The Civil Law Centre

In April of 1994 the School of Law at the University of Aberdeen approved the establishment of a Centre for the Study of the Civil Law Tradition. In 2009, after a break of a number of years, the Centre was relaunched with a broader remit. The Centre provides a single institution devoted to the study of the Civil law and the Civil tradition in modern legal systems.

The aims of the Centre are to

• Research the Classical Roman law, its second life in Europe, and the means by which it was transmitted into modern legal systems
• Research the law of modern civil or mixed legal systems
• Research Scots law where it shows the influence of the Civil law tradition
• Promote, where appropriate, the functional solutions offered by the Civil law tradition to the problems of Scots law
• Promote and expand the teaching of Roman and Civil law

Forthcoming Events

The Centre is currently planning a series of events for the 2012-2013 session. This will include a series of three seminars, and a two-day workshop on the practicks on 3rd-4th May 2013. The workshop will be funded by the Research Institute for Irish and Scottish Studies, and held in association with the Legal Authority and Governance Project and the Society and Culture in the North Sea World Project.

Anyone who would like to speak at the Centre, attend any of our events, or request more information is more than welcome to contact Adelyn at adelyn.wilson@abdn.ac.uk. You can also stay aprising of the Centre's activities by following us on twitter: @civillawcentre.

Previous Events

The Centre has also run a successful seminar series. Previous speakers have included

• Professor Jan Hallebeek, Amsterdam VU, April 2012
• Craig Anderson, RGU, April 2011
• Dr Ivan Melotic, Zagreb, October 2011
• Dr Jørn Sunde, Bergen, March 2011
• Dr John Ford, Cambridge, April 2011
• Dr Tom Green, Edinburgh, March 2011
• Dr Eric Descheemaeker, then at Oxford, February 2010

The Centre has also hosted an annual conference. In July 2011, we held a conference on the theme of 'Scottish Legal History'. See the conference programme.

In May 2012, we held a two-day workshop funded by the Research Institute for Irish and Scottish Studies and in association with the Society and Culture in the North Sea World Project on the theme 'Law and Governance in Renaissance Scotland'. See the conference programme.

Research Projects

• Centre members are involved in the Legal Authority and Governance project, a collaboration between the Law School and History Department which examines these themes in Scotland between approximately 1400 and 1800. Our 2011 and 2012 Workshops are part of this project.
• We are also involved in the fledgling Burgh Records project, a digitization and analysis project undertaken by academics from Law and History as well as external partners including the City and Shire Archives.
• The Centre is proud to have significant links with the Society and Culture in the North Sea World Research Project, an interdisciplinary project which currently supports six doctoral students, including one based in the Law School.

Teaching at the University of Aberdeen

Undergraduate Teaching

Various courses promoting the aims of the Centre are currently available to students of the University, including:

• Foundations of Private Law - an introductory course in private civil law compulsory for first year LLB students. This course focuses particularly on property law and the law of obligations but also covers the revival of Roman law from the eleventh century and the Scottish reception of Roman law. Coordinated in 2012-2013 by Professor Robin Evans-Jones.
• Scottish Legal History Honours - the course teaches the history of Scots law and institutions, teaches students how to interrogate legal-historical sources, and shows them how to undertake doctrinal legal history. Coordinated in 2012-2013 by Dr Andrew Simpson and Dr Adelyn Wilson.
• Scottish Legal History Honours - a course which explores in detail a variety of traditional and innovative topics, from the Regiam Majestatemand the founding of the College of Justice to the methods of the jurists and legal education. Coordinated in 2012-2013 by Dr Adelyn Wilson.
• Roman Law Honours - a course which equips the student with the crucial knowledge of Roman legal writing and court procedure but also provides them with the opportunity to explore in greater depth Roman procedure and the development of the Lex Aquilia. Coordinated in 2012-2013 by Professor Robin Evans-Jones.
• European Legal History Honours - covers a range of topics, from Roman law through the movements of legal scholarship Humanism, Natural law, second Scholasticism, and the rise of institutional writing in Europe. Coordinated in 2012-2013 by Dr Andrew Simpson.
• Legal History in Recent Court Practice - provides students with a knowledge and understanding of the use and applicability of legal-historical sources (specifically Roman law and the Institutional Writers) in Scottish courts by examining the application of legal history in Scottish cases from the last ten years. Coordinated in 2012-2013 by Dr Adelyn Wilson.

