually supposed to have been made by Pharamond, or at least by Clovis; in virtue whereof males only are to inherit.

Some, as Poitellus, would have it to have been called Salic, q. d. Gallic, because peculiar to the Gauls. Fer Montanus infers, it was because Pharamond was at first called Salius. Others will have it to be so named, as having been made for the falc lands. These were noble fields which their first kings used to bestow on the fal- lans, that is, the great lords of their falle or court, without any other tenure than military service; and for this reason, such fields were not to descend to women, as being by nature unfit for such a tenure. Some, again, derive the origin of this word from the Salians, a tribe of Franks that settled in Gaul in the reign of Julian, who is said to have given them lands on condition of their personal service in war. He even passed the conditions into a law, which the new conquerors ac- quiesced in, and called it salic, from the name of their former countrymen.