DITLEV TAMM. JENS ULF JØRGENSEN: DANSK RETSHISTORIE I HOVEDPUNKTER FRA LANDSKABSLOVENE TIL ØRSTED. Bd. 1 Kilder til Dansk Retshistorie (Universitetsforlaget i Kbhv. 1973) 323 s., kr. 86,25. Bd. II Oversigt over retsudviklingen

DITLEV TAMM. JENS ULF JØRGENSEN: DANSK RETSHISTORIE I HOVEDPUNKTER FRA LANDSKABSLOVENE TIL ØRSTED. Bd. 1 Kilder til Dansk Retshistorie (Universitetsforlaget i Kbhv. 1973) 323 s., kr. 86,25. Bd. II Oversigt over retsudviklingen (Akademisk Foralg, Kbhv. 1975

Kongelev og krongods

Kongelev and Crown LandsSince the middle of the nineteenth century there has been a particular tradition among Danish historians regarding the use of the concepts "the king's domain" and "the crown lands." There is no doubt that Danish historians' view of this matter rests upon the authority of three legal historians and jurists: Johannes Steenstrup (1844-1935), Henning Matzen (1840-1910) and Poul Johannes Jørgensen (1873-1947). Steenstrup defined crown lands (kongelev) as the estates assigned for the sustenance of the king regardless of the succession, as opposed to the royal patrimony, which consisted of the king's inherited property. In the beginning of the nineteenth century historians had discussed the question of the kings' right to the realm and its estates, but Steenstrup reacted forcefully, when the historian Caspar Paludan-Müller (1805-1882) in 1871 ascertained that the registration of crown lands in King Valdemar's Cadastre was merely to be considered as an exercise in handwriting. While Paludan-Müller considered patrimony solely as the king's inheritance, Steenstrup saw it not only as inheritance, but also as private wealth - basing his view on the juridical contradistinction to crown lands (kongelev). Steenstrup's contention is ultimately explained by his own as well as his contemporaries' legal method, which was based on their rationalistic view of natural law and the conceptual jurisprudence of the nineteenth century. Matzen, like Steenstrup, considered the king's and the crown's property rights as an instance of a fixed concept of the right of property. For them the right of inheritance and the right of property flowed from a given legal system; it was assumed to be primordial and universal. Steenstrup's arguments for what he presented as an age-old distinction are, however, demonstrably flawed by distortions suited to supporting his conclusions, for it can be clearly shown that the distinction between the king's and the crown's property does not go back to the twelfth century. The nineteenth century's legal concept of the right of property is not a concept found in the Middle Ages, where no distinction was made between property rights and possession.Conclusions based on the premise that the king or the crown owned all the estates of the realm are therefore misconceptions, however persistently they occur in presentday Danish historical writings. In some of this literature regal rights are also endowed with great age, whereas they first appear in a European context at the Diet of Roncalia in 1158. Finally, the concept of crown lands presupposes the legal phenomenon of a juridical or fictitious person, a concept developed in Canon Law on the basis of Roman Law and accepted only much later by secular jurists. There is therefore no reason to equate the list of kongelev in Valdemar's Cadastre (the word itself is found in no other source) with crown lands. The basis for the distinction between crown lands and patrimony is thereby dissolved. Whatever the meaning of kongelev, it cannot be decided philologically. The question remains moot, but legal definitions of the nineteenth century are no help in understanding Mediaeval legal concepts: Le conformisme commence á la definition. Translated by Michael Wolf

Occupational Pattern and Income Inequality in A Sichuan Village

This article is based on a stay in Xin Cun village in Sichuan province during most of the month of March 1988. The participants of the field work were organized in four groups, dealing with agriculture, village industry, family Peter Fenger, Steen Folke, Allan Jsrgensen, Peter Milthers and Ole Odgaard and womens issues and organization and decision making. All groups carried out numerous interviews with village leaders and ordinary villagers, using formal questionnaires as well as informal checklists. All interviews were undertaken without accompanying officials, and no questionnaires were subject to official approval. Important knowledge was acquired when accomodated in the private homes of villagers, who patiently answered our innumerable questions. We have chosen to concentrate on the occupation and income situation, as we succeeded in obtaining detailed quantitative data on these issues for each and every household in the village. We are aware of the question of reliability. The data material is not without lacunae and inconsistencies, and some of these will be discussed in this presentation. However, we have no reason to believe that this detailed statistical material, obtained from the village authorities, should not be authentic and, generally speaking, correct. The interviews we conducted with numerous families both confirmed the overall validity and revealed some minor discrepancies

Danmark i Senmiddelalderen

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