Henry James Sumner Maine
Encyclopedia
Order of the Star of India
The Most Exalted Order of the Star of India is an order of chivalry founded by Queen Victoria in 1861. The Order includes members of three classes:# Knight Grand Commander # Knight Commander # Companion...
(15 August 1822 — 3 February 1888), was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
comparative jurist and historian
Historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...
. He is famous for the thesis outlined in Ancient Law that law and society developed "from status to contract." According to the thesis, in the ancient world individuals were tightly bound by status to traditional groups, while in the modern one, in which individuals are viewed as autonomous agents, they are free to make contracts and form associations with whomever they choose. Because of this thesis, Maine can be seen as one of the forefathers of modern sociology of law
Sociology of law
The sociology of law is often described as a sub-discipline of sociology or an interdisciplinary approach within legal studies...
.
Biography
Maine was educated at Christ's HospitalChrist's Hospital
Christ's Hospital is an English coeducational independent day and boarding school with Royal Charter located in the Sussex countryside just south of Horsham in Horsham District, West Sussex, England...
, where a boarding house was named after him in 1902. From there he went up to Pembroke College, Cambridge
Pembroke College, Cambridge
Pembroke College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England.The college has over seven hundred students and fellows, and is the third oldest college of the university. Physically, it is one of the university's larger colleges, with buildings from almost every century since its...
, in 1840. At Cambridge, he was one of the most brilliant classical scholars of his time and also won the Chancellor's Gold Medal
Chancellor's Gold Medal
The Chancellor's Gold Medal is a prestigious annual award at Cambridge University for poetry, paralleling Oxford University's Newdigate prize. It was first presented by Prince William Frederick, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh during his time as Chancellor of the University of Cambridge...
for poetry in 1842. He won a Craven scholarship and graduated as senior classic in 1844, being also senior chancellor's medallist in classics.
Shortly afterwards, he accepted a tutorship at Trinity Hall
Trinity Hall, Cambridge
Trinity Hall is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. It is the fifth-oldest college of the university, having been founded in 1350 by William Bateman, Bishop of Norwich.- Foundation :...
. In 1847, he was appointed regius professor of civil law
Regius Professor of Civil Law (Cambridge)
The Regius Professorship of Civil Law is one of the oldest and most prestigious of the professorships at the University of Cambridge.The chair was founded by Henry VIII in 1540 with a stipend of £40 per year, and the holder is still chosen by The Crown....
, and he was called to the bar three years later; he held this chair till 1854. Maine contributed to the Cambridge Essays an essay on Roman law and legal education, republished in the later editions of Village Communities, which was the first characteristic evidence of his genius.
Meanwhile, in 1852 he had become one of the readers appointed by the Inns of Court
Inns of Court
The Inns of Court in London are the professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. All such barristers must belong to one such association. They have supervisory and disciplinary functions over their members. The Inns also provide libraries, dining facilities and professional...
, in the first of their many half-hearted attempts at legal education. Lectures delivered by Maine in this capacity were the groundwork of Ancient Law (1861) (See Wikisource), the book by which his reputation was made at one stroke. Its object, as stated in the preface, was "to indicate some of the earliest ideas of mankind, as they are reflected in ancient law, and to point out the relation of those ideas to modern thought." Within a year of its publication, the post of legal member of council in India was offered to Maine, then a junior member of the bar with little practice, few advantages of connection and no political or official claims. He declined once, on grounds of health; the very next year the office was again vacant. This time Maine was persuaded to accept, not that his health had improved, but that he thought India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
might not make it much worse.
It turned out that India suited him much better than Cambridge or London. He was asked to prolong his services beyond the regular term of five years, and returned to England in 1869. The subjects on which it was his duty to advise the government of India were as much political as legal. They ranged from such problems as the land settlement of the Punjab
Punjab region
The Punjab , also spelled Panjab |water]]s"), is a geographical region straddling the border between Pakistan and India which includes Punjab province in Pakistan and the states of the Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh and some northern parts of the National Capital Territory of Delhi...
, or the introduction of civil marriage to provide for the needs of unorthodox Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
s, to the question how far the study of Persian
Persian language
Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...
should be required or encouraged among European civil servants. Plans of codification were prepared, and largely shaped, under Maine's direction, which were implemented by his successors, Sir James Fitzjames Stephen
James Fitzjames Stephen
Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, 1st Baronet was an English lawyer, judge and writer. He was created 1st Baronet Stephen by Queen Victoria.-Early life:...
and Dr Whitley Stokes. The results are open to criticism in details, but form on the whole a remarkable achievement in the conversion of unwritten and highly technical law into a body of written law sufficiently clear to be administered by officers to many of whom its ideas and language are foreign. All this was in addition to the routine of legislative and consulting work and the establishment of the legislative department of the government of India.
