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The Sachsenspiegel or Mirror of the Saxons (1220-35) is a collection of customary laws compiled by Eike von Repgow (1180-1235). Encouraged by his overlord, Hoyer von Falkenstein , from Saxon high nobility, he produced a German version of his own (lost) Latin original. Their purpose was to textualize, and thus to stabilize what up until the 13th century had been a long oral tradition of regional jurisprudence. The Sachsenspiegel is divided into two parts, one concerned with laws regarding the management of fiefs, the Lehnrecht , and the other with more general laws, the Landrecht , or regional law.
Historical Context The Great Depression and the World Wars were the major historical influences on Americans between 1933 and 1945. The 1929 stock market crash had left 13 million people unemployed and 2 million homeless. A documentary of the period would have revealed Hoovervilles, dust storms, labor union strikes, violent farmers protesting foreclosures and unarmed WWI Vets marching on the White House for their promised bonuses, only to be met by U.S. Army tanks. Adolf Hitler Geburtstagfeier. (Birthday Celebration) Los Angeles, April 20, 1935 In 1933 Adolf Hitler became the head of Germany's Third Reich and Franklin Delano Roosevelt entered the Oval Office. In the United States, the New Deal brought hope for recovery.
The Harvard Law School Library has approximately one million pages of documents relating to the trial of military and political leaders of Nazi Germany before the International Military Tribunal (IMT) and to the twelve trials of other accused war criminals before the United States Nuremberg Military Tribunals (NMT).
The documents, which include trial transcripts, briefs, document books, evidence files, and other papers, have been studied by lawyers, scholars, and other researchers in the areas of history, ethics, genocide, and war crimes, and are of particular interest to officials and students of current international tribunals involving war crimes and crimes against humanity.
