Henry James Sumner Maine
Sir Henry Maine | |
---|---|
Kelso, Scotland, UK | |
Died | 3 February 1888 Cannes, France | (aged 65)
Alma mater | Pembroke College, Cambridge |
Scientific career | |
Fields | History, law |
Institutions | University of Oxford University of Cambridge University of Calcutta |
Signature | |
Sir Henry James Sumner Maine,
Early life
Maine was the son of Dr. James Maine, of
Shortly afterwards, he accepted a tutorship at Trinity Hall. In 1847, he was appointed Regius Professor of Civil Law,[7] and he was called to the bar three years later; he held this chair until 1854. Meanwhile, in 1852 he had become one of the readers appointed by the Inns of Court.[3]
In India
The post of legal member of council in India was offered to Maine in 1861; he declined it once, on grounds of health. The following year Maine was persuaded to accept, and 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 he returned to England in 1869.[3]
The subjects on which it was Maine's duty to advise the government of India were as much political as legal. They ranged from such problems as the land settlement of the
Maine became a member of the Secretary of State's council in 1871 and remained so for the rest of his life.[3] In the same year he was gazetted a K.C.S.I.[8]
Oxford professor
In 1869, Maine was appointed to the
In 1877, the mastership of
In 1886, he was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society.[11]
Death
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, France, on 3 February 1888. He left a wife, Jane, and two sons, of whom the elder died soon afterwards.[10] An oil portrait of Jane remains in the possession of their descendants.[12]
Works
Maine wrote journalism in 1851 for the
Maine contributed to the Cambridge Essays an essay on Roman law and legal education, republished in the later editions of Village Communities. Lectures delivered by Maine for the Inns of Court were the groundwork of Ancient Law (1861), 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." He published the substance of his Oxford lectures: 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 are brought into line to illustrate the process of development in legal and political ideas[10] (see freedom of contract).
As vice-chancellor of the
His brief work in international law is represented by the posthumous volume International Law (1888). Maine had published in 1885 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.[10]
In 1886, there appeared in the Quarterly Review an article on the posthumous work of
A summary of Maine's writings was in
Selected publications
- Ancient Law: Its Connection with the Early History of Society, and Its Relation to Modern Ideas. London: John Murray, 1861.
- Village-Communities in the East and West. London: John Murray, 1871.
- The Early History of the Property of Married Women. Manchester: A. Ireland and Co., 1873.
- Lectures on the Early History of Institutions. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1875.
- Dissertations on Early Law and Custom: Chiefly Selected from Lectures Delivered at Oxford. London: John Murray, 1883.
- Popular Government: Four Essays. London: John Murray, 1885.
- International Law: A Series of Lectures Delivered Before the University of Cambridge, 1887. London: John Murray, 1888.
- Plato: A Poem. Cambridge: Privately Printed, 1894.
Selected articles
- "Mr. Fitzjames Stephen's Introduction to the Indian Evidence Act," The Fortnightly Review, Vol. XIX, 1873.
- "South Slavonians and Rajpoots," The Nineteenth Century, Vol. II, 1877.
- "The King and his Successor," The Fortnightly Review, Vol. XXXVII, 1882.
Notes
- ^ Bevir, Mark (2017). Historicism and the Human Sciences in Victorian Britain. Cambridge University Press. p. 5.
- ^ Pollock, Frederick (1893). "Sir H. Maine as a Jurist," The Edinburgh Review, Vol. 178, pp. 100–121.
- ^ a b c d e f Pollock 1911, p. 432.
- ^ Maine, Henry (1861). Ancient Law, Its Connection with the Early History of Society, and Its Relation to Modern Ideas (1 ed.). London: John Murray. p. 170.
- ^ University of Cambridge (1859). A Complete Collection of the English Poems which Have Obtained the Chancellor's Gold Medal in the University of Cambridge (PDF). Cambridge: W. Metcalfe. Retrieved 1 October 2008.
- ^ "Maine, Henry James Sumner (MN840HJ)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
- ^ "Henry James Sumner Maine," Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. 23, 1887–1888, p. 356. via – Internet Archive
- ^ "No. 23739". The London Gazette. 20 May 1871. p. 2474.
