BOOK REVIEW: Emanuel VAN DONGEN on Codifications of Late Antiquity: exclusive and universal, by JHA Lokin, edited by Tom Von Bochove, Frits Brandsma, Anne-Marie Drummond and Pia Lokin-Sassen (Comparative Legal History, XIII (2025), nr. 2 (December), pp. 318-323)

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This work represents the final project of the late Jan Lokin, professor of Roman law and its history at the University of Groningen, which he had nearly completed just before his passing. Lokin was a well-known Dutch law professor who taught Roman law and legal history to around 25,000 students through his lifetime, and a legal historian with broad interests and knowledge. He wrote numerous works on Greek-Roman or Byzantine law, Justinian as a codifier, legal education in the sixth century, and the phenomenon of codification (nb, a bibliography of Lokin can be found at the end of the book that motivates this review). Throughout his long career, Lokin frequently wrote about the codification of law. Fittingly, the present book on codifications in Late Antiquity has been published in a period in which there seems to be a renewed interest in codifications.

To read the full review, please click here. Online access is free for members of the European Society for Comparative Legal History. 

DOI: 10.1080/2049677X.2025.2580107