Hudson, John and Ana Rodríguez, eds. Diverging Paths? The Shapes of Power and Institutions in Medieval Christendom and Islam. Brill. 2014. (original) (raw)
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Religion and Law in Medieval Christian and Muslim Societies 1
In the middle ages, from Baghdad to Barcelona, significant communities of religious minorities resided in the midst of polities ruled by christians and muslims: Jews and christians throughout the Muslim world (but particularly from Iraq westward), lived as dhimmis, protected but subordinate minorities; while Jews (and to a lesser extent Muslims) were found in numerous places in Byzantine and Latin Europe. Legists (Jewish, Christian and Muslim) forged laws meant to regulate interreligious interactions, while judges and scholars interpreted these laws. Religion and Law in medieval Christian and muslim societies presents a series of studies on these phenomena. our goal is to study the history of the legal status of religious minorities in medieval societies in all their variety and complexity. most of the publications in this series are the products of research of the european Research council project Relmin: The legal status of Religious Minorities in the Euro-Mediterranean World (5th-15th centuries) (www.relmin.eu). au moyen âge, de Bagdad à Barcelone, des communautés importantes de minorités religieuses vécurent dans des etats dirigés par des princes chrétiens ou musulmans : dans le monde musulman (surtout de l'Iraq vers l'ouest), juifs et chrétiens résidèrent comme dhimmis, minorités protégées et subordonnées ; tandis que de nombreuses communautés juives (et parfois musulmanes) habitèrent dans des pays chrétiens. Des légistes (juifs, chrétiens et musulmans) édictèrent des lois pour réguler les relations interconfessionnelles, tandis que des juges et des hommes de lois s'efforcèrent à les interpréter. La collection Religion and Law in medieval Christian and muslim societies présente une série d'études sur ces phénomènes. Une partie importante des publications de cette collection est issue des travaux effectués au sein du programme ERC RELMIN : Le Statut Légal des Minorités Religieuses dans l'Espace Euro-méditerranéen (Ve-XVe siècles) (www.relmin. eu).
Byzantine Legal Culture and the Roman Legal Tradition, 867-1056 (Introduction)
This social history of Byzantine law offers an introduction to one of the world's richest yet hitherto understudied legal traditions. In the first study of its kind, Chitwood explores and reinterprets the seminal legal-historical events of the Byzantine Empire under the Macedonian dynasty, including the re-appropriation and refashioning of the Justinianic legal corpus and the founding of a law school in Constantinople. During this last phase of Byzantine secular law, momentous changes in law and legal culture were underway: the patronage of the elite was reflected in the legal system, theological terms from Orthodox Christianity entered the vocabulary of Byzantine jurisprudence, and private legal collections of uncertain origins began to circulate in manuscripts alongside official redactions of Justinianic law. By using the heuristic device of exploring legal culture, this book examines the interplay in law between the Roman political heritage, Orthodox Christianity and Hellenic culture.
The Post-Byzantine Legal Tradition: In Theory and in Practice
2004
This thesis outlines the main characteristics and components of the Byzantine legal tradition, as it evolved in time, and how this legal tradition changed once there was no longer a Byzantine Empire, particularly in terms of family law. This thesis will analyze in detail the family law section of one 17 th century post-Byzantine law code, the Nomokritirion, and compare this law code to other legal sources from the period, in order to see how the content of the Nomokritirion differed from post-Byzantine law in practice. The main argument of the thesis is that post-Byzantine law codes in the Ottoman Empire, such as the Nomokritirion, were simplified modifications of earlier Byzantine law codes. Post-Byzantine law codes only addressed matters in which the church had legal jurisdiction and they do not entirely reflect the, then, contemporary legal realities, as they both contained archaisms and generally did not address issues related to the Islamization of society.
Empires of Faith is the first volume of a new 'oxford History of Medieval Europe' series. Unlike most recent surveys of the post-Roman period it is the work of a scholar who is primarily a Byzantinist, and one who has contributed notably to our understanding of the economy of the Age of Justinian — an aspect of the period which is richly emphasized in the current book. The importance of the economy, and of the related structures of society, in both the eastern and western Mediterranean, is finely underlined. It would be difficult to find a clearer or more persuasive account of the aristocracy, its wealth and malign influence (especially on Byzantine policy), on the one hand, or of the peasantry and its travails on the other. As a guide to such issues, Sarris is expert (though it is surprising to find here the idea that the precaria may originally have been ecclesiastical (p. 330): they are well established in Roman law). Given Sarris's distinction as a Byzantinist, it is not surprising that Empires of Faith is especially strong on the history of the eastern Mediterranean and beyond. In particular, there is a keen sense of the contemporary importance of Persia and of the nomadic peoples of the Steppes, as well as the Arabs. on these topics Sarris not only draws on his own work, but also on the work of James Howard-Johnston, which has been appearing since the 1970s, but most significantly in the last decade. The title of the book also points to one of its other great strengths: it places firm emphasis on the Church, particularly on the problems caused by doctrinal division. It does an excellent job in explaining the significance of the Church councils, not just their doctrine, but also their social and political importance. Nor are religions other than Christianity neglected: the significance of both Zoroastrianism and Islam is well established. From all these various perspectives, Empires of Faith is a distinctive and welcome addition to recent surveys of Late Antiquity. It is distinctive not just for what it emphasizes, but also for what it downplays. Some of the big debates that have consumed Western early medievalists are passed over with little comment: one would scarcely guess that a great deal of ink has been spilt over the nature of the barbarian settlement, or indeed over the formation of the Germanic peoples (their 'ethnogenesis'). Sarris takes a clear and reasonable stance over both issues, without signalling how contentious they have
A Cultural History of Law in the Middle Ages, ed. E. Conte and L. Mayali, London-New York- Oxford-New Delhi-Sydney, 2019
Medieval coronation and medieval constitution. - The Emperor and the Roman law. - Balancing law and power. - The use of images to communicate constitutional contents: three Roman examples (1125; 1248; 1346). - Kingdom: The example of Sicily. - Frederick II. - Customs and the “ascending theme” of government in the late Middle Ages. -
Comparing Medieval Institutions: A Few Introductory Remarks
Diverging Paths? The Shape of Power and Institutions in Mediaeval Islam and Christendom, John Hudson and Ana Rodriguez, eds. (Leiden: Brill Publishers, 2014), pp. 3–15, 2014
Can we engage in large-scale comparisons between societies and even groups of historical societies and ask why they changed in one and not the other without assuming the superiority of one particular historical path, without taking this path for granted even while rejecting any value judgements, and without reducing alternative trajectories to no more than the roads not taken? Can we do so without essentializing whole civilizations, presenting them as coherent wholes and ignoring their relationships, entanglements, and processes of cultural borrowing? And, assuming we have reasonable solutions for these issues -how should we proceed when comparing pre-modern, and in particular medieval societies, without two of the tools that serve to check uncontrolled and impressionistic comparisons and ideological bias -reliable quantification and accepted theoretical models for conceptualizing whole societies as social formations, models which could offer sets of accepted priorities and focus attention on crucial dimensions and their articulation?