Thread by @StephanieLahey, Today is #InternationalLegalHistoryDay and I will be tweeting some medieval legal #manuscripts [...]

Today is #InternationalLegalHistoryDay and I will be tweeting some medieval legal #manuscripts … [thread]
#LegalHistory #HistLaw #MedievalTwitter

Let’s start with some common law: the opening of Magna Carta from a medieval English statute book now @UofT’s @Fisher_Library. #Manuscripts #LegalHistory #HistLaw #CdnMdvManuscripts

An unknown scribe worked around the limitations of their material throughout this 13th century legal collection (Southern France or Italy, s. xiii 1/4). #Manuscripts #Parchment #HistLaw #LegalHistory

The oldest extant copy of the Edictum Rothari, the early medieval law of the #Lombards as decreed by King Rothari (636–652) in 643 (Bobbio, 670–680). #Manuscripts #HistLaw #LegalHistory

A decorated initial opening a Register of Writs.¹ Tucked away later in this codex we find what appears to be a tiny portrait of a lawyer (the coif gives him away). (England, c.1310?). #Manuscripts #HistLaw #LegalHistory
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¹ See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writ

A rather busy leaf from a copy of the Digestum Vetus, the first of the three parts of the civil law Digesta or Pandectæ which forms the main body of Justinian’s Corpus Juris Civilis (Italy, 1300s). #Manuscripts #HistLaw #LegalHistory #CivilLaw

A (much-faded) fragment of a Corpus Iuris Civilis (France, c.1250–1300) rescued from a binding, and now @UVic, @UVicLib, @UVicSC. #Fragmentology #Manuscripts #LegalHistory #HistLaw #CdnMdvManuscripts

In medieval #Ireland, bees were so important that Irish Brehon law developed a code covering their keeping: An Bechbretha (The Bee Judgments) (

: Ireland, 1300s). #bees

#beekeeping #HistLaw #LegalHistory #Manuscripts

In medieval #Ireland, bees were so important that Irish Brehon law developed a code covering their keeping: An Bechbretha (The Bee Judgments) (: Ireland, 1300s). #bees #beekeeping #HistLaw #LegalHistory #Manuscripts

Two very different copies of Schwabenspiegel (‘Mirror of the Swabians’), a collection of national & feudal laws from Southern #Germany, #Bohemia, & parts of #Switzerland. (

: Fribourg, 1410;

: SW Germany, late 1300s / early 1400s). #Manuscripts #HistLaw #LegalHistory

Two very different copies of Schwabenspiegel (‘Mirror of the Swabians’), a collection of national & feudal laws from Southern #Germany, #Bohemia, & parts of #Switzerland. (: Fribourg, 1410; : SW Germany, late 1300s / early 1400s). #Manuscripts #HistLaw #LegalHistory

Cyfraith Hywel / Cyfraith Hywel Dda: the #law code of #Welsh king Hywel ap Cadell (c.880–948, r. 942–948), known as Hywel Dda ‘Hywel the Good’, a reference to the justness of these sensible, compassionate laws. (South #Wales, mid-1300s). #Manuscripts #HistLaw #LegalHistory

A Celtic #law similar to Irish Brehon law, Cyfraith Hywel was passed down orally until codification under Hywel in the 900s. Over 40 manuscripts survive. Its criminal codes were superseded by the 1284 Statute of Rhuddlan; its civil codes by the 1535–42 Law in Wales Acts.