FadeTheButcher
10-14-2004, 12:54 PM
From one of my previous posts. This is taken from Henri Pirenne's Mohammad and Charlemagne:
"From whatever standpoint we regard it, then, the period inaugurated by the establishment of the Barbarians within the Empire introduced no absolute historical innovation. What the Germans destroyed was not the Empire, but the Imperial government in partibus occidentis. They themselves acknowledged as much by installing themselves as foederati. Far from seeking to replace the Empire by anything new, they established themselves within it, and although their settlement was accompanied by a process of serious degradation, they did not introduce a new scheme of government; the ancient palazzo, so to speak, was divided up into apartments, but it still survived as a building. In short, the essential character of "Romania" still remained Mediterranean. The frontier territories, which remained Germanic, and England, played on part in it as yet; it is a mistake to regard them at this period as a point of departure. Considering matters as they actually were, we see that the great novelty of the epoch was a political fact: in the Occident and plurality of States had replaced the unity of the Roman State. And this, of course, was a very considerable novelty. The aspect of Europe was changing, but the fundamental character of its life remained the same. These States, which have been described as national States, were not really national at all, but were merely fragments of the great unity which they had replaced. There was no profound transformation except in Britain.
There the Emperor and the civilisation of the Empire had disappeared. Nothing remained of the old tradition. A new world had made its appearance. The old law and language and institutions were replaced by those of the Germans. A civilisation of a new type was manifesting itself, which we may call the Nordic or Germanic civilization. It was completely opposed to the Mediterranean civilisation syncretised in the Late Empire, that last form of Antiquity. Here was no trace of the Roman state with its legislative ideal, its civil population, and its Christian religion, but a society which had preserved the blood tie between its members; the family community, with all the consequences which it entailed in law and morality and economy; a paganism like that of the heroic poems; such were the things that constituted the originality of these Barbarians, who had thrust back the ancient world in order to take it place. In Britain a new age was beginning, which did not gravitate towards the South. The man of the North and conquered and taken for his own this extreme corner of that "Romania" of which he had no memories, whose majesty he repudiated, and to which he owed nothing. In every sense of the word he replaced it, and in replacing it he destroyed it.
The Anglo-Saxon invaders came into the Empire fresh from their Germanic environment, and had never been subjected to the influences of Rome. Further, the province of Britain, in which they had established themselves, was the least Romanised of all the provinces. In Britain, therefore, they remained themselves: the Germanic, Nordic, Barbarian soul of peoples whose culture might almost be called Homeric has been the essential factor in the history of this country."
Henri Pirenne, Mohammad and Charlemagne (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1954), pp.140-141
England's Germanic Culture
"It is apparent that little can be said in favour of the early Germanic legal process. Yet German law made one great contribution to western civilisation in its political implications. Roman law found origin in the will of the despotic emperor and favoured political absolutism. The king had no control over Germanic law; his only legal function was to see that the community courts met and decided cases, and even in this regard his contribution was negligable. Germanic law was based on the principle that law resided in the folk, that law was the custom of the community, and that the king could not change this law without the assent of the community. Because of this difference between Germanic and Roman law and because England, even in the High Middle Ages, remained relatively untouched by Roman law, the Victorian historians found the origin of English parliamentary institutions and the idea of the rule of law in the forests of Germany. Although it has been fashionable among twentieth century writers to scoff at this interpretation, there is an element of truth in it. The Victorians, with their organic conception of institutional development, erred in thinking that the great oak of English liberalism grew inevitably out of the acorn of German law. There was nothing inevitable about this development; in 1200 England appeared to be going in the direction of absolutism, and it took centuries of experience and political strife before the legislative supremacy of Parliament triumphed. But it is true that from German law England received a legal heritage of supremacy of the community over the king. All western European countries could have drawn upon the same legal tradition. But after 1100 the Roman principle of legal absolutism slowly won out on the Continent, whereas England alone preserved the early Germanic idea that law resides in the folk, rather than in the will of the king."
Norman F. Cantor, The Civilisation of the Middle Ages (New York: HarperPerennial, 1994), pp.98-99
More on England's Germanic culture and legal system:
"England was the only country whose legal system did not come heavily under the influence of the Justinian code. While the civil law was beginning to penetrate into the juristic systems of Germany and France in the twelfth century, English law went off in another direction, developing both institutions and principles that were remarkably different from the theory and procedure of Roman law. The departure had a profound effect on both the later government and law of England, and it constitutes one of the outstanding ways in which the intellectual changes of the twelfth century influenced th subsequent course of European history. Therefore, no study of the twelfth century can avoid the question of why England developed its own non-Roman legal system."
