Court Law for the People and the Question of Its Origin

Abstract

The article discusses the Court Law for the People, the oldest Slavic legal text, focusing on the central research question that seeks to elucidate its place of origin. Two most prominent theories are presented in detail, linking the code’s origin with Great Moravia and the First Bulgarian Empire. The only two articles of this code of law that are yet to be ascribed their models are explored. It is proposed that Article 2, which addresses the hearing of witnesses in judicial proceedings, was likely modelled after Germanic law. The Pannonian theory, according to which Methodius authored the code in Lower Pannonia, lacks proper scientific underpinnings.