RT Article
T1 The Crisis and Recovery of Criminal Justice in Late Sixteenth-Century France
JF The sixteenth century journal
VO 55
IS 1/2
SP 195
OP 219
A1 Hamilton, Tom 1987-
LA English
YR 2024
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1906795096
AB This article considers the role of criminal justice in maintaining state authority and social cohesion during a period of crisis. It presents a case study of the Parlement of Paris during the French Wars of Religion (1562-98), particularly in the final phase of the conflict known as the troubles of the League (1584-98). The article analyses a major body of new evidence in sample periods of appeals to the Parlement that contain a total of 2,500 appellants who brought their cases to Paris from across the court's jurisdiction. This evidence demonstrates that, despite the crisis of the civil wars, the magistrates of the Parlement ensured that some provision for criminal justice remained in place. In this light, we might reassess the resilience of criminal justice under the Old Regime and judge it not only by the ideal of absolute monarchy that its advocates misleadingly proclaimed, but rather within the limited resources and systemic constraints that existed at the time.
K1 Authority
K1 Criminal Justice System
K1 Criminal Law
K1 French Wars of Religion, 1562-1598
K1 Social Cohesion
DO 10.1086/731060