Last month I decided that I needed to see what this book, a summary of legal doctrine and procedure in one north French province, said about warfare. When I got hold of this translation of Beaumanoir's Customs of the Beauvaisis I found that I couldn't put it down. Legal texts of any era are not usually my favorite reading, but this had so much personality. I probably ended up reading two thirds of this heavy tome, without complaint.
One warning: given the scholarly debates around the terms vassal and fief I found it rather unfortunate that the translator was not absolutely clear what Old French terms he was translating when he used these English words.
Woot! Beaumanoir is a lot of fun. And there's a lot of material on trial by combat in there.
ReplyDeleteAriella Elema
I'm currently studying this text and I'm interested in particular in its source studies, connection with roman law etc. Please post here if you have found something particularly interesting.
ReplyDeleteMichael, Moscow, Russia