Friday, May 7, 2021

Common Law, Civil Law, and Colonial Law: Papers from the 24th BLHC

Just published by Cambridge University Press: Common Law, Civil Law, and Colonial Law: Essays in Comparative Legal History from the Twelfth to the Twentieth Centuries, ed. William Eves, University of St Andrews, John Hudson, University of St Andrews, Ingrid Ivarsen, University of Cambridge, and Sarah B. White, University of St Andrews.

Common Law, Civil Law, and Colonial Law
builds upon the legal historian F.W. Maitland's famous observation that history involves comparison, and that those who ignore every system but their own 'hardly came in sight of the idea of legal history'. The extensive introduction addresses the intellectual challenges posed by comparative approaches to legal history. This is followed by twelve essays derived from papers delivered at the 24th British Legal History Conference. These essays explore patterns in legal norms, processes, and practice across an exceptionally broad chronological and geographical range. Carefully selected to provide a network of inter-connections, they contribute to our better understanding of legal history by combining depth of analysis with historical contextualization. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
TOC after the jump.

Introduction: Situating, researching and writing comparative legal history
John Hudson and William Eves

1 'In aliquibus locis est consuetudo': French lawyers and the Lombard customs of Fiefs in the mid-thirteenth century
Attilio Stella

2. What does Regiam maiestatem actually say (and what does it mean)?
Alice Taylor

3. James VI and I, rex et iudex: One king as judge in two kingdoms
Ian Williams

4. George Harris and the comparative legal background of the first English translation of Justinian's Institutes Lukasz 

Jan Korporowicz

5. The nature of custom: Legal science and comparative legal history in Blackstone's commentaries
Andrew J. Cecchinato

6. Through a glass darkly: English common law seen through the lens of the Göttingische gelehrte Anzeigen (Eighteenth century)
Carsten Fischer

7. Looking afresh at the French roots of continuous easements in English law
Ciara Kennefick

8. Case law in Germany: The significance of Seuffert's Archiv
Clara Günzl

9. Leone Levi (1821–1888) and the History of comparative commercial law
Annamaria Monti

10. Radical title of the crown and aboriginal Title: North America 1763, New South Wales 1788 and New Zealand 1840
 David V. Williams

11. The High Court of Australia at mid-century: Concealed frustrations, private advocacy and the break with English Law
Tanya Josev

12. English societal laws as the origins of the comprehensive slave laws of the British West Indies
Justine Collins.