This collection of original essays brings together leading legal historians and theorists to explore the oft-neglected but important relationship between the discplines of legal theory and history. Legal historians have often been sceptical of theory. The methodology which informs their own work is often said to be an empirical one, of gathering information from the archives and presenting it in a narrative form. The narrative produced by history is often said to be provisional, insofar as further research in the archives might falsify present understandings and demand revisions. On the other...