Early English Laws

Project start date: 2009-01 Project end date: 2019-01
The project aims to edit or re-edit and translate all 138 early English legal codes, edicts and treatises produced up to the time of Magna Carta 1215, and to provide each with an introduction and full commentary on all aspects of the texts, language and law. It also aims to provide a comprehensive resource on early law, including introductory essays on issues of law, language, archaeology, palaeography and codicology, descriptions of all manuscripts holding legal texts and used for this edition, glossaries in Old English, Latin and Anglo-Norman, and a regularly updated bibliography and guide to the literature, with links to relevant philological and archaeological sites.
Subject domains: 
Era(s): 
Country/region(s): 
Methods usedCategory
2d Scanning and photographyData capture
IndexingData analysis
Text encoding - descriptiveData structuring and enhancement
Text encoding - presentationalData structuring and enhancement
Text encoding - referentialData structuring and enhancement
Text Encoding Initiative (TEI)Metadata standards
Collaborative publishingData publishing and dissemination
textContent types
historyDiscipline
Funding sources: 
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
Content types created: 
Dataset/structured data, Still Image/Graphics, Text
Software tools used: 
none as yet
Source material used:  
Legal codes and treatises produced in England between the reign of Æthelberht of Kent and Magna Carta (1215). Mauscripts and the universally cited and still useful editions of Liebermann and Stubbs (Select Charters 1913).
Digital resource created:  
Online edition of all 138 early English legal texts produced up to the time of Magna Carta 1215, with translation, commentaries and introductory sections. In the first phase (autumn 2011), about ten texts will be published, along with the bibliography, images of the texts and the current editions of the laws available in Felix Liebermann's Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen. The website will contain an online collaborative workspace where historians, students and other interested parties can post queries and comments about the texts, the laws and legal history in general, as well as arguments for alternative reconstructions of texts, translations and interpretations.
Access to digital resource:  
Open Access
Data Formats created: 
Extensible Markup Language (XML)
Generation of HTML files from XML data for web-delivery
Metadata standards employed: 
Text Encoding Initiative (TEI)

Institutions affiliated with this project: 

UK HE institutions involved:
King's College London
University of London
Institute of Historical Research

Project staff and expertise: 

Principal staff member:Dr Jane Winters (Principal Investigator), Paul Spence (Co-Investigator), Professor Bruce O’Brien (Academic Adviser), Dr Jenny Benham (Project Editor)
Other staff:Computing officer(s) / Technical supporter(s)
External expertise:


Metadata on this arts-humanities.net record
Author(s) of recordJane Winters
TitleEarly English Laws
Record created2010-04-22
Record updated2010-06-29 09:52
URL of recordhttp://www.arts-humanities.net/node/3510
Citation of recordJane Winters: Early English Laws.
<http://www.arts-humanities.net/node/3510>
created: 2010-04-22, last updated 2010-06-29 09:52