answers are given; but the contradictions are not spelled out. This talk on transformation of law has concentrated on the impact of the need for authority in the subsequent approaches to natural law and ius gentiumthat result from the bizarre treatment in Justinian’s Institutes. But I could equally have chosen to focus on substantive law. A superb example of a transplant that is, above all, a transformation, would be the law on damage to property deriving from the Roman lex Aquilia of around B.C. through Holland (and other Dutch territories) to the contemporary Republic of South Africa. Most of the particular features of the original lex Aquilia have disappeared but even today the terminology is retained, and when particular issues arise the Roman and intervening sources will be examined, with some impact.37 This talk will seem confused. Rightly; because it is confused. But the confusion is not mine alone. It is fundamentally the result of searching for needed authority in a universe of transformation of law. The contours and contents of the Corpus Iuris Civilis are so surprising that they are often misrepresented by scholars who should know better. A good example is William Blackstone at the very beginning of his Commentaries on the Law of England, at volume , Introduction:38 37 See e.g. Alan Watson, Law Out of Context (Athens, Ga., 2000), pp. 92ff. 38 At p. 4 of the first edition of 1765. APPENDIX I Far be it from me to derogate from the study of the civil law, considered (apart from any binding authority) as a collection of written reason. No man is more thoroughly persuaded of the general excellence of it’s rules, and the usual equity of it’s decisions; nor is better convinced of it’s use as well as ornament to the scholar, the divine, the statesman, and even the common lawyer. But we must not carry our veneration so far as to sacrifice our
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