"Treason" is a word with many connotations, a word applied to a
host of varied offenses throughout the history of humanity. These
essays by Floyd Seyward Lear analyze the development of the
political theory of treason from its beginning in Roman Law to its
transformation in the Germanic custom of the early Middle Ages.
The author has presented treason as a political idea, possessing
historical continuity, though varying from age to age as it follows
the evolution of political authority itself. These studies trace
the shifting emphasis in crimes against the state from acts
directed against a central absolutist authority to acts involving
the personal relationship of a pledged troth and individual fealty.
This is a shift from the concept of majesty in Roman law to the
concept of fidelity in Germanic law with the corollary shift from
allegiance as an act of deference to allegiance as a token of
mutual fidelity.
These ideas are examined chronologically across an interval
extending from archaic Roman law to incipiently feudal forms, from
which modern theories of treason, allegiance, and sovereignty
derive. Contemporary concepts in these political areas can hardly
be understood apart from their historical origins. Broadly
considered, this work is intended as a contribution to intellectual
history.
Further, this collection represents the synthesis of material
widely scattered in the primary sources and relevant secondary
works. The two concluding bibliographical essays are intended as a
general survey of the literature relevant to these studies in Roman
and Germanic public law. Descriptive and interpretive works which
deal with treason and its allied aspects of political and legal
theory are not numerous in the English language.
General
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