Volume 137, Issue 1

The free population of the early medieval German kingdom largely has disappeared from the historiographical tradition due to the influence of the New Constitutional History and its contemporary intellectual successors. One important result of this writing out of history of the free has been a thorough distortion of the roles and purposes of the royal government, and the relationship between the ruler and his free subjects. This essay seeks to redress this imbalance by identifying the king’s obligations to his free subjects, particularly in the areas of law and justice. The focus of the study is on the role played by counts, as royal officials, in providing a forum for the free to adjudicate their legal disputes and to obtain justice for injuries that they had sustained. A thorough investigation of the Ottonian period reveals that comital courts continued to function throughout the tenth and early eleventh century as venues for royal justice in a manner thoroughly consistent with the institutions of Carolingian East Francia.

Conflicts of interests in maritime law in the 13th century : A comparison . Almost simultaneously, at the end of the 13 th century, maritime laws were written down all around Europe. This coincidence invites to a synchronic comparative study. The paper compares three different matters on varying abstraction levels: jettison, mariner’s labour law, and situations of common decision building before and during the voyage. The outcome, as in any comparison, are differences and similarities – differences in the degree of the lord’s (king’s, duke’s) influence, but also, e.g., due to the presence of a ship notary on Mediterranean ships. More importantly, the maritime laws less influenced from above abound with casuistic details, apparently products of negotiation processes between the involved parties, including seamen who appear as an influential and self-confident group. Despite the climatic differences between Norway and the Mediterranean, the challenges posed by the characteristics of seafaring in general resemble one another a lot. The solutions however differ greatly and bristle with creative variety. The maritime law of the 13 th century looks a lot like a giant experimental lab. Tendencies towards a stronger unification and implementation of certain solutions only belong to the following century.

Judicial Decision-Making from the Perspective of Institutional History. A Diachronic Comparison of Court Procedures and Amicable Settlements in the Holy Roman Empire, Prussia, and the Federal Republic of Germany . Amicable settlements were a core practice in judicial courts of the early modern period. While recent studies tend to focus on strategies of litigants, this article shifts the attention to the process of decision-making from an institutional perspective. To that end, the author examines working procedures and tools of political influencing at court using examples of civil cases at judicial courts in the Holy Roman Empire (particularly the Imperial Aulic Council), in Prussia under the reign of Frederick the Great, and in the Federal Republic of Germany. As will be shown, throughout times institutional dispositions influence the outcome of judgements and amicable settlements at least to the same degree than strategies of litigants do.

Religion and Law in Savigny . The subject is old and new at the same time. It’s well known that the relation of law and religion in Savigny seems to be a central point in his system of law. But the relation itself and the more concrete consequences have not yet been investigated in the rather scattered sources. The study undertakes some first steps in this direction. Inhalt: Einleitung, I. Christlich nach 1789, II. Religion und Recht bei Savigny: Quellenlage, III. Christliches im Recht bei Savigny, IV. Ergebnis

German-Language Jurisprudence since 1800 and Legal Pluralism . This paper examines the history of legal pluralism in German-speaking jurisprudence since 1800 using the topoi of law without the state, alternative law, interlegality and nomos. It shows the continuous presence of these topics in the classical debates of German jurisprudence until the concept of legal pluralism was invented in the second half of the 20 th century. The end of the Old Reich in 1806, the foundation of the German Reich in 1871 and the BGB from 1900 are important caesuras in this story. They indicate the assumption of a “delayed sattelzeit” in German legal theory during this period.

Naturalizing and excluding. Nationality and citizenship law in 19 th and 20 th century Germany . Nationality law in Germany came up as a legal institution of German federal states at the beginning of 19 th century and underwent a process of nationalization. The principle of descent (Abstammungsprinzip), which was – before a legal reform in 2000 – hegemonic, was used to define German nationality primarily as a community of ethno-cultural descent. This restrictive use of German nationality law did not establish, however, a direct line of conceptual and political continuity between ‘ethno-cultural’ and ‘racial’ criteria, and it was primarily based on a politico-social constellation of political, demographic and national instability, not on a specific German national discourse.

The Jurisprudence under the wartime regime in Japan: 1931–1952 . In 2016, a book was published in Tokyo with the title “Senji-taisei to Hōgakusha: 1931–1952” (The Wartime Regime and Legal Scholars: 1931–1952) as the first collective work about sixteen diverse legal scholars under the economic and political system of total war in Japan. This invited article summarizes the main points of the book from the viewpoint of one of its editors and explains why it was written now, and why not until now.

Für Bernhard Diestelkamp zum 90. Geburtstag The Dating of Saxon Mirror Landrecht III 57,2 and the Origin of the College of the Prince Electors . The famous article in question contains a list of six German princes who were the first in royal elections (the archbishops of Mayence, Trier, and Cologne; the Count Palatinate, the duke of Saxony, and the Margrave of Brandenburg). Thereafter all the princes elected. Although the King of Bohemia had been an elector before, he is excluded “because he is not German”. In opposition to the traditional view, which sees this article as an original part of the work of Eike von Repgow (ca. 1220/35) and which is upheld lately by Alexander Begert, it is shown that the article III 57,2 does not fit to any of the royal elections of 1198, 1237, 1252 or 1257. It fits, however, perfectly to the election of Rudolf of Habsburg on October 1 st , 1273 – when the Bohemian vote was refused. The article must have been inserted to the Saxon Mirror after that date, but before May 1275 when a seventh vote was attributed to the duchy of Bavaria. In 1290, the hereditary vote was returned to the King of Bohemia. The traditional Seven Prince Electors met never before 1298. In this very year they documented their election of Albert of Austria in the first charter drawn up by all of them together with their individual names and corroborated with their own seven seals. This act can be regarded as the foundation of the College of Electors. In the same year the expressions kurfursten (prince electors) and their collegium appeared for the first time. Also https://www.historisches-lexikon-bayerns.de/Lexikon/EN:Electors

