Anna Floris joined the Robbins Collection as a Research Fellow from July through August of 2023. Her research topic, “Interpreting Local Law in the Middle Ages: The Case of the Carta de Logu,” originated as her PhD thesis that she completed at the Università degli Studi di Trento.
The focus of Anna’s research, the Carta de Logu, is a unique part of fifteenth-century legal history. The document is written in the Sardinian vernacular language, instead of Latin, which one would typically expect of a legal document from this period. The quaestiones, hypothetical legal cases drafted in the form of questions and answers, are also unique, in that many of these hypothetical cases relate to agricultural and pastoral questions, reflecting the society from which the text emerged. However, the hypothetical cases in these quaestiones are still solved through Roman law, much like more traditional quaestiones. There are also references to things like the Gloss of Accursius and ius commune, though not explicit references. “You need to know what you’re looking for to see these,” Anna said. She spent time during her Fellowship finishing a book project, a critical edition of the quaestiones explicativae of the Carta de Logu.
In addition to working on her book, Anna plans to use the resources of the Robbins Collection to begin work on some other projects. She is also interested in a collection quaestiones by Federico Delle Scalle, a jurist from 13th century communal Italy, a period that is often overlooked and neglected by legal historians. She would like to provide a critical edition of this collection of quaestiones, as well. “To what degree did these jurists influence later generations of jurists?” she asked. Anna is also part of an upcoming FONTES course teaching legal history, especially how to read and use medieval manuscripts. The project consists of two semester-long courses, two intensive study programs, a digital textbook, and an online platform with resources and exercises. She also hopes to use some time in her fellowship to look through the Robbins manuscripts to see if there’s an appropriate manuscript she could use for this purpose. After her fellowship ends, Anna will be returned to her postdoc position at Università degli Studi di Palermo.