Thomas McSweeney

Excited to announce that "Medieval Treatises and the Judicial Search for a Useable Past," which I wrote together with my colleague and friend Alli Larsen, has been accepted for publication in the Stanford Law Review.

Draft is available on SSRN. Just follow the link.

A little over a week ago I was up at Catholic U. to speak on a panel with John Langbein on the role of priests in the early history of the English common law. The panel was recorded if anyone is interested: cit.catholic.edu/events/the-p...

There was a case I discussed in my book where the major players were Richard, Roger, and Robert. Spent a lot of time rewriting to try to minimize reader confusion.

Fun fact: the painting on the front cover, of Odysseus, washed up on the shore of Phaeacia, kneeling in front of Nausicaä, actually hung in the court’s chamber. The book contains a wonderful description of the courtroom and how it was designed to send a message of rehabilitation. 3/3

Court, Credit, and Capital, A brilliant blend of legal, economic, and cultural history that reveals how credit and trust sustained commerce during the Dutch Golden Age 2/3

Excited to see Maurits den Hollander’s Court, Credit, and Capital in print with Studies in Legal History at CUP. Court, Credit, and Capital uncovers how Amsterdam’s 17th-century insolvency court transformed insolvency law—from punishment to rehabilitation 1/3

The God and the Bureaucrat is also just a great read. I enjoyed working with Zach to get it published with Studies in Legal History, and I’m happy to see it in print! 6/6

The Roman law that has come down to us is thus not a record of how Roman law actually worked on the ground so much as it is a record of how the Roman emperors represented their rule through the medium of law. 5/6

As Herz puts it “Classical Roman law should be understood not as a record of Classical Romans actually handling their legal business, but instead as a record of Romans using the structures of law to tell stories about their world and in particular about their state.” 4/6

Herz takes us through the process by which Roman law acquired these attributes. He argues that emperors used law as an important means of political representation. 3/6

Herz starts with the observation that Roman law, in the form in which it has come down to us, has three important attributes: it is suprapersonal (i.e., authority does not depend on the personality of the particular emperor issuing the law), it is technocratic, and it is supreme. 2/6

Really excited for @zacharyherz.bsky.social's new book, The God and the Bureaucrat: Roman Law, Imperial Sovereignty, and Other Stories, out now with Studies in Legal History at CUP. 1/6

2025 McGlothlin Teaching Award Given to Exceptional Business and Law Professors The 2025 McGlothlin Award for Exceptional Teaching has been granted to Professor Thomas J. McSweeney of William & Mary Law School and to Professor Alex Woods of the Raymond A. Mason School of Busines...

A very nice write up for the McGlothlin Award

I was honored to receive this at the law school graduation ceremony yesterday.

Congratulations to the William & Mary Law School class of 2025!

As a thank-you, the very thoughtful students in the legal history society gave me these.

Happy to do this for the grads and families. I'm glad so many people are interested in the history of the law school. Enough people signed up that we had to split it into two tours today!

The Journal of Legal History Volume 46, Issue 1 of The Journal of Legal History

Extremely pleased to announce (and first ever post here) that Danica Summerlin and my special issue on 'law beyond the legal renaissance', funded by @britishacademy.bsky.social, is now out, with open access introduction www.tandfonline.com/toc/flgh20/4... .

Politics from Law or Law as Politics? Hugh of Poitiers’s Chronica and the Politics of ius in the Mid-twelfth Century This paper considers the relationship between the modern concepts of law and politics and the twelfth-century concept of ius (‘law, right’) in a chronicle written by a monk, Hugh of Poitiers, betwe...

And link to my own article: Politics from Law or Law as Politics? Hugh of Poitiers’s Chronica and the Politics of ius in the Mid-twelfth Century www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Thomas McSweeney of William & Mary Law School Elected to the American Law Institute Thomas J. McSweeney, Professor of Law at William & Mary Law School, has been named among the latest elected members of the American Law Institute.

