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This edited collection presents an interesting and original series of essays on the roles of principle and pragmatism in Roman private law.
The book traverses key areas of Roman law to examine the explanatory power of - and delineate interactions between - abstract, doctrinal principle, and pragmatic, real-world problem-solving. Essays canvassing sources of law, property, succession, contracts and delicts sketch the varied roles of theoretical narratives - whether internal to Roman doctrine or derived from external influence - and of practical, policy-based solutions in the jurists' thought.
Principled reasoning in Roman juristic argument ranges from safeguarding commerce, to the priority of acts or intentions in property transactions, to notions of
pietas, to Platonic conceptions of the market. Pragmatism is discernible in myriad ways, from divergence between form and substance, to extension of legal rules for economic, social or political utility, to emphasis on what parties did rather than what they said.
The distinctive contribution of the book is its survey of different manifestations of principle and pragmatism across Roman private law. The essays - by eminent as well as emerging academics - will stimulate debate about the roles principle and pragmatism play in juristic argument, and will be of interest to both scholars and students of Roman law.
List of contents
Principle and Pragmatism Benjamin Spagnolo and Joe Sampson2.
Modes of Roman Legal Reasoning in Context: A Brief Survey Paul J du Plessis3.
The Case of the Careless Purchaser, or 'Bonitary Ownership' and Ownership Mike Macnair4.
Explaining D. 41.1.36 Joe Sampson5.
The Place of Rhetoric in Late Republican Law: Some Thoughts on Pietas
and the Querela Inofficiosi Testamenti
Graeme Cunningham6.
Writing, Speaking and the Roman Stipulatio
David Ibbetson7.
Principle and Practice in the Pacta Adiecta
Boudewijn Sirks8.
Plato, Principle and Pragmatism: Market Regulation in D. 50.11.2 Constantin Willems9.
Limits of Juristic Argument in the Exercitorian Edict Peter Candy10. Insulam Exurere:
Reading Collatio 12.7.1-3 Closely Wolfgang Ernst11. Quasi
and (Cor)ruptio
Benjamin Spagnolo
About the author
Benjamin Spagnolo is a Fellow, Lecturer and Director of Studies in Law at Trinity College Cambridge, UK.Joe Sampson is Assistant Professor of Legal History, University of Cambridge, UK.
Summary
This edited collection presents an interesting and original series of essays on the roles of principle and pragmatism in Roman private law.
The book traverses key areas of Roman law to examine the explanatory power of - and delineate interactions between - abstract, doctrinal principle, and pragmatic, real-world problem-solving. Essays canvassing sources of law, property, succession, contracts and delicts sketch the varied roles of theoretical narratives - whether internal to Roman doctrine or derived from external influence - and of practical, policy-based solutions in the jurists’ thought.
Principled reasoning in Roman juristic argument ranges from safeguarding commerce, to the priority of acts or intentions in property transactions, to notions of pietas, to Platonic conceptions of the market. Pragmatism is discernible in myriad ways, from divergence between form and substance, to extension of legal rules for economic, social or political utility, to emphasis on what parties did rather than what they said.
The distinctive contribution of the book is its survey of different manifestations of principle and pragmatism across Roman private law. The essays - by eminent as well as emerging academics - will stimulate debate about the roles principle and pragmatism play in juristic argument, and will be of interest to both scholars and students of Roman law.
Foreword
The essays in this ground-breaking collection examine the interplay between principle and pragmatism in juristic arguments across a range of topics in Roman private law.
