Sachsenspiegel

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The Sachsenspiegel (lit. "Saxon mirror"; Low German: Sassenspegel) is the most important law book and legal code of the German Middle Ages. Written ca. 1220 as a record of existing law, it was used in parts of Germany until as late as 1900, and is important not only for its lasting effect on German law, but also as an early example of written German prose, being the first large legal document to be written in German, instead of Latin. A Latin edition is known to have existed, but only fragmented chapters remain.

[edit] History

Choosing the king. Top: the three ecclesiastical princes choosing the king, pointing at him. Centre: the Count Palatine of the Rhine hands over a golden key, acting as a servant. Behind him, the Duke of Saxony with his marshall's staff and the Margrave of Brandenburg bringing a bowl of warm water, as a valet. Below, the new king in front of the great men of the empire (Heidelberg Sachsenspiegel, around 1300)

The Sachsenspiegel was one of the first prose works in German language. It is believed to have been compiled by the Saxon administrator Eike von Repgow at the behest of his liege lord Graf Hoyer von Falkenstein in the years 1220 to 1235.^[1] Where the original was compiled is unclear. It was thought to have been written at Burg Falkenstein, but Peter Landau, an expert in medieval canon law recently suggested that it may have been written at the monastery of Altzelle (now Altzella).^[2]

The Sachsenspiegel served as a model for other law books like the Augsburger Sachsenspiegel, the "Deutschenspiegel", and the Schwabenspiegel. Its influence extended into Eastern Europe, the Netherlands, and the Baltic States.

In Prussia, the Sachsenspiegel was used until the introduction of the Allgemeines Landrecht für die preußischen Staaten in 1794. In Saxony it was used until the introduction of the Saxon Civil Code in 1865. In Anhalt and Thuringia the Sachsenspiegel was not replaced until the introduction of the German civil code, the Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch in 1900. Its precedents continued to be cited as recently as 1932 by the "Reichsgericht" (Supreme Court of the Reich).

The influence of the Sachsenspiegel, or at least parallels with it, can still be found in modern German law, for instance in inheritance law and the law governing disputes between neighbors:

[edit] Branches of Law

The Sachsenspiegel contains two branches of law: common law and the feudal law.

[edit] Common Law

The common law (Landrecht in German)is the law of free people including farmers (known as "legal persons"). It contains important regulations concerning property rights, inheritances, matrimonies, the distribution of goods and the regulation of various legal disputes (e.g. between neighbors). It also regulates the criminal law and the constitution of the courts. In terms of modern legal systems it can be thought of as including criminal and civil law.

[edit] Feudal Law

The feudal law (Lehnrecht in German) determines the relationship between the different estates, for example the election of emperors and kings, feudal rights, etc. Though it has no modern equivalent, it can be compared to what one would call today constitutional law.

[edit] Extant copies

Eike von Repgow from the Oldenburg Sachsenspiegel

Four (of the original seven) illuminated manuscripts copies are still extant. They are named after their present locations: Heidelberg, Oldenburg, Dresden, and Wolfenbüttel, and date from about 1300 to 1370.

[edit] Proverbs

Some German proverbs date from the Sachsenspiegel:

• "Wer zuerst kommt, mahlt zuerst" (First come, first served, literally: "Who comes first, grinds first"), which is a rule for the order for grinding corn by a miller.
• "Wo der Esel sich wälzt, da muss er Haare lassen.", lit: "Where donkey rolls, there he has to lose hairs." This is a rule for the jurisdiction of courts.

[edit] See also

• Germanic tribal laws

[edit] References

1. ^ Some sources give the period during which the Sachsenspiegel was written as 1220 to 1230, but 1220 to 1235 is given by others, such as sources at the Library of Congress ([1]), the European Court of Human Rights ([2]) and Tufts University ([3])
2. ^ The suggestion that the Sachsenspiegel was written at Altzelle was made in a paper given by Professor Landau at the Deutscher Rechtshistorikertag 2004 and later published in an article (Landau, Peter: Die Entstehungsgeschichte des Sachsenspiegels: Eike von Repgow, Altzelle und die anglo-normannische Kanonistik; Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 2005, Vol 61, No. 1, pp 73-101), cited at the German Wikipedia article on Kloster Altzella and http://www.rechtsbuchforschung.de.