per andersen national law (ius gentium), the Roman and the Germanic jurisprudence and the principal and the dogmatic differences between Roman-Germanic law and Danish legislation. In addition, the diploma would be endorsed if the candidate demonstrated skills in Germanic feudal law, Danish and Norwegian legal history, the law of the Danish duchies in Northern Germany as well as Saxon or Lübeck procedural law. Thus, the law degree, which would be taken in Latin, provided a basis to be able to draw on other legal systems’ solutions if Danish law was unable to solve a legal conflict. The idea behind the 1736 ordinance was that prior to taking the law degree, two years of study was required by the country’s sole university in Copenhagen. In practice this was, however, economically or intellectually impossible for many of the judges and officials in the Danish, obviously, not particularly learned legal system. Thus, the central administration was realistic enough to introduce a Danish-language law degree which required much less of the candidates and which could be passed before the local clergyman, prefect or teacher. The minimum requirements to the Danish exam, also introduced in 1736, thus included a reasonable knowledge of natural law, the Danish and Norwegian procedural law, and, more generally, to “the law and knowledge of the law itself ”. For those knowing something about Danish legal procedure, it would have been possible to attend the Supreme Court since the main lines of the legal procedure used there were much like the common used procedure; the strong tendency to retain traditions and procedure rooted in past practice are even today special attributes of the Danish Supreme Court.56 Over time quite a few Danish law professors were appointed as members of the Court in the years leading up to the end of the eighteenth century, so that the Supreme Court had control over legal proficiency. The original demand for balance between noble and civil members was repealed, and legal competence was strengthened in a civil-dominated court. In 1792 all the judges were lawyers. At that time, namely in 1771, 56 Nielsen, Thøger 1961 pp. 480-550. 269
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