Category: News and Events

Geofrey MacCormack, Professor Emeritus of Jurisprudence in the University of Aberdeen, is well known to legal historians for his humanity, gentle wit, and fine scholarship. For much of his career he was a noted scholar of Roman law, with a particular interest in the insights anthropology could provide in developing our understanding of early Roman law. Thirty or so years ago, he developed an interest in traditional Chinese Law, and he has written extensively on it since, including two books: Traditional Chinese Penal Law (1990) and The Spirit of Traditional Chinese Law (1996). One lawyer acquaintance of this blog described Professor MacCormack's course on the subject as the best course he took in his law degree in Aberdeen. MacCormack's contribution to the School of Law of Aberdeen is being recognised on 28 January 2011 by the Alexander Green Law Agency Lecture, given by Professor Michael Palmer of SOAS, entitled "A Perspective on Chinese Law In Honour of the Work of Geoffrey MacCormack".

  UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN
SCHOOL OF LAW
ALEXANDER GREEN LAW AGENCY LECTURE IN HONOUR OF PROFESSOR GEOFFREY MacCORMACK 

Friday 28 January 2011 @ 6.30 pm  in the Linklater Rooms, King’s College 
Professor Michael Palmer
School of Oriental and African Studies
University of London

A PERSPECTIVE ON CHINESE LAW
In honour of the work of Geoffrey MacCormack

Proceedings will be opened by Margaret Ross,
Head of School

Lecture Chair: Nicol Stephen MSP

          The audience is invited to a drinks reception after the lecture

On 12 November, the Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis, arguably the best general journal on legal history, held a symposium to mark the 90th birthday of Professor Emeritus Robert Feenstra. It was hosted by the Faculty of Law at Leiden and held at the Academiegebouw on the Rapenburg.

After an introduction by Professor Zwalve, papers were delivered reflecting facets of Professor Feenstra's scholarship. Professor Emeritus Anne Lefebvre-Teillard (Paris II) talked on delict and Jacques Revigny; Professor Emeritus Klaus Luig (Cologne) on Heineccius as a German in Franeker; Professor Boudewijn Sirks (Oxford) on Bynkershoek; and Professor Laurent Waelkens (Leuven) on the first titles of the Code of Justinian.

Afterwards Professor Feenstra himself delivered a notable address, switching between French, German, English and Dutch, in which he touched on aspects of his career.

There was an agreeable lunch (with kroketten – a Dutch speciality (along with bitterballen) to which your blogger is partial) in the Faculty Club, and later a memorable reception in the Bestuursgebouw (the beautiful former University Library).  It was all excellently organised by Professor Laurens Winkel (Rotterdam) and Dr Marguerite Duynstee (Leiden). Legal historians attended from all over Europe, although your blogger and Professor Sirks were the only individuals from British universities, while there was another British presence in the form of Dr Douglas Osler based in Frankfurt-am-Main.

Professor Feenstra had shortly before been made a Commandeur in de Orde van de Nederlandse Leeuw in which order he was already a Ridder.

See further http://www.law.leidenuniv.nl/nieuws/robert-feenstra-commandeur-nederlandse-leeuw.html

   

The inaugural annual lecture of the Exeter Centre for Legal History Research "Revolting Law – Revolting Law Teachers? The Struggle to Render Law a Subject Fit for University Education" will be given by Professor David Sugarman of Lancaster University on Wednesday 23 June at 6pm in the Moot Room, Amory Building, University of Exeter. 

The Centre was founded in 2009, and last year hosted the British Legal History Society's Conference. See http://huss.exeter.ac.uk/law/research/clhr/

The Inaugural Conference of the above will be held on 5-6 July 2010 in Valencia. For details, see http://esclh.blogspot.com/

It is worth noting the forthcoming conference in Oxford debating the need to move away from  overly national focus on legal history.

 

WRITING LEGAL HISTORY :  BREAKING OUT OF NATIONAL FRAMEWORKS (FRANCE & UNITED KINGDOM)

Monday 24 May 2010, Maison Française d’Oxford

Convenor:  Frédéric AUDREN, CNRS-MFO

Introduction by Luc BOROT (MFO), Jacques KRYNEN (Université Toulouse 1 Capitole) and Frédéric AUDREN (CNRS-MFO)

10:00 – 13.00
John CAIRNS (University of Edinburgh), National, Transnational, and European Legal Histories: Paradigms and Problems

Jean-Louis HALPÉRIN (ENS Ulm, Paris), Is it time for the de-construction of myths in French legal history ?

