This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1927.
This book is a comprehensive guide on the development of criminal law in ancient communities. Richard R. Cherry, a renowned legal scholar, provides a detailed analysis of the origins, evolution and transformation of criminal laws in early societies. The book delves into the legal systems of Mesopotamia, Rome, Greece, Israel and other ancient cultures, exploring the social, political and economic factors that influenced the codification of criminal laws. Cherry's work sheds light on a fascinating period in legal history and is an invaluable resource for legal scholars, historians and anyone interested in the evolution of law. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Countless books detail the development of Roman law and explain the laws of the ancient Romans. Similarly, many scholars have traced the law of ancient Athens. Written for both students and educated lay readers, the chapters dealing with ancient Greece focus primarily on the law of ancient Athens in the 5th and 4th centuries B.C.E. But material relating to other Greek colonies and city states also plays a significant role in the development of ancient Greek law. The Roman law chapters explore both law and legal institutions and emphasize the growth and expansion of legal principles. Roman law still serves as the foundation for the civil laws of many nations today. And given the importance of globalization, Roman law is likely to continue to influence the modern word for the foreseeable future. Each unit begins with a "Background & Beginnings" chapter that establishes the historical context in which law developed and introduces relevant principles of jurisprudence (i.e., legal philosophy). The second chapter in each unit covers procedural aspects of the law, such as court structure, judges, trial procedure, evidence, and legislation. The remaining chapters examine substantive legal topics such as property, contracts, family law, criminal law, and the like.The text also maintains a focus on the connections and influences of social, cultural, economic, philosophical, and political forces as they have affected law and its development. In addition, several sections of the book add another dimension. These sections, entitled "Law in Literature," use works of ancient literature to explore aspects of law as seen through the eyes of poets, dramatists, orators, and historians. In theory, modern readers can learn a great deal about law through literature because literature often lacks the "official filter" of many traditional legal sources.Of course each individual author brings his own biases about law and the legal system to his writing. But as long as we acknowledge the potential for such bias, these sections have the potential to offer completely different perspectives and insights.
During the inspired years of the Athenian empire, through the tragedy of its collapse, to the more prosaic era that followed, most of the great names in Athenian history were involved in the procedures of criminal law. Political Trials in Ancient Greece, first published in 1990, explores the relationships between historical process, constitution, law, political machinations and foreign policy, concentrating on fifth and fourth century Athens and on Macedonia. These trials contribute significant details to our knowledge of such towering figures as Aeschylus, Pericles, Thucydides, Alcibiades, Socrates, Demosthenes and Aristotle, as well as a diverse collection of Macedonian defendants. The jurisdiction of the Areopagus, trials of communities, and the personal jurisdiction of the Macedonian king are also examined. Richard Bauman’s original account broadens our understanding of Greek legal institutions and of the ancient Greek approach to the law, as well as the general ethos of Athenian and Macedonian society.
The relationship between law and literature is rich and complex. In the past three and half decades, the topic has received much attention from literary critics and legal scholars studying modern literature. Despite the prominence of law and justice in Ancient Greek literature, there has been little interest among Classical scholars in the connections between law and drama. This is the first collection of essays to approach Greek tragedy and comedy from a legal perspective. The volume does not claim to provide an exhaustive treatment of law and literature in ancient Greece. Rather it provides a sample of different approaches to the topic. Some essays show how knowledge of Athenian law enhances our understanding of individual passages in Attic drama and the mimes of Herodas and enriches our appreciation of dramatic techniques. Other essays examine the information provided about legal procedure found in Aristophanes' comedies or the views about the role of law in society expressed in Attic drama. The collection reveals reveal how the study of law and legal procedure can enhance our understanding of ancient drama and bring new insights to the interpretation of individual plays.
