Appendix CASE ONE - Collection Point® | The Total Digital Asset ...

An Introduction to Iconographical Studies of Legal History 89
half a century before in Germany.
In 1900 Franz Heinemann, a German professor, published a richly illustrated
book in which, for the first time, some illustrations formed the basis for the
text. 10 Two years later von Amira published his famous book on the gestures
in the illustrations of the Sachsenspiegel. 11 Here for the first time in legal history
the illustrations themselves were the object of investigation. But probably the
first book on legal iconography is Hans Fehr's Recht im Bilde. 12 In this book Fehr
shows by means of authentic illustrations how much law and justice formerly
were incorporated into daily life. Then legal historians seemed to lose interest
and it was not until the 1960s that interest was renewed. 13 The last ten years
especially have been important for legal iconography as there are now some
major and growing collections in Europe. 14 In the Netherlands the collection
already contains over 6,000 photographs and is still growing rapidly. The data
are for the greater part on computer. 15 The documentation is done at the level of
iconographical description. 16 At this level the main task of the Centre ends and
the challenge for the legal historian begins, that is, iconographic interpretation,
looking for a deeper meaning, and iconology, the searching for cultural, social
and historical backgrounds of a picture. 17 Only then can the picture be used to
its utmost extent as a legal source. Only then can it clarify, complete and correct
our view of law and justice in former times; show us the interaction between,
for example, law and religion. Perhaps we may even detect the influence of
pictures on law. 18
Some examples may demonstrate the use that legal historians can make of
pictures. My first one (Illustration 4) is an engraving dated 1631, used as the
title-page of the first edition of one of the most famous Dutch law books:
Inleidinge tot de Hollandsche rechtsgeleertheyt by Grotius. As it looks like a
10 F. Heinemann, Der Richter und die Rechtsgelehrten infruheren Zeiten (Leipzig, 1900; reprinted,
Diisseldorf and Cologne, 1969).
11 K. von Amira, Die Dresdener Handschrift: Die Handgebarden in den Bilderhandschriften des
Sachsenspiegels (Leipzig, 1902).
12 H. Fehr, Das Recht im Bilde (Zurich, Munich and Leipzig, 1923).
13 The works of Prof. G. Kocher and Prof. W. Schild especially have been very important for the
growing interest in legal iconography.
14 Austria, the University of Graz; Germany, the University of Bielefeld (private collectiion);
Switzerland, the University of Zurich; Sweden, the University of Lund; Denmark, the University of
Copenhagen.
15 The data are: the name of the object; the name of the artist; the date of creation; composition;
material; size; in case of books, engravings etc., the name of the publisher and the town of publication;
the present whereabouts; object, geographical and name entries according to a controlled open entrysystem.
16 For the different levels of iconographical research see R. van Straten, Inleiding in de iconografie
(Muiderberg, 1983).
17 Because of its time-consuming nature research is done only on a small scale.
18 This may be the case especially with satirical pictures as it may have been, for example, during the
time shortly before the abolition of torture.