In recent years a number of the Honours courses have had guest speakers. In 2010-2011, we were delighted to have Mr James Merson (advocate) join us for a seminar in Legal History in Recent Courts Practice. In 2011-2012, we will be welcoming Dr Ivan Milotec (Zagreb) to present at a joint meeting of the Centre's seminar series and the Roman law honours course.

Postgraduate Teaching

We are delighted to welcome Katherine Anderson as the Centre's first PhD student after the relaunch. Katherine will be studying the law and procedure in the Northern Isles after the transfer into Scottish jurisdiction. She will be co-supervised by Professor Robin Evans-Jones and Dr Adelyn Wilson. She is funded by the Society and Culture in the North Sea World Research Project.

Anyone interested in pursuing postgraduate study at the University of Aberdeen are encouraged to contact Dr Adelyn Wilson at adelyn.wilson@abdn.ac.uk or any of the members of the Centre.

Members of the Centre

A full list of publications by the various members of the Centre can be found by following the links below:

Dr Adelyn Wilson (Centre Director)

Adelyn joined the University in September, 2009. She had previously taught at the University of Edinburgh while working on her doctoral thesis. Her research interests include Roman law and Scottish and European legal history of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. She is a member of the Stair Society, the Scottish Legal History Group, the Legal History Discussion Group, the European Society for Comparative Legal History, the Association of Young Legal Historians, and the Society of Legal Scholars. She currently teaches and coordinates:

• Foundations of Private Law
• Roman Law Honours
• Scottish Legal History Honours
• European Legal History Honours
• Legal History in Recent Court Practice

She is also the current director of the Civil Law Centre and the convener of the Aberdeen Roman law, Legal History and Civilian Tradition research group.

Professor David Carey Miller

David L Carey Miller came to Aberdeen as a lecturer in 1971 following a period of practice at the Natal Bar as an Advocate of the High Court of South Africa. With prior degrees from the Universities of Natal and Edinburgh, his Aberdeen doctoral thesis subject was the role of the advocate. Turning increasingly to property law David Carey Miller published South African and Scottish textbooks in 1986 and 1991; Land Title in South Africa (with Anne Pope, University of Cape Town, 2000), was researched with British Academy and Carnegie Trust funding. Professor Carey Miller's interest in comparative law and legal history is reflected in the joint editorship of two volumes of essays: the first (with David W Meyers, 1992) as a tribute to Professor Sir Thomas Smith QC; the second (with Professor Reinhard Zimmermann, 1997) to mark the quincentenary of the University of Aberdeen.

A particular current aspect of his work is the area of property problems in portable antiquities and works of art. David Carey Miller is currently director of the Baltimore/Maryland Summer School in Comparative Law, an annual five week programme which the Aberdeen Law School has hosted since 1987. He was Head of the School of Law for the 2005-2006 academic year and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in early 2006. He has been appointed a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies for three years from September 2006. Professor Carey Miller retired from his full-time post in 2006 but continues to be active in teaching and scholarship.

Professor Robin Evans-Jones

Professor Evans-Jones specialises in Roman law, unjustified enrichment and comparative law. He edited The Civil Law Tradition in Scotland, published by the Stair Society in 1995. The first volume of his work on unjustified enrichment (details below) was published in 2003, and he is currently researching for the second volume. His contributions to scholarly literature have appeared in:

• Revue Internationale des Droits de L'Antiquité
• Bullettino dell'Istituto di Diritto Romano
• Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis (Legal History Review)
• Labeo
• Cuadernos Informativos de Derecho Historico
• Rechtshistorische Journal
• Zeitschrift der Savigny Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte
• Juridical Review
• Irish Jurist
• Journal of the Law Society of Scotland
• Scots Law Times
• South African Law Journal
• Law Quarterly Review
• Cambridge Law Journal

Professor Roderick Paisley

Professor Paisley's doctorate was awarded for a thesis on Crown Rights in Relation to Land in Scotland. He joined the School following a period as a solicitor in private practice specialising in land law and conveyancing in Scotland and is conducting research related to land law including servitudes.

