Paul Johannes Merkel

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Paul Johannes Merkel (born August 1, 1819 in Nuremberg , † December 19, 1861 in Halle an der Saale ) was a German legal scholar .

Life

Merkel began his law studies in Munich in 1836 and moved to Erlangen in 1838 after the death of his father . In 1840 he was expelled from the university for five years as a result of a duel . After rejected requests for clemency, he worked at the Nuremberg Regional Court from 1840 to 1842 and from 1842 to 1844 in the office of a lawyer from Nuremberg. Then in 1845 he set out on a two-year trip to Italy . He visited the Vatican and many northern Italian cities. During the trip he dealt with writings on Lombard law. After his return in 1847, he continued his studies in Erlangen and wrote his dissertation on the subject of Lombard law and obtained his doctorate . In 1848 he completed his habilitation in Berlin and from 1851 worked as a professor of law in Königsberg .

In 1852 he moved to Halle, where he gave lectures in German legal history and in applicable procedural and private law. Merkel was one of the first lawyers to concentrate their academic work on legal history . In 1861 he was involved in founding the legal history journal . Merkel's name is also closely linked in specialist circles to research into Germanic popular rights. His writings on jurisprudence in various Germanic tribes were appreciated during his lifetime, but increasingly criticized after his death, including in 1910 as "based on serious errors". Nowadays his main work is seen in the study of Lombard law.

Merkel's religious standpoint was that of strict Lutheranism. This made him an opponent of the Church Union in Prussia and a friend of the old Lutherans Huschke and Lasius. But he never resigned from the regional church himself.

Publications (selection)

  • Iura et officia Comitum quondam ad Rhenum Palatinorum , Halis Sax., 1861.
  • ed. by Johannes Merkel, with a preface by Jacob Grimm : Lex Salica , Hertz, Berlin 1850.

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Merkel, Paul Johannes
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German legal scholar
DATE OF BIRTH August 1, 1819
PLACE OF BIRTH Nuremberg
DATE OF DEATH December 19, 1861
Place of death Halle on the Saale