Michael LOBBAN (Mary Queen, University of London), The Varieties of Legal History

Alain WIJFFELS (CNRS – Centre Georges Chevrier), Le ius commune européen: les limites d'une base commune pour l'historiographie du droit anglais et français

Paul BRAND (All Souls, University of Oxford), The English medieval Common Law and the learned law tradition

14:00 – 17.00

Soazick KERNEIS (Université Paris Ouest), Alternative Dispute Resolution. Penal Law, History and Anthropology

Andrew LEWIS (University College London), The Tithe and La Dîme : similarities and différence

Chantal STEBBINGS (University of Exeter), The ‘Unreported’ Tax Case: its Place in the Development of Law in Nineteenth Century England

David DEROUSSIN (Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3), Une nouvelle nationalisation du droit : la culture juridique française vue par la doctrine (1ère moitié du XXè s.)

Conclusion : Louis ASSIER-ANDRIEU (CNRS-ISP Cachan)

With the support of Institute of European and Comparative Law, Service Culturel de l’Ambassade de France à Londres, Centre de Théorie et Analyse de Droit (CNRS-UMR 7074), Centre Lyonnais d’Histoire du Droit et de la Pensée Politique, and Centre Toulousain d’Histoire du Droit et des Idées Politiques

 – All welcome – 
 
For any further detail, please contact Frédéric AUDREN: frederic.audren@iecl.ox.ac.uk

Maison Française d’Oxford, 2- 10 Norham Road, Oxford OX2 6SE
Tel: 01865 274 220 ; maison@herald.ox.ac.uk

Next annual forum will take place in Frankfurt in March 2010. More details here:

http://www.aylh.org/association/history/

EDINBURGH ROMAN LAW GROUP

The next meeting of the Group will be held on Friday 29 January 2010 at
5.30 p.m. when

Dr. Eric Descheemaeker

School of Law, University of Bristol

will speak on

“'Dividing Wrongs: the Civilian Experience'”

L05, Old College
University of Edinburgh

All welcome

 

Those interested in this topic may wish to know about Dr. Descheemaeker's recent book on the topic:

 

 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Division-Wrongs-Historical-Comparative-Study/dp/0199562792/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264408739&sr=8-1

 

 

The Legal History Consortium and the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, both of the University of Pennsylvania, together with the American Society for Legal History, the University of Michigan Law School and the University of Minnesota Law School, will sponsor a conference focusing on the legal history and historiography of North America to 1820.  The conference will take place at the McNeil Center, and will feature work by new scholars, as well as commentary and new work by senior legal historians. Professor Bruce H. Mann of Harvard Law School will deliver the keynote address; other confirmed participants include Sarah Barringer Gordon of the University of Pennsylvania, William Novak and Martha Jones of the University of Michigan, Barbara Welke of the University of Minnesota Law School, and Richard Ross of the University of Illinois.  Paper proposals in any field of law related to the geographic and chronological focus of the conference should be submitted by February 15, 2010.  Proposals must include a 300-word abstract and a cv.  For those selected to present, final papers of no more than 9,000 words must be submitted by May 1, 2010.  All papers will be pre-circulated to conference participants. Support for presenters' travel and lodging expenses will be available.

Please send proposals via email to: mceas@ccat.sas.upenn.edu, with "Legal History Conference" in the subject line.

Karen Grudzien Baston, a Ph.D student in the Centre for Legal History, University of Edinburgh, won first prize in the Edinburgh Ph.D. poster competition for her poster on her research on the library of Charles Erskine of Tinwald. See

http://www.law.ed.ac.uk/research/students/118.aspx

In 1909 Eveline MacLaren and Josephine Gordon Stuart became Scotland's first female law graduates: both were awarded an LLB from the Faculty of Law at Edinburgh. This academic year, to mark the centenary, the Edinburgh Law School is celebrating the achievements of its distinguished women graduates. This started on 2 June with an excellent lecture by Professor Hector L. MacQueen on the first two graduates in their historic context. For further details, see http://womeninlaw.law.ed.ac.uk/