Law as Text

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Abstract Roman and canon law were fields of knowledge based on the interpretation of authoritative texts. In their study of Roman and canon law, the authors of Bracton would have begun to think about the practice of law as a textual practice. This was not an obvious way to think about law in the thirteenth century. In England’s county and manor courts, much of the law was contained in the collective memory of the suitors of the court, not in authoritative texts. Thus, the fact that Bracton’s authors studied Roman and canon law would have led them to think about law in a different manner from many of their colleagues in the central royal courts.