Udo Heyn Dept. of History, California State University, Los Angeles

“Pax et Justitia: “Arms Control, Disarmament and the Legal System in the Medieval Reich.” Peace and Change 8 (Spring 1982): 23–36.

Prior to the Peace of Lands, the resort to arms was employed for “extra‐​judicial” self‐​help, as when a litigant failed to receive what he considered was his legal due. Even after edicts prohibiting all violence at certain times, the Crusades and the Investiture Conflict (resolved by Concordat of Worms, 1122) managed to keep conflict alive. It was not until medieval society began to focus less on an ideal peace and more on maintaining internal law and order that Europe witnessed a reduction in societal conflicts. By phasing out the extra‐​judicial but legitimate acts of self‐​help, the Landfrieden tamed the feud and eventually proscribed it altogether. At the same time, this medieval peace movement restrained ordinary crime by making punishment fit the crime, regardless of the criminal’s social or kinship status.

For our own times, we ought to remember that peace cannot be pursued as an end‐​in‐​itself, but only as an adjunct of orderly and lawful societal change. The article contains copious historical and bibliographical citations.