Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables and Figures
- Foreword
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The King and the Fox: Reaction to the Role of Kingship in Tales of Reynard the Fox
- 2 Flanders: A Pioneer of State-orientated Feudalism? Feudalism as an Instrument of Comital Power in Flanders during the High Middle Ages (1000 -1300)
- 3 'The People of Sweden shall have Peace': Peace Legislation and Royal Power in Later Medieval Sweden
- 4 The 'Assize of Count Geoffrey' (1185): Law and Politics in Angevin Brittany
- 5 Charter Writing and the Exercise of Lordship in Thirteenth-Century Celtic Scotland
- 6 Liberty and Fraternity: Creating and Defending the Liberty of St Albans
- 7 Counterfeiters, Forgers and Felons in English Courts, 1200-1400
- 8 Law, Morals and Money: Royal Regulation of the Substance of Subjects' Sales and Loans in England, 1272-1399
- 9 The Hidden Presence: Parliament and the Private Petition in the Fourteenth Century
- 10 Conscience, Justice and Authority in the Late-Medieval English Court of Chancery
- 11 Appealing to the Past: Perceptions of Law in Late-Medieval England
- 12 Victorian Perceptions of Medieval Jurisprudence
- 13 Historians' Expectations of the Medieval Legal Records
- Index
12 - Victorian Perceptions of Medieval Jurisprudence
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 March 2023
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables and Figures
- Foreword
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The King and the Fox: Reaction to the Role of Kingship in Tales of Reynard the Fox
- 2 Flanders: A Pioneer of State-orientated Feudalism? Feudalism as an Instrument of Comital Power in Flanders during the High Middle Ages (1000 -1300)
- 3 'The People of Sweden shall have Peace': Peace Legislation and Royal Power in Later Medieval Sweden
- 4 The 'Assize of Count Geoffrey' (1185): Law and Politics in Angevin Brittany
- 5 Charter Writing and the Exercise of Lordship in Thirteenth-Century Celtic Scotland
- 6 Liberty and Fraternity: Creating and Defending the Liberty of St Albans
- 7 Counterfeiters, Forgers and Felons in English Courts, 1200-1400
- 8 Law, Morals and Money: Royal Regulation of the Substance of Subjects' Sales and Loans in England, 1272-1399
- 9 The Hidden Presence: Parliament and the Private Petition in the Fourteenth Century
- 10 Conscience, Justice and Authority in the Late-Medieval English Court of Chancery
- 11 Appealing to the Past: Perceptions of Law in Late-Medieval England
- 12 Victorian Perceptions of Medieval Jurisprudence
- 13 Historians' Expectations of the Medieval Legal Records
- Index
Summary
The late Victorian period saw a significant rise in interest in historical and legal studies. Because modern law originated in medieval jurisprudence, and because it was an obscure field in clear need of study, there evolved a particular fascination with the medieval foundations of English law. It was appreciated and understood as an area of considerable intellectual and practical challenge. The evidence confirming and establishing the Victorian appetite for medieval manuscripts of a legal or quasi-legal character is abundant. It is well illustrated by the Domesday Celebration of 1886, an event which served to articulate Victorian attitudes to medieval public documents and instruments.
The celebration of the eight hundredth anniversary of the Domesday Book was the brainchild of the Royal Historical Society, and because of the quasilegal nature of the document, a number of eminent lawyers were involved from the very beginning. This prominent legal participation was so even though the learned institutions affiliated to the celebration covered every aspect of historical study, including the archaeological, architectural, literary, artistic and antiquarian. The celebration took the form of an exhibition of medieval documents of national interest and importance, including the two original volumes of the Domesday Book itself, with the chest, binding boards and tallies, and a series of lectures to be delivered in Lincoln's Inn Hall. The Committee also intended to publish a bibliography of all published works relating to the Domesday Book. It was hoped that these activities would encourage further research into the Domesday Book and related matters.
This interest in historical research found expression in a legal context in the founding of learned societies such as the Pipe Roll Society in 1884, and the Selden Society, founded in 1887 as a direct result of the Domesday Celebration of the previous year, and whose principal aims were the identification, cataloguing, translation, editing and publishing of medieval manuscript legal materials. The Law Quarterly Review began in 1885 and the penultimate year of Victoria's reign saw the beginning of the reprint of the English Reports.
There are two aspects to this intense activity in the field of early legal materials, the first of which is well documented. That is the resulting great works of legal history,4 both general and specific, and their effect on legal history as a subject of study in its own right.
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- Expectations of the Law in the Middle Ages , pp. 181 - 190Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2001