Henry James Sumner Maine
Sir Henry James Sumner Maine, KCSI (15 August 1822 – 3 February 1888), was an English comparative jurist and historian. 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.
Read more about Henry James Sumner Maine: Early Life, In India, Oxford Professor, Death, Works
Famous quotes containing the words james, sumner and/or maine:
“A custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black, stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless.”
—James I of England, James VI of Scotland (1566–1625)
“through the Sumner Tunnel,
trunk by trunk through its sulphurous walls,
tile by tile like a men’s urinal,
slipping through
like somebody else’s package.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“I heard the dog-day locust here, and afterward on the carries, a sound which I had associated only with more open, if not settled countries. The area for locusts must be small in the Maine Woods.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)