entangled in insolvency – jussi sallila 291 measures against bankrupt debtors were combined with the benefit of discharge for honest debtors. Running the bankruptcy system was the task of bankruptcy commissions nominated by the Lord Chancellor. Therefore, English bankruptcy law was developed outside of the common law courts. However, in the nineteenth century some observers regarded the commissioners of bankruptcy as London’s “main commercial court.”841 In Germany, the major commercial cities had bankruptcy systems of their own. This was the case not only in free city republics, but also in Leipzig, the commercial centre of Electoral Saxony.842 In the early 1680s, Leipzig enacted its first comprehensive bankruptcy legislation and established a new commercial court. Using these means, the municipal government attempted to uphold the creditworthiness of its merchants and protect its civic independence against the absolutist policies of the Dresden government.843 Thus, even though German (often Saxon) insolvency jurisprudence had a great influence in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Sweden, it was created in a different context.844 One can imagine alternative histories of Swedish bankruptcy law on the basis of these examples. However, the actual course of events took another turn. How, then, did the conceptions concerning the rights of the insolvent debtor and the possibility of acquiring a fresh start develop under the unitary system introduced in the 1680s? It appears that the compromise solution of the royal edicts could be interpreted in very different ways. In the Code of 1734, the provisions concerning the effects of cessio bonorumin Chapter 16 of the Commercial Section were based on the legislation of the 1680s and 1690s. Since there were no specific rules concerning compositions in the Code, the rules of 1685 and 1687 were still valid, and a composition was not effective against privileged creditors. The order of priority between creditors was regulated in Chapter 17. 841 Jones, W.J. 1979 pp. 5-11; Welbourne, E. 1932 p. 51. 842 Beachy, Robert 2000 pp. 329-335. 843 Beachy, Robert 2000 pp. 335-339. 844 On German influence on the order of creditors’ privileges, see Jägerskiöld, Stig 1967b pp. 341-344. Bankruptcy Law in the Code of 1734
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