The Selden Society

 

                                                                              June, 2007

 

 

 

Dear Member,

 

            Once again it is time for us to request payment of your annual dues.  The dues for 2007 are $65.00 for individuals and $90.00 for institutions.

 

            Your prompt payment will be very much appreciated.  If you are paying with a check that does not contain your name, could you please write your name on it or include your name on a separate piece of paper within the envelope?  (Institutions should include a copy of the invoice form.)  This will save us much time here.

 

            This year’s dues notice is a bit late, because we needed get our plans for the coming year in order.  We regret that we have not yet been able to send the volume for 2006 (vol. 123), Part IV of Dr. Paul Brand’s Earliest English Reports, during the calendar year.  We are happy to report that it is now virtually complete and will be mailed to members who have paid their 2006 dues over the course of the summer.

 

            The volume for 2007 (vol. 124) will be the Literary Director’s edition of the reports of William Dalison.  Dalison was justice of King’s and Queen’s Bench during the reigns of Philip and Mary.  The early printed edition of reports that bears his name is puzzling, because most of the reports in the volume date from after Dalison’s death in 1559.  Professor Baker has discovered a manuscript that seems to be a copy of Dalison’s original, which will be the basis of the edition.  The reports date from 1552 to 1558 and are of particular interest because they contain a substantial number of reports of criminal cases discussed in Serjeants’ Inn.

 

            Professor Baker’s volume will probably be followed in 2008 by Mr. Le Poidevin’s edition of Bryt’s Reports (a named Year Book reporter of the early fifteenth century).  Further along in the pipeline are a proposed edition of William Staunford’s Plees del Coron (1557) and an edition of the papers of Sir Matthew Hale’s law reform commission of the 1550’s.

 

            The Letters of Sir William Blackstone, edited by Professor W. R. Prest, volume 14 of the Supplementary Series, appeared last year.  The volume publishes all 180 known letters of Blackstone.  It will be of considerable interest to lawyers and legal historians, and also to political and social historians.  Supplementary Series volumes are not included in your membership dues.  The volume is available to members at a concessional rate of $50.00, post free if payment accompanies your order.  Once more, we will handle U.S. dollar orders from this office.

 

Other volumes in the pipeline of the Supplementary Series include Professor Baker’s and Mr. Anthony Taussig’s Catalogue of the Manuscripts of Anthony Taussig (this remarkable collection of manuscripts, the catalogue of which is now in press, may be the best such collection in private hands), Dr. David Crook’s The King’s Bench and Common Bench in the Reign of Henry III, and Dr. A. Lyall’s edition of Cases in the Irish Court of Exchequer, 1716–34.

 

            The main series of Selden volumes is entirely in print.  Volumes 1–99 have been reprinted by W. S. Hein & Co., Inc., 1285 Main Street, Buffalo, NY 14209–1987 (phone: [800]828–7571; FAX: [716]883–8100; email: mail@wshein.com; website: http://www.wshein.com/).  The cost is $95 per volume, with a twenty percent discount for Selden members, plus dispatch costs.  Volume 100 and forward can, as before, be obtained from the Secretary, Victor Tunkel, Selden Society, Faculty of Laws, Queen Mary and Westfield College, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS, U.K. (phone: 44 20 7882 5136; FAX: 44 20 8981 8733; email: selden-society@qmw.ac.uk).

 

            In 2004, Hein, with the Society’s permission, issued a volume reproducing the whole of the Society’s lecture series from 1952–2001.  The volume has over 700 pages and is case bound in maroon cloth similar to that of the Supplementary Series.  Many of the past lectures have been out of print for some years, and the Council hope that members and especially libraries will want to complete their holdings.  The volume is offered to members at a special price of $120 inclusive of all dispatch costs.  A leaflet with order form will be sent to members in a forthcoming dispatch.

 

            Hein has also reprinted the four volumes of Professor Thorne’s edition of Bracton on the Laws and Customs of England.  The price is $395, with a discount to Selden members of twenty percent, plus dispatch costs.  Simultaneously, the Ames Foundation, the Harvard Law School Library, and the Legal Information Institute of the Cornell Law School have produced a fully-searchable “on-line” version of both the Latin and the English text of Bracton.  It is available on the “world-wide web” at:

 

            http://hlsl.law.harvard.edu/bracton/ (please note the change in this URL)

 

            The Ames Foundation, which, as many Selden members know, is an organization similar to Selden, though its publications are more irregular, has recently entered into a distribution agreement with Hein & Co.  Hein has the stock of Ames back volumes and has reprinted those volumes that are out of print.  Hein has also agreed to give discounts on Ames volumes to Selden members similar to those that Ames has offered in the past.

 

            We call your attention to the “web page” for the Selden Society.  This contains a complete list of Selden publications and other information that we hope will be useful.  It is available on the “world-wide web” at:

 

            http://www.law.harvard.edu/Programs/selden_society/

 

Links may found on this page to Selden’s London web page.  A similar “web page” for the Ames Foundation is available at:

 

            http://www.law.harvard.edu/Programs/ames_foundation/

 

            Members will have received an announcement of the Society’s Annual General Meeting which will be held at the Old Hall of Lincoln’s Inn on Tuesday, 10 July.  It will be followed by a lecture by Professor Wilfrid Prest on what is revealed by his recent edition of Blackstone’s letters.  Following this our customary buffet supper will be offered in the crypt.  Further information may be obtained from the Secretary at the addresses listed above.

 

 

                                                                              Yours sincerely,

 

                                                                              Charles Donahue, Jr.

 

                                                                              David Warrington

 

 

Download this letter in Word format.

 

 

This page last updated 06/24/07. Contact Rosemary Spang with comments.
URL: http://www.law.harvard.edu /programs/selden_society/DUES07.NOT.html.
Copyright © 2007 The Selden Society. All rights reserved.