Maine's power of swiftly assimilating new ideas and appreciating modes of thought and conduct remote from modern Western life came into contact with the facts of Indian society at exactly the right time, and his colleagues and other competent observers expressed the highest opinion of his work. In return, Maine brought back from his Indian office a store of knowledge that enriched all his later writings, though he took India as an explicit theme only once. This essay on India was his contribution to the composite work entitled The Reign of Queen Victoria (ed. T. H. Ward, 1887).
As vice-chancellor of the University of Calcutta
University of Calcutta
The University of Calcutta is a public university located in the city of Kolkata , India, founded on 24 January 1857...
, Maine commented on the results produced by the contact of Eastern and Western thought. Three of these addresses were published, wholly or in part, in the later editions of Village Communities; the substance of others is understood to be embodied in the Cambridge Rede lecture
Rede Lecture
The Sir Robert Rede's Lecturer is an annual appointment to give a public lecture, the Sir Robert Rede's Lecture at the University of Cambridge. It is named for Sir Robert Rede, who was Chief Justice of the Common Pleas in the sixteenth century.-Initial series:The initial series of lectures ranges...
of 1875, which is to be found in the same volume. Maine became a member of the secretary of state's council in 1871, and remained so for the rest of his life. In the same year he was gazetted a K.C.S.I.
Order of the Star of India
The Most Exalted Order of the Star of India is an order of chivalry founded by Queen Victoria in 1861. The Order includes members of three classes:# Knight Grand Commander # Knight Commander # Companion...
In 1869, Maine was appointed to the chair of historical and comparative jurisprudence newly founded in the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
by Corpus Christi College
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom...
. Residence at Oxford was not required, and the election amounted to an invitation to the new professor to resume and continue in his own way the work he had begun in Ancient Law.
During the succeeding years, he published the principal matters of his lectures in a carefully revised literary form: Village Communities in the East and the West (1871); Early History of Institutions (1875); Early Law and Custom (1883). In all these works, the phenomena of societies in an archaic stage, whether still capable of observation or surviving in a fragmentary manner among more modern surroundings or preserved in contemporary records, are brought into line, often with singular felicity, to establish and illustrate the normal process of development in legal and political ideas (see freedom of contract
Freedom of contract
Freedom of contract is the freedom of individuals and corporations to form contracts without government restrictions. This is opposed to government restrictions such as minimum wage, competition law, or price fixing...
).
In 1877, the mastership of Trinity Hall, Cambridge
Trinity Hall, Cambridge
Trinity Hall is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. It is the fifth-oldest college of the university, having been founded in 1350 by William Bateman, Bishop of Norwich.- Foundation :...
, where Maine had formerly been tutor, became vacant. There were two strong candidates whose claims were so nearly equal that it was difficult to elect either; the difficulty was solved by a unanimous invitation to Maine to accept the post. His acceptance entailed the resignation of the Oxford chair, though not continuous residence at Cambridge. Ten years later, considerations of a similar kind led to his election to succeed Sir William Harcourt
William Vernon Harcourt (politician)
Sir William George Granville Venables Vernon Harcourt was a British lawyer, journalist and Liberal statesman. He served as Member of Parliament for various constituencies and held the offices of Home Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer under William Ewart Gladstone before becoming Leader of...
as Whewell Professor of International Law at Cambridge. His brief performance in this office is represented by a posthumous volume that had not received his own final revision, International Law (1888).
Meanwhile, Maine had published in 1886 his one work of speculative politics, a volume of essays on Popular Government, designed to show that democracy is not in itself more stable than any other form of government, and that there is no necessary connexion between democracy and progress. The book was deliberately unpopular in tone; it excited much controversial comment and some serious discussion.
In 1886, there appeared in the Quarterly Review (clxii. 181) an article on the posthumous work of JF McLennan, edited and completed by his brother, entitled "The Patriarchal Theory". The article, though necessarily unsigned (in accordance with the rule of the Quarterly as it then stood), was Maine's reply to the McLennan brothers' attack on the historical reconstruction of the Indo-European family system put forward in Ancient Law and supplemented in Early Law and Custom. Maine was generally averse from controversy, but showed on this occasion that it was not for want of controversial power. He carried the war back into the invader's country, and charged JF McLennan's theory of primitive society with owing its plausible appearance of universal validity to general neglect of the Indo-European evidence and misapprehension of such portions of it as McLennan did attempt to handle.
Maine's health, which had never been strong, gave way towards the end of 1887. He went to the Riviera under medical advice, and died at Cannes
Cannes
Cannes is one of the best-known cities of the French Riviera, a busy tourist destination and host of the annual Cannes Film Festival. It is a Commune of France in the Alpes-Maritimes department....
, France, on 3 February 1888. He left a wife, Jane, and two sons, of whom the elder died soon afterwards.
A comprehensive summary of Maine's principal writings may be seen in Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff
Mountstuart Elphinstone Grant Duff
Sir Mountstuart Elphinstone Grant Duff GCSI, CIE, PC FRS , known as M. E. Grant Duff before 1887 and as Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff thereafter, was a Scottish politician, administrator and author...