Ibid., p.315
"From whatever standpoint we regard it, then, the period inaugurated by the establishment of the Barbarians within the Empire introduced no absolute historical innovation. What the Germans destroyed was not the Empire, but the Imperial government in partibus occidentis. They themselves acknowledged as much by installing themselves as foederati. Far from seeking to replace the Empire by anything new, they established themselves within it, and although their settlement was accompanied by a process of serious degradation, they did not introduce a new scheme of government; the ancient palazzo, so to speak, was divided up into apartments, but it still survived as a building. In short, the essential character of "Romania" still remained Mediterranean. The frontier territories, which remained Germanic, and England, played on part in it as yet; it is a mistake to regard them at this period as a point of departure. Considering matters as they actually were, we see that the great novelty of the epoch was a political fact: in the Occident and plurality of States had replaced the unity of the Roman State. And this, of course, was a very considerable novelty. The aspect of Europe was changing, but the fundamental character of its life remained the same. These States, which have been described as national States, were not really national at all, but were merely fragments of the great unity which they had replaced. There was no profound transformation except in Britain.
There the Emperor and the civilisation of the Empire had disappeared. Nothing remained of the old tradition. A new world had made its appearance. The old law and language and institutions were replaced by those of the Germans. A civilisation of a new type was manifesting itself, which we may call the Nordic or Germanic civilization. It was completely opposed to the Mediterranean civilisation syncretised in the Late Empire, that last form of Antiquity. Here was no trace of the Roman state with its legislative ideal, its civil population, and its Christian religion, but a society which had preserved the blood tie between its members; the family community, with all the consequences which it entailed in law and morality and economy; a paganism like that of the heroic poems; such were the things that constituted the originality of these Barbarians, who had thrust back the ancient world in order to take it place. In Britain a new age was beginning, which did not gravitate towards the South. The man of the North and conquered and taken for his own this extreme corner of that "Romania" of which he had no memories, whose majesty he repudiated, and to which he owed nothing. In every sense of the word he replaced it, and in replacing it he destroyed it.
The Anglo-Saxon invaders came into the Empire fresh from their Germanic environment, and had never been subjected to the influences of Rome. Further, the province of Britain, in which they had established themselves, was the least Romanised of all the provinces. In Britain, therefore, they remained themselves: the Germanic, Nordic, Barbarian soul of peoples whose culture might almost be called Homeric has been the essential factor in the history of this country."
Henri Pirenne, Mohammad and Charlemagne (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1954), pp.140-141
England's Germanic Culture
"It is apparent that little can be said in favour of the early Germanic legal process. Yet German law made one great contribution to western civilisation in its political implications. Roman law found origin in the will of the despotic emperor and favoured political absolutism. The king had no control over Germanic law; his only legal function was to see that the community courts met and decided cases, and even in this regard his contribution was negligable. Germanic law was based on the principle that law resided in the folk, that law was the custom of the community, and that the king could not change this law without the assent of the community. Because of this difference between Germanic and Roman law and because England, even in the High Middle Ages, remained relatively untouched by Roman law, the Victorian historians found the origin of English parliamentary institutions and the idea of the rule of law in the forests of Germany. Although it has been fashionable among twentieth century writers to scoff at this interpretation, there is an element of truth in it. The Victorians, with their organic conception of institutional development, erred in thinking that the great oak of English liberalism grew inevitably out of the acorn of German law. There was nothing inevitable about this development; in 1200 England appeared to be going in the direction of absolutism, and it took centuries of experience and political strife before the legislative supremacy of Parliament triumphed. But it is true that from German law England received a legal heritage of supremacy of the community over the king. All western European countries could have drawn upon the same legal tradition. But after 1100 the Roman principle of legal absolutism slowly won out on the Continent, whereas England alone preserved the early Germanic idea that law resides in the folk, rather than in the will of the king."
Norman F. Cantor, The Civilisation of the Middle Ages (New York: HarperPerennial, 1994), pp.98-99
More on England's Germanic culture and legal system:
"England was the only country whose legal system did not come heavily under the influence of the Justinian code. While the civil law was beginning to penetrate into the juristic systems of Germany and France in the twelfth century, English law went off in another direction, developing both institutions and principles that were remarkably different from the theory and procedure of Roman law. The departure had a profound effect on both the later government and law of England, and it constitutes one of the outstanding ways in which the intellectual changes of the twelfth century influenced th subsequent course of European history. Therefore, no study of the twelfth century can avoid the question of why England developed its own non-Roman legal system."
Ibid., p.315