legal history•introduction • kjell å modéer 34 One important change to legal history in the twenty-first century is the field’s openness to a variety of theories and methods.41 Another participant in Gagnér’s seminar, Dag Michalsen, professor of legal history at the University of Oslo law faculty, has been a signally creative, productive, and innovative colleague. He accepted an honorary degree from Lund in the spring of 2017, and it says a great deal about his position in Nordic legal history that in November 2017 we celebrated his sixtieth birthday with a seminar in Oslo, at which sixteen of his colleagues presented their projects, all of them related to his research. He has published extensively on roman law, constitutional legal history, always with new perspectives and a diversity of new theories and methods.42 The Oslo seminar, Rettshistorisk samling, is a creative melting pot and a haven for all jurists as well as historians concerned with current problems and discourses in legal history. He was a great support for Martin Sunnqvist when he wrote his thesis on judicial review in Nordic legal history,43 and for Julia Björverud in her postgraduate research into the freedom of the press from a historical perspective. In 2009 the Lund law faculty hosted an international workshop on teaching methods in comparative legal history.44 Several participants went on to found the European Society for Comparative Legal History (ESCLH), which had its inaugural conference in Valencia in 2010, and has been a driving force in the development of the field of legal history, 41 Robert W.Gordon,Taming the Past: Essays on Law in History and History in Law(Cambridge: CUP, 2017); Dag Michalsen, Rettshistorisk kritikk: Tolv studier (Oslo: Dreyersforlag, 2017). 42 Dag Michalsen, Romerrettsideologi. Pax Forlag 2008. Ola Mestad & Dag Michalsen (eds.), Rett,nasjon, union: Den svensk-norske unionens rettslige historie 1814–1905(Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 2005); Hilde Sandvik & Dag Michalsen (eds.), Kodifikasjon og konstitusjon: Grunnloven § 94s krav til lovbøker i norsk historie (Nye perspektiver på Grunnloven 1814–2014; Oslo: Pax, 2013); Dag Michalsen (ed.), Unntakstilstand og forfatning: Brud og kontinuitet i konstitusjonell rett (Oslo: Pax, 2013); Ruth Hemstad & Dag Michalsen (eds.), Frie ord i Norden? Offentlighet, ytringsfrihet og medborgerskap 1814–1914 (Oslo: Pax, 2019). 43 Martin Sunnqvist, Konstitutionellt kritiskt dömande: Förändringar av nordiska domares attityder under två sekel (Rättshistoriskt bibliotek, 71; Stockholm: Institutet för rättshistorisk forskning, 2014). 44 Kjell Å. Modéer & Per Nilsén(eds.),How to Teach European Comparative Legal History:Workshop at the Faculty of Law, Lund University, 19–20 August 2009 (Lund: Juristförlaget i Lund, 2011).
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