The Mirrour of Justices. Washington, D.C., 1903

Book Description

1903. Horne, Andrew [d.1328]. The Mirrour of Justices Written Originally in the Old French, Long Before the Conquest; and Many Things Added. To Which is Added the Diversity of Courts and Their Jurisdiction. Translated into English by W.H., of Gray's Inn, Esq. With an Introduction by William C. Robinson. Washington, D.C.: John Byrne & Co., 1903. xix, 337 pp. Contemporary law calf, red and black lettering pieces. Moderate rubbing, wear to board edges, joints and corners, some scuffing to spine, split between endleaf and title page. Offsetting to margins of endleaves, interior otherwise fresh. * Written about 1290, The Mirrour of Justices became an authority in the latter part of the sixteenth century when English lawyers began to look to Glanville, Bracton, and Britton as guides to put the common law into a more logical arrangement. It was not a terribly reliable source, however. As Maitland observed, it is "the work of one profoundly dissatisfied with the administration of the law by the king's judges. As against this he appeals to myths and legends about the law of King Alfred's day and the like, some of which myths and legends were perhaps traditional, while others were deliberately concocted. Intelligently read it is very instructive; but the intelligent reader will often infer that the law is exactly the opposite of what the writer represents it to be.": Collected Papers II:46. Sweet & Maxwell, A Legal Bibliography of the British Commonwealth 1:40 (20).

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