BOOK: B. J. SPAGNOLO and Joe SAMPSON, Principle and Pragmatism in Roman Law (London: Hart Publishing, 2020). ISBN 9781509938964, £50.40

(Source: Hart Publishing)

Hart Publishing is publishing a new book on principle and pragmatism in Roman private law.

ABOUT THE BOOK

This edited collection presents an interesting and original series of essays on the roles of principle and pragmatism in Roman private law.

The book traverses key areas of Roman law to examine the explanatory power of - and delineate interactions between - abstract, doctrinal principle, and pragmatic, real-world problem-solving. Essays canvassing sources of law, property, succession, contracts and delicts sketch the varied roles of theoretical narratives - whether internal to Roman doctrine or derived from external influence - and of practical, policy-based solutions in the jurists' thought.

Principled reasoning in Roman juristic argument ranges from safeguarding commerce, to the priority of acts or intentions in property transactions, to notions of pietas, to Platonic conceptions of the market. Pragmatism is discernible in myriad ways, from divergence between form and substance, to extension of legal rules for economic, social or political utility, to emphasis on what parties did rather than what they said.

The distinctive contribution of the book is its survey of different manifestations of principle and pragmatism across Roman private law. The essays -by eminent as well as emerging academics - will stimulate debates and shed new light on this topic, and will be of interest to both scholars and students of Roman law.

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Benjamin Spagnolo is a Fellow, Lecturer and Director of Studies in Law at Trinity College Cambridge.

Joe Sampson is an Associate Professor of Law, University of Oxford, and Tutorial Fellow in Law, Magdalen College, Oxford

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Principle and Pragmatism

Benjamin Spagnolo and Joe Sampson

2. Modes of Roman Legal Reasoning in Context: A Brief Survey

Paul J du Plessis

3. The Case of the Careless Purchaser, or 'Bonitary Ownership' and Ownership

Mike Macnair

4. Explaining D. 41.1.36

Joe Sampson

5. The Place of Rhetoric in Late Republican Law: Some Thoughts on Pietas and the Querela Inofficiosi Testamenti

Graeme Cunningham

6. Writing, Speaking, and the Roman Stipulatio

David Ibbetson

7. Principle and Practice in the Pacta Adiecta

Boudewijn Sirks

8. Plato, Principle, and Pragmatism: Market Regulation in D. 50.11.2

Constantin Willems

9. Limits of Juristic Argument in the Exercitorian Edict

Peter Candy

10. Insulam Exurere: Reading Collatio 12.7.1–3 Closely

Wolfgang Ernst

11. Quasi and (Cor)ruptio

Benjamin Spagnolo

More info here