Ancient Law: Its Connection with the Early History of Society, and its Relation to Modern Ideas

Birmingham, AL: Gryphon Editions/The Legal Classics Library , 1982 Gryphon Editions/The Legal Classics Library, Birmingham, AL. 1982. Hardcover. Special Edition for The Legal Classics Library/facsimile copy of the 1861 original. Book is tight, square, and unmarked. Book Condition: As New. No DJ. Red leather boards and spine with bright gilt lettering on the spine and bright gilt decorations on the spine and both boards; marbled endpapers; four bands on spine; gilt textlock edges; sewn in page marker ribbon; banded head and tail. 415 pp 8vo. This treatise on the study of early municipal institutions, first published in 1861, has been likened, in its influence and importance, to Darwin's Origin of Species. With this slim volume, Maine, one of the most brilliant classical scholars of his day, created a natural history of law by demonstrating that our notion of legality is as much the product of historical development as biological organisms are the outcome of evolution. Through an intense focus on the contribution of Roman code to modern jurisprudence, Maine explores early ideas about property, wills, contracts, and crime. This is a pioneering work of legal history, one that has had an immeasurable effect not only on our understanding of ancient concepts of justice and punishment but on the view of civilization itself as an arrangement of public rules and statutes. A clean very presentable copy.