- ^ Grant Duff, M.E (1892). Sir Henry Maine: A Brief Memoir of his Life. London: John Murray, p. 36.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Pollock 1911, p. 433.
- ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 24 May 2021.
- ^ "Seeking Sir Henry in British Columbia". Democracy Street. 26 June 2011. Retrieved 4 March 2020.
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/17808. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ Maine, Henry (1887). "India". The Reign of Queen Victoria, A Survey of Fifty Years of Progress (Thomas Ward ed.). Vol. I. London: Smith, Elder & CO. pp. 460–558.
- ^ Maine, Henry (1886). "The Patriarchal Theory," The Quarterly Review, Vol. 162, pp. 181–209.
References
- public domain: Pollock, Frederick (1911). "Maine, Sir Henry James Sumner". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 17 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 432–433. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
- Stephen, Leslie (1893). . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 35. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
Further reading
- Carey, George (2008). "Maine, Henry Sumner (1822–1888)". In OCLC 750831024.
- Cassani, Anselmo (2002), Diritto, antropologia e storia: studi su Henry Sumner Maine, prefazione di Vincenzo Ferrari, Bologna, Clueb.
- Chakravarty-Kaul, Minoti (1996). Common Lands and Customary Law: Institutional Change in North India over the Past Two Centuries, Oxford University Press.
- Cocks, Raymond (1988). Sir Henry Maine: A Study in Victorian Jurisprudence. Cambridge University Press.
- Cotterrell, Roger (2003). The Politics of Jurisprudence: A Critical Introduction to Legal Philosophy. Oxford University Press, pp. 40–48.
- Deflem, Mathieu (2023). "Maine, (Sir) Henry (1822–1888)." In The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology, Second Edition, edited by George Ritzer and Chris Rojek. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
- Diamond, Alan. ed. (2006). The Victorian Achievement of Sir Henry Maine: A Centennial Reappraisal. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521400236, 052103454X
- Feaver, George (1969). From Status to Contract: A Biography of Sir Henry Maine 1822–1888. London: Longmans Green.
- Hamza, Gabor (1991): Sir Henry Maine et le droit comparé. Annales Universitatis Scientiarum Budapestinensis de Rolando Eötvös nominatae, Sectio Juridica pp. 59–76.
- Hamza, Gabor (2007): Sir Henry Maine’work and the traditional legal systems. In: Chinese Culture and the Rule of Law. Ed. by China Society of Legal History. Social Sciences Academic Press (China) Beijing, pp. 417–429.
- Hamza, Gabor (2008): Sir Henry Maine et le droit comparé. In: Philia. Scritti per Gennaro Franciosi. (A cura di F. M. d’Ippolito), vol. II. Napoli pp. 1217–1232.
- Grant Duff, Sir M.E (1900). Notes From a Diary, 1886–1888, Vol. 2. London: John Murray.
- Landauer, Carl (2003). "Henry Summner Maine´s Grand Tour: Roman Law and Ancient Law," Current Legal Issues, Vol. 6, pp. 135–147.
- Lyall, Alfred Comyn [and others] (1888). "Sir Henry Maine". Law Quarterly Review, Vol. IV, pp. 129–138.
- Mantena, Karuna (2010). Alibis of Empire: Henry Maine and the Ends of Liberal Imperialism. Princeton University Press.
- Pollock, Sir Frederick (1890). "Sir Henry Maine and his Work." In: Oxford Lectures. London: Macmillan Company, pp. 147–168; Ancient Law, Introduction and Notes. London: John Murray.
- Vinogradoff, Paul (1904). The Teaching of Sir Henry Maine. London: Henry Frowde.
External links
- "Sir Henry Maine (Obituary Notice, Monday, February 6, 1888)". Eminent Persons: Biographies reprinted from The Times. Vol. IV (1887–1890). London: Macmillan and Co., Limited. 1893. pp. 24–34. Retrieved 11 February 2019 – via Internet Archive.
- Works by Henry James Sumner Maine at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about Henry James Sumner Maine at Internet Archive
- Works by Henry James Sumner Maine, at Hathi Trust
- Maine, Henry Sumner: at McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought.
- Maine, Henry Sumner: at Online Library of Liberty
- Henry Sumner Maine, Writings
- Portraits of Henry James Sumner Maine at the National Portrait Gallery, London