The Special Court in Katowice 1939–1945. Organizational structure and cadres . The article is devoted to the Special Court in Katowice operating in a specific area of Upper Silesia during World War II. In the basic scope, the issue of special courts created in the Third Reich and the creation of the title ‘special court’ is discussed. Then its structure and judges are analyzed in detail. Ziel des Artikels ist es, die Organisationsstruktur und die Besetzung des Sondergerichts in Kattowitz zu skizzieren. Den für dieses Gericht spezifischen Überlegungen, die sich in erster Linie auf die Primärquellenforschung stützen, sollten jedoch einleitende Bemerkungen vorausgehen. Diese können das Wesen der nationalsozialistischen Sondergerichte erklären. Die Quellengrundlage der eingehenden Erwägungen bilden Personalakten der deutschen Richter, die im Bundesarchiv Berlin, im Bestand R 3001: Reichsjustizministerium, und im Geheimen Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz Berlin-Dahlem, im Bestand der XVII. Hauptabteilung [HA]: Schlesien, Rep. 222a: Oberamtsregierung, Appellationsgericht bzw. Oberlandesgericht Breslau [zit. GStAPK XVII/222a], aufbewahrt werden. Die Identität der Mitarbeiter des Sondergerichts war dagegen auf Grund von Archivalien des Sondergerichts feststellbar, die das Staatsarchiv in Kattowitz im Bestand Nr. 134 Sondergericht Kattowitz (nur Strafsachenakten) Im Lichte des zur Verfügung stehenden Aktenmaterials, das nicht nur die in Kattowitz aufbewahrten Archivalien, sondern auch in Berlin aufbewahrte Urteilsabschriften umfasste, ist festzustellen, dass das Sondergericht Kattowitz mindestens 2394 Sachen erledigt hat, in denen 3625 Personen angeklagt waren. Verurteilt wurden 3180 Personen, davon 1391 Personen zu einer Gefängnisstrafe (ggf. zu gleichwertiger Straflagerstrafe), 1506 zu einer Zuchthausstrafe (ggf. zu gleichwertiger verschärfter Straflagerstrafe) und 247 Personen zur Todesstrafe. Freigesprochen wurden 333 Personen, in Bezug auf 49 Personen wurde das Verfahren eingestellt und gegenüber 42 vorläufig eingestellt. Aufgrund des Zustands der meisten Urteile konnten detaillierte Rechtsprechungsstudien durchgeführt werden, deren Ergebnisse eine gesonderte Veröffentlichung verdienen. Die Rechtsprechung des Sondergerichts wurde vom Autor in der Doktorarbeit zum Thema „Sondergericht Kattowitz 1939–1945“ bearbeitet. Die Doktorarbeit wurde am 16. September 2019 verteidigt und am 30. September 2019 durch den Rat der Fakultät für Rechtswissenschaften und Verwaltung der Schlesischen Universität in Kattowitz mit Auszeichnung behandelt. Der Autor beabsichtigt, die Dissertation zu ergänzen, zu verbessern und in deutscher Sprache zu veröffentlichen. ) verwahrt. Da diese Archivalien keine Organisations- und Verwaltungsakten umfassen, wurden die diesbezüglichen Feststellungen auf der Grundlage des Inhalts der Personalakten getroffen.

The resumption of academic life at the Law Faculty of Goettingen University 1945–1949 . Full professors at German law faculties after World War II have been the subject of extensive research. But little is known about other academic staff, the students or the way the rules of their examinations were made. In this article, Goettingen’s Law school serves as an example of how things and people changed or continued after supposed “Stunde Null”.

Interpretatio triplex? Germanists and Romanists facing Savigny . This short piece was stimulated by some critical remarks of Kenichi Moriya to my interpretation of Savigny’s “Besitz”. The criticism helped me to shape my arguments on Savigny and to reflect my approach to pandectist studies on Roman legal sources. Thus, I propose a threefold interpretation of these sources in order to evaluate Savigny’s own appreciation: Before interpreting Savigny’s own interpretation we should interpret the pertinent roman text as well as its comprehension in the time of and before Savigny.

Saxon-Magdeburg Law in the manuscripts from the Seminar Library in Kielce, Shelfmark RK 35/28 . In medieval cities and towns which had been founded on Magdeburg law in the Kingdom of Poland, Magdeburg Weichbild and the Speculum Saxonum belonged to the most important sources of law. One of their manuscripts from the Seminar Library of Kielce (shelfmark RK 45/28) was until now not well known. This manuscript consists of several theological and legal texts and was written in 1429 by rector Paulus de Potok. A comparison with 19 other texts of Magdeburg Weichbild of the so called ‘Silesian-Lesser Poland version’ (which prevails in the Kingdom of Poland) makes obvious that a text from Częstochowa (of 1423) was a base, direct or indirect, for the Kielce manuscript, compiling the Sandomiriensis and Cracoviensis versions. The Speculum Saxonum in the Kielce ms. is related to the so called versio Sandomiriensis .