GOTHOFRED or Godefroy, the name of a noble French family, of which many members attained distinction as jurists or historians.

The first whose name is associated with the active study of jurisprudence, at the close of the 16th century, was Denis Godefroy (1549-1621). He was born at Paris, and studied law at the universities of Louvain, Cologne, and Heidelberg. Having embraced the Reformed religion, he found Geneva a safer abode than Paris, and became professor of law there. Some years afterwards he obtained α public appointment in one of the districts in the Jura, but was driven from his home by the troops of the duke of Savoy and retired to Basel. Thence he was induced by the offer of a chair of Roman law to go to Strasburg, but soon changed his appointment for one at Λltorf, which then pos∙ sessed a university celebrated for its late professor of law, Donneau. In 1600 the elector palatine appointed him professor of Roman law in Heidelberg, where he spent the greater portion of the remainder of his life, and was placed at the head of the faculty of law. The most flattering offers from several universities failed to induce him to leave his adopted country, but the invasion of the Palatinate by Tilly’s troops forced him to take refuge again at Strasburg, where he died in 1621. His most important work is his edition of the Corpus Juris. The text given by him was very generally adopted and used in quotation. More than twenty editions of the work were published in various towns of France, Germany, and Holland. Godefroy’s other writings are very numerous; but they are for the most part either editions of classical authors or compilations which display great industry and learning, but are of little use to the modern student....