Dr Andrew Simpson

Andrew joined the School of Law as a lecturer in September 2010, following three years as a doctoral student at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. His recently completed postgraduate studies concerned perceptions of legal authority in Scotland during the sixteenth century. While in Cambridge, he supervised Civil Law Part 1A for Caius College for the academic year 2009-2010. His research interests include Scottish and European legal history, with a particular focus on the history of legal thought. He is also interested in the law of Obligations and Property law. He is involved in teaching Foundations of Private law, An Introduction to European Legal Systems, Conveyancing, Scottish Legal History (Honours), European Legal History (Honours), and Corporeal Moveable Property (Honours).

Dr Catherine Ng

Catherine Ng joined the School of Law as a lecturer after a period of private practice in Toronto, and then completing her DPhil in intellectual property law at the University of Oxford and her post-doctorate work at the Graduate Institute (HEI - now "Institut de hautes études internationales et du développement") in Geneva. Her principal teaching and research interests are in the laws relating to intellectual property, the media, the arts, antiquities, history, and in legal history and anthropology as they pertain to these subject areas. She is the Director of the Post-Graduate Research Student Training Programme at the School of Law.

Books from the Centre

Books recently published by current and former members of the Centre include the following:

• Carey Miller, D. and Irvine, D., Corporeal Moveables in Scots Law, pp.367 + xli, Scottish Universities Law Institute / W.Green, 2005. 2nd edn.
• Carey Miller, D. and Reid, E. (eds), A Mixed Legal System in Transition: TB Smith and the Progress of Scots Law, pp.332 + x, Edinburgh University Press, 2005.
• Carey Miller, D. and Zimmermann, R. (eds.), The Civilian Tradition and Scots Law. Aberdeen Quincentenary Essays. Schriften zur Europäischen Rechts- und Verfassungsgeschichte, bd. 20. Duncker & Humblot. Berlin, 1997. ISBN 3-428-09011-X. ISSN 0937-3365.
• Carey Miller, D. and Pope, A., Land Title in South Africa. Juta. Capetown, 2000. ISBN 0-7021-5120-3.
• Evans-Jones, R. (ed.), The Civil Law Tradition in Scotland. The Stair Society, supplementary series, vol. 2. Edinburgh, 1995. ISBN 1-872517-08-0.
• Evans-Jones, R., Unjustified Enrichment: Enrichment by Deliberate Conferral: Condictio.Thomson/W. Green. Edinburgh, 2003. ISBN 0-414009-97-5.
• Metzger, E. (ed.), A Companion to Justinian's Institutes. Duckworth. London, 1998. Cornell University Press. Ithaca, NY, 1998. ISBN 0-7156-2798-8.
• Metzger, E., A New Outline of the Roman Civil Trial. Oxford University Press. Oxford, 1997. ISBN 0-19-826474-7.
• Metzger, E. (ed.), Law for All Times. Essays in Memory of David Daube. Lawrence, KS: Roman Law Society of America, 2004. ISBN 0-9764149-0-2.
• Metzger, E., Litigation in Roman Law. Oxford University Press. Oxford, 2005. ISBN 0-19-829855-2 [for the OUP USA page for this book, click here]

Papers from the Centre

A small number of papers by present and former members of the Centre can be read directly from here.

Evans-Jones, R.

• Roman Law in Britain. Originally published as R. Evans-Jones, 'Roman Law in Britain', in U. Manthe and C. Krampe, edd., Quaestiones Iuris. Festschrift für Joseph Georg Wolf zum 70. Geburtstag [Freiburger Rechtsgeschichtliche Abhandlungen (n.F.), Bd. 36] (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2000) (ISBN 3-428-09866-8), pp 83-110. Reprinted by Roman Law Resources Electronic Reprints in HTML, or for downloading in Microsoft® Reader or PDF.

MacCormack, G.