I was thrilled to learn, just before Christmas, that I was elected to the American Law Institute. Many thanks to the colleagues who nominated me!

A faint writing, the text is in Latin and it reads: Domina magistra felhin date mihi licenciam in hac nocte vigilare cum magistra adalu et ego vobis ambabus manibus confirmo atque iuro ut per totam noctem declinare volo aut legere aut pro seniore nostro cantare Valete et ut peto facite. (Abbreviations have been resolved in this transcription).

Sometimes working with manuscripts gets us really, really close to the people from the past allowing us to hear their voices. This is a story of a letter from a schoolgirl to her teacher, written probably sometime at the end of the 9th or the beginning of the 10th century. A thread 🧵 #medievalsky /1

A person wearing a dark tunic is leaving a windmill, presumably at the end of a hard day's work. The person is carrying a mallet and has a look on their face like they've done something wrong. Maybe they've killed the miller? Reference: Taymouth Hours, BL, Yates Thompson 13 (14th century)

Murder at the Medieval Mill

Medieval millers were not always well liked and it’s not uncommon to read in criminal court records that a miller had been killed. This person leaving a windmill sure looks like they regret doing something nefarious at the mill with the mallet they're holding. 🧵1/5

I'm chairing this search, and we're really eager for applicants!

A link to the minutes at Swem: digital.libraries.wm.edu/node/383718

Happy Birthday, Phi Beta Kappa!

248 years ago today, on December 5th, 1776, a group of William & Mary students met at the Raleigh Tavern on Duke of Gloucester Street and established Phi Beta Kappa. The original minutes, running from 1776 to 1781, are held by Swem Library.

Happy birthday, William & Mary Law School!

On December 4th, 1779, the Board of Visitors met and reorganized the college, establishing a chair in law, the first in the United States.

From the Virginia Gazette, December 18, 1779.

A record of a homicide case from 1255 in which the clerk recorded the wrong name for the killer, then put a line through the incorrect name and added the correct name. The record is written in brownish-black ink in abbreviated Latin on parchment. Reference: TNA, JUST 1/300C

Correcting errors in medieval records:

You listed the wrong person as a killer in a court record. What do you do? Well, you could draw a line through the name, as the clerk did in this homicide case from 1255 when he accidentally listed Walter le Stock as the killer instead of Walter Stuttuk. 🧵1/4

<em>The Economic History Review</em> | EHS Journal | Wiley Online Library Click on the article title to read more.

Do you want to stay up to date with scholarship on late medieval economic and social history?

@stephemmabrown.bsky.social's review of the literature published in 2023 is now available at Economic History Review doi.org/10.1111/ehr....
#MedievalSky #EconHist

A group of people are in a procession in the marginalia at the bottom of a manuscript. There are eight people in total. The person at the front is playing a fiddle, while the person at the back is banging a set of drums that is being carried by (what appears to be) a child. The other five people in the middle are holding hands.

Medieval villages were often tasked with transporting people to gaol. This could be dangerous and expensive business. Friends and family of criminals could try to free the person through violence or bribery. And if a captive escaped, then the village would collectively be fined £5–£8! 🧵1/5

I've put together a legal history starter pack for anyone interested in the history of crime & punishment, law, policing, social control, and violence. Please let me know if you want to (or know someone who should) be added to the list.
go.bsky.app/Vg4M4V5

Cover of the book 'Marginalized Religion and the Law in the Roman Empire', by K.P.S. Janssen. The background is an ochre yellow. The bottom left side of the cover is taken up by an ancient relief of Daniel in the lions' den, depicting a naked Daniel with his hands spread, standing up to his ankles in a pit with a lion on either side. Two figures in tunics or togas are standing behind him, with one of them carrying a basket.

Proud and happy to share that my first book 'Marginalized Religion and the Law in the Roman Empire' (based on my PhD research) will be out with OUP this December!

Interested? Pre-order now via global.oup.com/academic/pro...