Ancient Law: Its Connection with the Early

Preface
Introduction
Ancient codes
Legal fictions
Law of nature & equity
The modern history of the law of nature
Primitive society & ancient law
The early history of testamentary succession
Ancient & modern ideas respecting wills & successions
The early history of property
The early history of contract
The early history of delict & crime
Index

Henry Sumner Maine was an English chap of the High Victorian era, i.e. the late 19th century. His Popular Government, a book discussing the properties and deficiencies of broad-suffrage democracy, is often recommended by reactionaries in the vein of Mencius Moldbug. Moldbug, in particular, included Popular Government in a list of three books constituting the canon of the so-called “Froude Society” (of which I am apparently a deacon). But while Maine’s work has reactionary implications, it is never polemic. Maine was a sober-minded jurist and historian. The present book, his Ancient Law, is probably his best-known work, and the one most representative of his broader oeuvre. Maine tends to be a bit of a dry writer, but he never fails to deliver on the subject matter, and the book is a pleasure to read.