• Anthropology and Legal Theory. 1978 Juridical Review, pp. 216-32.
• Culpa in the Scots Law of Reparation. 1974 Juridical Review, pp. 13-29.
• Voluntas testatoris and Scaev. D. 29,7,14 / Afr. 29,7,15. Pomoerium 1. 1994.

Metzger, E.

• 'Acquisition of Living Things by Specification', Edinburgh Law Review 8 (2004), 112-15.
• Actions. Originally published as E. Metzger, 'Actions', in E. Metzger, ed., A Companion to Justinian's Institutes (London: Gerald Duckworth and Co., Ltd, and New York: Cornell University Press, 1997), ISBN 0715628305 (Duckworth Pbk), 071562798 (Duckworth Hbk), 0801485843 (CUP Pbk), 0801436192 (CUP Hbk), pp 208-228. Reprinted by Roman Law Resources Electronic Reprints in HTML and for downloading in PDF format or Microsoft® Reader.
• 'Adam Smith and Roman Servitudes', Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis, 2004. [Download preprint in PDF]
• The Case of Petronia Iusta, Revue Internationale des Droits de l'Antiquité47 (2000), pp. 151-65.
• The Current View of the Extra-Judicial Vadimonium, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte (2000), pp 133-78.
• Evidence for Ladungsvadimonium. [Paper]. 52nd Session of the Société 'Fernand De Visscher' pourl'Histoire des Droits de l'Antiquité, Madrid. 29 September 1998. (17K).
• Interrupting Proceedings in iure: uadimonium and intertium . Originally published at 120 Zeitschrift der Papyrologie und Epigraphik 215-225 (1998). Reprinted by Roman Law Resources Electronic Reprints in HTML and by the ZPE for downloading in PDF format.
• 'Roman Judges, Case Law, and Principles of Procedure', Law and History Review 22/2 (2004). [Download in PDF]
• 'Quare? Argument in David Daube, after Karl Popper'. In: E. Metzger (ed.), Law For All Times: Essays in Memory of David Daube. Lawrence, KS: Roman Law Society of America. 2004. pp. 27-58.
• Scholarship in the Sunshine. [Paper]. 50th Session of the Société 'Fernand De Visscher' pour l'Histoire des Droits de l'Antiquité, Brussels. 17 September 1996. (18K).

Materials from Former students of the Centre

Meyer-Spasche, R.

• Roman Law [The Recovery of Benefits Conferred under Illegal or Immoral Transactions, Chapter One]. Part of a thesis submitted for the degree of PhD at the University of Aberdeen. 2002. Available for reading in HTML, or for downloading in PDF format or Microsoft® Reader.

du Plessis, J.

• Compulsion in Roman Law. Part of a thesis submitted for the degree of PhD at the University of Aberdeen. 1997. Available for reading in HTML, or for downloading in PDF format or Microsoft® Reader.

Roman Law Resources

Dr Ernest Metzger, formerly a member of the Centre and now at the University of Glasgow, manages a comprehensive internet 'portal' for Roman law. Roman Law Resources gives access to a wide range of internet materials, including sources, secondary literature, bibliographies, CD-ROMs, book reviews, discussion lists, discussion forums, newsgroups, journals, events, faculties, libraries, instititutes, chairs, errata, booksellers, and other related websites. The site also contains a directory of historians of ancient law, a collection of corrections to the English translation of Justinian'sDigest, two large palingenesiae of late imperial laws, and a moderated discussion forum for Roman and civil law.

Aberdeen Quincentenary

In September of 1995 the Centre hosted A Celebration of the European Legal Tradition, a conference to mark the quincentenary of the University of Aberdeen. Seventy participants from Britain and the continent attended the two days of presentations and discussion of Roman, Civil, and European Law. The papers have been published by Duncker and Humblot.

Library at the University of Aberdeen

In 1995 Professor Gero Dolezalek prepared an enormous catalogue of the older legal literature held at the library at the University of Aberdeen. The catalogue is principally concerned with the literature of ius commune, and comprises all law books (generally) at the University of Aberdeen printed before 1800, all books on Scots law and other non-English law before 1840, and some later law books hidden in unsuspected places. His An Account of Antiquarian Legal Literature at the University of Aberdeen is available.