Tag Archives: legal history

A double-edged sword: Reframing Northern Ireland’s relationship with Europe and the world

By Lara Hatwell The relationship between Northern Ireland and Europe has dominated the headlines since the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement was signed in 2020. This has largely been a result of the Democratic Unionist Party, the (then) largest party’s opposition to the Northern Ireland Protocol, and its subsequent refusal to elect a speaker, leaving the Stormont… Read More »

Law French – When Law and Language Collide

I can guess what you thought when you looked at today’s date! Ah 31st May, the anniversary of the execution of Waltheof, Earl of Northumbria.  No? Okay, fair enough. However back in 1076 this date was taken as the end of the Revolt of the Earls.  It was arguably the end of Anglo-Saxon Britain.  As… Read More »

The Coventry Carol

The lilting lament of The Coventry Carol is not especially festive, being as it is a mother’s song to her doomed infant as she waits for Herod’s soldiers to visit and murder him, however it is a haunting, beautiful tune with extraordinary history. If you’d like to know more about that, you can compare audio… Read More »

We Three Kings

We three kings of Orient are. Bearing gifts, we traverse afar. Field and fountain, moor and mountain, Following yonder star…‘ By Madeleine Lawson ‘We Three Kings of Orient Are,’ also known as ‘The Quest of the Magi,’ is a nineteenth-century carol by Reverend John Henry Hopkins Junior.  (Click here for a rendition of the song… Read More »

Local history: Sir William Blackstone

William Blackstone (1723-1780) studied at Oxford, joining Pembroke College at the age of 15, eventually holding high office at All Souls (where his statue now sits in his Judge’s robes in The Codrington Library) and taking the first Chair of Vinerian Professor of English Law. He held many other distinguished legal and administrative positions during… Read More »

Sir John Fielding

November 22nd to December 22nd is UK Disability History Month, and in the light of that we’d like to introduce you to an eminent figure in British legal history: Sir John Fielding, “the blind beak”. John Fielding, born 1721, was the third son of the Hon. Edmund Fielding by his second wife (of four; his… Read More »

A new online treasure trove

Well – new for the Bodleian and a trove  at least for those lawyers with an historical bent! Law Library Microfilm Consortium – digital (as of August 2012) makes available online 5,554 titles (112,372 volumes!). The focus is on law or legal-related titles – so it may well be of use to social scientists more… Read More »