Law and Language in the Middle Ages investigates the encounter between law and legal practice from the linguistic perspective. The essays explore how legal language expresses and advances power relations, along with the ways in which the language of law legitimates power. The wide geographical and chronological scope showcases how power, legitimacy and language interact, moving the discussion beyond traditional issues of identity or the formation of nation-states and their institutions. What emerges are different strategies reflective of the diverse and pluralistic political, legal, and cultural worlds of the Middle Ages.


Contributors are Michael H. Gelting, Dirk Heirbaut, Carole Hough, Anette Kremer, Ada Maria Kuskowski, Anders Leegaard Knudsen, André Marques, Matthew McHaffie, Bruce O’Brien, Paul Russell, Werner Schäfke, and Vincenz Schwab.