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Laura Beck Varela
Institutes du droit civil pour les dames is the title of a unique piece of work printed in 1751 in the small town of Helmstedt. Its author, a little known jurist, Johann Heinrich Kratzenstein (1726–1805), close to the Pietistic circles, composed an abridged French translation in 48 pages of Justinian’s Institutes, one of the most widespread texts in European legal history. It was written as a birthday gift for a noblewoman, Regina Charlotte Topp, wife of an influential law professor of the University of Helmstedt. This short essay examines this rare attempt to translate and adapt Latin juridical texts for a female audience. What legal topics did Kratzenstein choose? What kind of legal knowledge did he consider »suitable« for the »other«, the female readership? What kind of reader did he »construct«, and what motivated him to engage in such a singular project? How was his work received? Could jurisprudence find a place among the new »popular« scientific and philosophical genres, promoted in certain enlightened circles, especially on the bookshelves of the so-called Frauenzimmer Bibliotheken (the specially designated ladies’ libraries)? To answer these questions about Kratzenstein’s translation, I discuss a topic that has so far been neglected by mainstream legal history, which is traditionally centered on legal scholarship: the vivid early modern debate on women’s education (the so-called querelle des femmes) and its impact on the field of jurisprudence in the eighteenth century.