's memoir, drawing particular attention to Maine's advice to his countrymen, in the heyday of British imperial self-confidence, that they should avoid the insularity that results from ignorance of all but their own law and institutions; his example showed the benefit of the contrary habit. Maine's prominent use of Roman law and the wide range of his observation have made his works as intelligible abroad as at home and thereby much valuable information—for example, concerning the nature of British supremacy in India, and the position of native institutions there—has been made the property of the world of letters instead of the peculiar and obscure possession of a limited class of British public servants.
Foreign readers of Maine have perhaps understood even better than British ones that he is not the propounder of a system, but the pioneer of a method, and that detailed criticism, profitable as it may be and necessary as in time it must be, will not leave the method itself less valid or diminish the worth of the Maine's lessons in its use. Maine also wrote much that was never publicly acknowledged. Before he went to India, he was one of the original contributors to the Saturday Review
Saturday Review (London)
The Saturday Review of politics, literature, science, and art was a London weekly newspaper established by A. J. B. Beresford Hope in 1855....
, founded in 1855, and the inventor of its name. Like his intimate friend James Fitzjames Stephen
James Fitzjames Stephen
Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, 1st Baronet was an English lawyer, judge and writer. He was created 1st Baronet Stephen by Queen Victoria.-Early life:...
, he was an accomplished journalist, enjoyed occasional article-writing as a diversion from official duties, and never quite abandoned it. The practice of such writing probably counted for something in the freedom and clearness of Maine's style and the effectiveness of his dialectic. His books are a model of scientific exposition that never ceases to be literature.
Works
- Maine, Henry Sumner, 'Ancient Law: Its Connection With the Early History of Society, and Its Relation to Modern Ideas,' London, John Murray, 1861
- Maine, Henry Sumner, Ancient Law: Its Connection With the Early History of Society, and Its Relation to Modern Ideas scanned copy of original printed book
- Maine, Henry Sumner, Village-communities in the East and West; six lectures delivered at Oxford, London, John Murray 1871
- Maine, Henry Sumner, Early History of Institutions, London, John Murray, 1875
- Maine, Henry Sumner, Dissertations on Early Law and Custom, New York, John Holt 1883
- Maine, Henry Sumner, Popular Government London, John Murray 1886
Literature
- Raymond Cocks "Sir Henry Maine: A Study in Victorian Jurisprudence" (Cambridge) 1988
- Alan Diamond, ed., The Victorian Achievement of Sir Henry Maine: A Centennial Reappraisal, Cambridge University Press (1991) ISBN 0521400236; (2006) ISBN 052103454X
- George Feaver "From Status to Contract: A Biography of Sir Henry Maine 1822-1888" (London:Longmans Green) 1969
- Alfred Comyn LyallAlfred Comyn LyallSir Alfred Comyn Lyall, GCIE, KCB was a British civil servant, literary historian and poet.-Early life:He was born at Coulsdon in Surrey, the second son of Alfred Lyall and Mary Drummond Broadwood, daughter of James Shudi Broadwood. He was educated at Eton...
and others, in Law Quart. Rev. iv. 129 seq. (1888) - Carl Landauer, "Henry Summner Maine´s Grand Tour: Roman Law and Ancient Law" Current Legal Issues 6 (2003) 135-147.
- Sir Frederick Pollock, "Sir Henry Maine and his Work," in Oxford Lectures, etc. (1890); "Sir H. Maine as a Jurist," Edin. Rev. (July 1893); Introduction and Notes to new ed. of Ancient Law (1906)
- Sir M. E. Grant DuffMountstuart Elphinstone Grant DuffSir Mountstuart Elphinstone Grant Duff GCSI, CIE, PC FRS , known as M. E. Grant Duff before 1887 and as Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff thereafter, was a Scottish politician, administrator and author...
, Sir Henry Maine: a brief Memoir of his Life... with some of his Indian speeches and Minutes Selected and Edited by Whitley Stokes. London: John Murray, (1892); Notes from a Diary, passim - Leslie StephenLeslie StephenSir Leslie Stephen, KCB was an English author, critic and mountaineer, and the father of Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell.-Life:...
, "Maine" in Dictionary of National BiographyDictionary of National BiographyThe Dictionary of National Biography is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published from 1885...
(1893) - Paul VinogradoffPaul VinogradoffSir Paul Vinogradoff November 1854, Kostroma, Russia– 19 December 1925, Paris, France) was a highly reputable Anglo-Russian historian-medievalist.-Career:...
, The Teaching of Sir Henry Maine (1904) - Karuna Mantena, Alibis of Empire: Henry Maine and the Ends of Liberal Imperialism (Princeton, PUP, 2010)
- Minoti Chakravarti-Kaul, "Common Lands and Customary Law: Institutional Change in North India over the Past Two Centuries" Oxford University Press, 1996