Role of medieval universities in reception of Roman law

Abstract

Objective: to comprehensively study the reception of Roman law in Europe in the 11th – 17th centuries as the key element of the continental legal system formation; to consider the reception process through the study of the activities of medieval universities, which had a decisive influence on the borrowing of Roman legal norms and adapting them to European realities, and on the formation of the continental system of law.Methods: the article uses the main general scientific research methods: induction, extrapolation, analysis and synthesis, and also uses a comparative method of scientific research that allows tracing changes in the norms of Roman law during its reception.Results: it is difficult to overestimate the importance of Roman law reception for the European legal order and legal culture. As a result of a long process of analyzing, borrowing and adapting the Roman legal norms, the continental law system developed with the legal traditions and institutions forming it. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the full-fledged perception and qualitative adaptation of Roman law in the medieval states were possible only due to higher educational institutions. University professors disclosed the meaning of Roman legal norms in research works, taught students to apply these norms in the social conditions of that period, analyzed judicial practice, and contributed to the evolutionary changes of law that had arisen in the Roman Empire. In general, thanks to their activities, the absolute authority of Roman law was confirmed, and the attitude towards jurisprudence changed – law was no longer perceived as a limited set of casuistic laws adopted by the state, but as science and art.Scientific novelty: the article for the first time examines the influence of the Roman law reception, which was carried out by European universities, on the continental legal system formation. The evolutionary stages of the Roman law reception are considered: from the scholastic interpretation of the Code of Justinian by glossators to the activities of humanists. The opinion is argued that the transfer of cases to the conclusion (the Aktenversendung Institute), the development of the school of glossators, postglossators and humanists directly shaped the trends, determined the rules and system of the Roman private law institutions borrowing and adaptation.Practical significance: the main provisions and conclusions of the article can be used in scientific and pedagogical activities when considering issues related to the study of the Roman law reception and the trends in the European legal systems development.