Overview

The sixth to ninth centuries saw a flowering of written laws among the early Germanic tribes. These laws include tables of fines for personal injury, designed to offer a legal, non-violent alternative to blood feud. Using these personal injury tariffs, The Body Legal in Barbarian Law examines a variety of issues, including the interrelationships between victims, perpetrators, and their families; the causes and results of wounds inflicted in daily life; the methods, successes, and failures of healing techniques; the processes of individual redress or public litigation; and the native and borrowed developments in the various 'barbarian' territories as they separated from the Roman Empire. By applying the techniques of linguistic anthropology to the pre-history of medicine, anatomical knowledge, and law, Lisi Oliver has produced a remarkable study that sheds new light on early Germanic conceptions of the body in terms of medical value, physiological function, psychological worth, and social significance.

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9781487547707

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'Intriguing book...The Body Legal in Barbarian Law is like an (unmutilated)body itself: pleasingly structured on the outside and hiding a lot of intricate workings under the skin.'

Author Information

Lisi Oliver is Greater Houston Alumni Chapter Endowed Alumni Professor in the Department of English at Louisiana State University.

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