Research Catalog

Title

Law, violence, and community in classical Athens / David Cohen.

Author

Cohen, David (David J.)

Publication

Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 1995.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

xii, 214 p.; 24 cm.

Summary

• The theme of this book is the legal regulation of violence and the role of litigation in Athenian society. Using comparative anthropological and historical perspectives, David Cohen challenges traditional evolutionary and functionalist accounts of the development of legal process. Examining Athenian theories of social conflict and the rule of law, as well as actual litigation involving the regulation of violence, he emphasizes the way in which the judicial process operates in an agonistic social field. In this light, it appears that judges and litigants alike view the courts as a competitive arena where ongoing conflicts are played out, continued, and exacerbated according to a logic characteristic of feuding societies. A sustained account of Athenian litigation places this subject in a new theoretical perspective and offers a new interpretation of the social and political dimensions of legal process.
• This book will be of interest to a broad audience of students and scholars in classics, history, anthropology, sociology, law, and political science.

Series Statement

Key themes in ancient history

Uniform Title

Key themes in ancient history

Subject

• To 146 B.C
• Justice, Administration of > Athens > History
• Sociological jurisprudence
• Rule of law > Athens > History
• Courts > Athens > History
• Violence > Athens > History
• Social conflict > Athens > History
• Athens (Greece) > History
• Greece > History > To 146 B.C

Genre/Form

History

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 199-211) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

1. Law and order -- 2. Theorizing Athenian society: the problem of stability -- 3. Theorizing Athenian society: the rule of law -- 4. Rhetoric, litigation, and the values of an agonistic society -- 5. Litigation as feud -- 6. Violence and litigation -- 7. Hubris and the legal regulation of sexual violence -- 8. Litigation and the family -- Conclusion: litigation, democracy and the courts.

ISBN

• 0521381673 (hardcover)
• 0521388376 (pbk.)

LCCN

^^^94045184^

OCLC

• 31608084
• SCSB-10357679

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library