HIST 615 Medieval English Law
This course provides an introduction to the legal systems of England from the thirteenth to the early sixteenth centuries. It concentrates upon the development of English common law, including laws of real property and of personal actions; the criminal law; canon law in ecclesiastical courts, with a particular focus upon matrimonial litigation; local customary law (the laws of manors and boroughs and their courts); the development of equity toward the end of the middle ages; and early legal education. The course will combine coverage of current secondary literature on each legal sector with intensive discussion of selected cases (with the case records provided in translation) and selected passages from a few of the more important legal treatises of the period (including Bracton, Lyndwood, Fortescue, and St. Germain). The principal aim of the course is to give students a comprehension of legal principles, institutions, and change in a formative period of the English-heritage legal system. No prior knowledge of law or English history is assumed, and although legal history in this period is rife with terms of art in Latin and French, no non-English language proficiency is required.