part iv • intellectual legal history • søren koch Analysing the complex interplay of law in books and law in action will be one of the most interesting challenges for Nordic legal historians in future.22 A reasonable starting point would be the context (literally speaking) of legal texts.23 Any contextual analysis of a legal text requires us to ask who was the author, what were his intentions, and who was supposed to read and use the book. What kinds of legal materials were produced, received, transmitted, distributed, and read? What techniques were used to speed the dissemination of legal knowledge to its intended audience? Furthermore, how did legal practitioners use these books and the knowledge contained in them, and to what extent did legal practice contribute to the scholarly discourse? On the other hand, we need to ask to what extent impulses from legal scholarship impacted on law in action. And if so, which kind of text most successfully and significantly change legal practice and why? Nordic legal historians have tended to ignore texts identified as ‘unoriginal’ compilations. The same applies for the techniques, intentions, and strategies of compilers. Consequently, the extent to which compilation drove a scientific discourse and the establishment of the legal system, or impacted on the intellectual history of law in the Nordic countries, is still obscure. Detailed, theory-based empirical research is required. In this essay, therefore, I will offer the blueprint of an analytical framework and a couple of useful examples proving that compilation as a technique for promoting and disseminating of legal knowledge had an impact on the scholarly discourse and the application of law, but was also used by the legislature. Recent research by historians, theologians, and literary scholars shows that compilation played an important role in creating a canon of ideas 22 Some work has been done already, see Sunde 2007; Koch 2015. 23 See for a different cultural setting, see António M. Hespanha, ‘Form and Content in Early Modern Lawyers’ Books, Bridging Material Bibliography with History of Legal Thought’, Rechtsgeschichte 12 (2008), 12–50. 204 The function of compilation in Nordic law
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