IMC 2019: Sessions
Session 250: Law as Social Practice
Monday 1 July 2019, 14.15-15.45
Organiser: | Silke Schwandt, Fakultät für Geschichtswissenschaft, Philosophie und Theologie, Universität Bielefeld |
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Moderator/Chair: | Mia Münster-Swendsen, Institut for Kommunikation og Humanistisk Videnskab, Roskilde Universitet |
Paper 250-a | Roman, Canon, Merchants' Law: Merchants' Representation in Late Medieval Antwerp (Language: English) Index terms: Economics - Trade, Law, Social History |
Paper 250-b | Law, Its Literary Imagination, and Manuscript Materiality in Old Norse Literature (Language: English) Index terms: Language and Literature - Scandinavian, Law |
Abstract | The goal of this session is to provide a praxeological perspective on law and to explore how law was shaped by the people who used it. The two papers show two situations that differ with regard to time and place: First, Scandinavia in the High Middle Ages, and second, Antwerp in the late Middle Ages. In each case, law was not created by studying ancient texts alone, but rather in concrete situations as a solution to daily problems. However, influential legal traditions like Roman and Canon law played an important role as a point of reference or delineation, as sources of ideas or legitimization. In Scandinavia, knowledge on law and legal dealings from oral tradition and foreign texts was adapted to current discourse in action-centred saga narrative. In late medieval Antwerp, merchants took the concept of representation, rooted in Roman and Canon law, and transformed it according to their needs. |