Łukasz Marzec

This paper presents the issue of the influence of the Roman Law on the English legal system through its historical development. One can find several fields where Roman Law, or ius commune was useful in England, like legal education, foreign serviced, the science of law and the practice of several courts administering equity, admiralty or ecclesiastical jurisdiction.

The Court of Chancery was a significant element of the English judicial system that operated outside the sphere of the common law. The equity law, intended to be a remedy for the strict rules of the common law, borrowed much from the Roman law. Many chancellors and masters in Chancery, having obtained a D.C.L or LL.D degree were open to adopt Roman law rules in the Court’s practice. In the common opinion, some of the equity institutions were borrowed from the Roman law, like trust (fideicomissum) or elements of mortgage (equity of redemption). Many “rules of equity” have also their origins in the Roman jurisprudence.

Many of Admiralty judges were doctors of civil law and members of the elitists organization Doctors’ Commons. Some of the court’s jurisdiction wad based on the Roman law, which was one of the reasons for professional envy and jealousy presented by common law judges headed by Sir Edward Coke. The Court of Admiralty was undoubtedly the most powerful English judicial institution using the rules of Roman law in its practice. One of the respodentia, based on the pecunia traiecticia and foenus nauticum.

Contemporary English barristers-to be are still required to get a pass in the Roman Law, in the United States the knowledge of the Roman Law is the mark of a very high professional status of the lawyer. Even American universities continue to offer summer courses in Roman Law and they still find applicants.

This text presents an outline of the academic and professional path of the late Professor Witold Wołodkiewicz (1929–2021). Wołodkiewicz was born in Warsaw and died there. He was an outstanding Polish scholar, lawyer, and humanist, and as an eminent expert and teacher in Roman law and ancient culture, he was a co-founder of the post-war Romanist studies in Poland. Wołodkiewicz was the author of many publications, such as Materfamilias and Obligationes ex variis causarum figuris. He was also a student and collaborator of the famous Italian Romanist Edoardo Volterra and initiated extensive Polish-Italian academic cooperation.

De Usu et Authoritate Juris Civilis Romanorum in Dominiis Principum Christianorum, the work by Artur Duck was published in London in 1653 In his work he analysed the position and infl uence of Roman Law in fifteen countries of the 17th‐century Europe. Apart from England, Scotland and Ireland, he researched the German Empire, France with Belgium, Italy, Sicily and Naples, Poland, Hungary, Bohemia, Spain, Portugal, Denmark and Sweden. Although Duck was an Englishman, he admired Roman Law and believed it could unify and consolidate the legal systems of Christian Europe. His work shows deep knowledge of how the legal systems of the 17th‐century Europe were organized and influenced by Roman Law. Although his work has remained forgotten for centuries, contemporary scholars are attempting to restore it to its proper position. Although the chapter concerning the Kingdom of Bohemia appears relatively short, it gives basic and true information on the Bohemian state and legal system. Duck used over twenty books of various authors, to mention only Goldast, Dubravius, Arumaeus, Besold, Mynsinger, Gail, Muscorn and Kromer. In his view, German emperor did not have a direct power over Bohemians, though Bohemian kings were not entirely independent. He stresses that Bohemians never accepted being a part of the German Empire. They had their own laws, to some extent based on the Roman Law, particularly in the fi eld of the municipal laws, derived from ius saxonicum. Duck believes that the Roman Law was the Bohemian ius commune, as it was said to be in Germany.