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Category: Collections

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Swimming a Witch: Evidence in 17th-century English Witchcraft Trials

Posted by: Nathan Dorn

In recent posts on this blog, I have written about the evidence used in 17th-century witch trials, both in America and in England. In those posts, I pointed out that proving the crime of witchcraft was no simple matter. Rules for evidence in criminal trials were not yet formalized at that time, and opinions about …

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17th Century Wardrobe Regulation in the Kingdom of Spain

Posted by: Stephen Mayeaux

The following is a guest post by Francesca Marquez, who served as a fall 2021 remote intern transcribing and researching documents in the Herencia: Centuries of Spanish Legal Documents crowdsourcing campaign at the Law Library of Congress. If, in the words of Victor Hugo, “curiosity is a sort of gluttony. To see is to devour[,]” then life …

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Enjoy Our New Virtual Meeting Background Featuring a 15th-Century Manuscript

Posted by: Kelly Goles

Many of us are still working from home or finding ourselves on modified work-from-home schedules. Why not spruce up your meetings with our new virtual background? This image comes from an illustrated manuscript of the Grand Coutumier de Normandie, from the Law Library’s rare book collection. This 15th-century manuscript, written on leaves of parchment, is …

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How Havana Became British … For Eleven Months

Posted by: Stephen Mayeaux

The following is a guest post by Silvia Lopez, who served as a fall 2021 remote intern transcribing and researching documents in the Herencia: Centuries of Spanish Legal Documents crowdsourcing campaign at the Law Library of Congress. One treasure from the Herencia collection of Spanish legal documents for the 15th -19th centuries is the Brief of Jose Antonio Manso de …

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How Not to Apologize: A Lesson from a 17th Century Hospital in Barcelona

Posted by: Stephen Mayeaux

The following is a guest post by Alèxia Devin, who served as a fall 2021 remote intern transcribing and researching documents in the Herencia: Centuries of Spanish Legal Documents crowdsourcing campaign at the Law Library of Congress. Special thanks to Francisco Macías for translation and analysis assistance. During my Herencia internship, I transcribed quite a few historical documents that …

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New Acquisition: A 14th-Century Manuscript of Registrum Brevium

Posted by: Nathan Dorn

Last month on this blog, I highlighted a 15th-century manuscript that the Law Library recently acquired that contained work on the laws of war for knights in the Middle Ages. In this post, I would like to announce the acquisition of another new addition to the Law Library’s growing collection of medieval manuscripts, a 14th-century …

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Introducing the Report on Turkish Presidential Decrees

Posted by: Kelly Goles

This is a guest post by Kayahan Cantekin, a foreign law specialist in the Global Legal Research Directorate of the Law Library of Congress. Our new report, Turkey: Presidential Decrees is now available on law.gov. The report provides an overview of the president’s power to issue presidential decrees under the Turkish Constitution. The presidential decree is …