Imperial Russian Law Exhibited at Yale Law Library
- by Michael Stillman
On display at the Yale Law Library.
The latest exhibition from the Yale University Law Library's Rare Book Collection is on display from now through May 25, 2012. This exhibit takes a look at MonumentsofImperialRussianLaw.This brings us back to the days before the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. Russia had built up an extensive code of law under the czars, but once the Communists came to power, they tried to bury all mention of the nation's past. There was to be no memory of those terrible days before the land became a workers' paradise.
With the fall of the Communists, Russia is again looking to its earlier past to help guide it through the post-Soviet era. According to William E. Butler, Distinguished Professor of Law and International Affairs at the Dickinson School of Law, Pennsylvania State University, “The post-Soviet era of Russian history has made the legacy of the pre-1917 era newly relevant in ways unimaginable. It is not merely a country recovering historical experience suppressed or distorted for ideological reasons during the Soviet regime, but a country seeking to modernize partly on the basis of its earlier legal legacy.” Butler is co-curator of the exhibition, along with Yale Law Rare Book Librarian Michael Widener. William Butler is the pre-eminent U.S. authority on the law of the former Soviet Union and is the author, co-author, editor, or translator of more than 120 books on Soviet, Russian, Ukrainian, and post-Soviet legal systems.
Among the items on display is a copy of the Sobornoeulozhenie, printed in 1649. It was the first printed collection of Russian laws, and it continued to be used into the 19th century. There are also three versions of the Nakaz (Instructions). This statement of law was promulgated by Catherine II in 1767. It was patterned on the enlightenment thoughts coming out of France at the time. She actually wrote it in French. It provided for such things as equality of men before the law, and disapproved of the death penalty and torture (no wonder the Soviets didn't want to to remember their past). If not applied in all its humanitarian splendor, it was still a remarkable document for its time, and helped earn Catherine the sobriquet of “Catherine the Great” (without it she simply would have been “Catherine the Ordinary”).
The exhibit includes material from the Yale University libraries, the Harvard Law Library, and a private collection. It is open to the public daily from 9:00 am – 10:00 pm at the Lillian Goldman Law Library at the Yale Law School in New Haven.
Swann Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books December 9, 2025
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 156: Cornelis de Jode, Americae pars Borealis, double-page engraved map of North America, Antwerp, 1593.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 206: John and Alexander Walker, Map of the United States, London and Liverpool, 1827.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 223: Abraham Ortelius, Typus Orbis Terrarum, hand-colored double-page engraved world map, Antwerp, 1575.
Swann Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books December 9, 2025
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 233: Aaron Arrowsmith, Chart of the World, oversize engraved map on 8 sheets, London, 1790 (circa 1800).
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 239: Fielding Lucas, A General Atlas, 81 engraved maps and diagrams, Baltimore, 1823.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 240: Anthony Finley, A New American Atlas, 15 maps engraved by james hamilton young on 14 double-page sheets, Philadelphia, 1826.
Swann Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books December 9, 2025
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 263: John Bachmann, Panorama of the Seat of War, portfolio of 4 double-page chromolithographed panoramic maps, New York, 1861.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 265: Sebastian Münster, Cosmographei, Basel: Sebastian Henricpetri, 1558.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 271: Abraham Ortelius, Epitome Theatri Orteliani, Antwerp: Johann Baptist Vrients, 1601.
Swann Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books December 9, 2025
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 283: Joris van Spilbergen, Speculum Orientalis Occidentalisque Indiae, Leiden: Nicolaus van Geelkercken for Jodocus Hondius, 1619.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 285: Levinus Hulsius, Achtzehender Theil der Newen Welt, 14 engraved folding maps, Frankfurt: Johann Frederick Weiss, 1623.
Swann, Dec. 9: Lot 341: John James Audubon, Carolina Parrot, Plate 26, London, 1827.
Sotheby’s Book Week December 9-17, 2025
Sotheby’s, Dec. 11: Darwin and Wallace. On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties..., [in:] Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society, Vol. III, No. 9., 1858, Darwin announces the theory of natural selection. £100,000 to £150,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 11: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997, first edition, hardback issue, inscribed by the author pre-publication. £100,000 to £150,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 11: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Autograph sketchleaf including a probable draft for the E flat Piano Quartet, K.493, 1786. £150,000 to £200,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 12: Hooke, Robert. Micrographia: or some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies made by Magnifying Glasses. London: James Allestry for the Royal Society, 1667. $12,000 to $15,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 12: Chappuzeau, Samuel. The history of jewels, first edition in English. London: T.N. for Hobart Kemp, 1671. $12,000 to $18,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 12: Sowerby, James. Exotic Mineralogy, containing his most realistic mineral depictions, London: Benjamin Meredith, 1811, Arding and Merrett, 1817. $5,000 to $7,000.
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