View source for New Natura Brevium

{{DISPLAYTITLE:''The New Natura Brevium''}}
===by Anthony Fitzherbert===
__NOTOC__
{{BookPageInfoBox
|imagename=FitzherbertNewNaturaBrevium1755TitlePage.jpg
|link=https://catalog.swem.wm.edu/law/Record/529996
|shorttitle=The New Natura Brevium
|author=Sir Anthony Fitzherbert
|edition=Eighth, carefully revised
|publoc=London (In the Savoy)
|publisher=Printed for Henry Lintot and sold by J. Shuckburgh
|year=1755
|pages=[12], 606, [42]
|lang=English
|desc=4to (27 cm.)
}}''The New Natura Brevium'' was a highly influential treatise on English law first issued in French in 1534 and written by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Fitzherbert Sir Anthony Fitzherbert] (1470-1538), an English judge, scholar, and "one of the best-known English legal writers of the sixteenth century."<ref>J. H. Baker, "[http://www.oxforddnb.com.proxy.wm.edu/view/article/9602 Fitzherbert, Sir Anthony (c.1470–1538)]," ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008, accessed 18 Sept 2013.</ref> Frequently cited in judgments for more than two hundred years following its publication,<ref>William Douthwaite, ''Gray’s Inn'' (London: Reeves and Turner, 1886), 46.</ref> ''The New Natura Brevium'' is an important text on 16th century common law.<br />
<br /> 
Fitzherbert had already published ''Magnum Abbreviamentum'', an abridgment of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Books year books],<ref>''Encyclopedia Britannica'', s.v. "Fitzherbert, Sir Anthony."</ref> "a massive digest of 13,845 cases ... arranged under alphabetical headings."<ref>Baker, "Fitzherbert, Sir Anthony."</ref> In 1522, he was made a judge of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Court_of_Common_Pleas_%28England%29 common pleas] and was knighted, although he continued to write and soon after published three works: one on law, one on agriculture, and one of law and agriculture combined.<ref>Ibid.</ref><br />
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It is for ''The New Natura Brevium'' that Fitzherbert is most well-known. In it he touches on an array of legal issues ranging from the skill and care one is owed by an expert, to the cause of action for a victim of fraud, and the scope of liability for trespasses on land.<ref>Douthwaite, ''Gray’s Inn.''</ref> His analysis was crucial to the development of English common law,<ref>Ibid.</ref> and consequently the foundation of the United States’ legal system. 

==Evidence for Inclusion in Wythe's Library==
Both [[Dean Bibliography|Dean's Memo]]<ref>[[Dean Bibliography|Memorandum from Barbara C. Dean]], Colonial Williamsburg Found., to Mrs. Stiverson, Colonial Williamsburg Found. (June 16, 1975), 11 (on file at Wolf Law Library, College of William & Mary).</ref> and the [https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/handle/10288/13433 Brown Bibliography]<ref> Bennie Brown, "The Library of George Wythe of Williamsburg and Richmond," (unpublished manuscript, May, 2012) Microsoft Word file. Earlier edition available at: https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/handle/10288/13433</ref> suggest Wythe owned the 8th edition (1755) of this title based on notes in John Marshall's commonplace book.<ref>''The Papers of John Marshall,'' eds. Herbert A. Johnson, Charles T. Cullen, and Nancy G. Harris (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, in association with the Institute of Early American History and Culture, 1974), 1:46.</ref> The Wolf Law Library followed their suggestions and purchased the 8th edition.

==Description of the Wolf Law Library's copy==
Rebound in brown buckram; pencil annotations on flyleaf.

View the record for this book in [https://catalog.swem.wm.edu/law/Record/529996 William & Mary's online catalog.]
==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Criminal Law]]
[[Category:George Wythe Collection at William & Mary's Wolf Law Library]]
[[Category:Titles in Wythe's Library]]