2/21/01--Boston College Law School is pleased to announce the recent gift of a number of important and rare law books to the Law Library, donated by J. Donald Monan Professor of Law and former Dean Daniel R. Coquillette. The gift includes two very early printed books from the 15th century, St. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica (1476) and The Decretals of Pope Gregory IX (1496), a rare pocket-sized copy of the Magna Carta from 1529, and other pre-Elizabethan English law books. The fourteen titles in all comprise a portion of a typical working lawyer’s library in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.

"There is nothing more nicely suited to the business of teaching law than these beautiful volumes," said BCLS Dean John H. Garvey. "We're thankful that Dan Coquillette continues to find ways of improving the BCLS student and faculty experience, both through his teaching and his remarkable generosity."

Added Sharon O’Connor, Associate Dean for Library and Computing Services: "Dan Coquillette’s generous donation to the Law Library assists us in building the type of historical legal collection that will truly benefit the faculty and students of Boston College Law School. These materials enrich the resources available for research and teaching and are treasures to be shared with faculty and students for years to come."

Perhaps foremost among the treasures in this collection is the pocket-sized copy of the Magna Carta, printed in red and black ink in 1529. The Magna Carta, signed in the early thirteenth century by England’s King John at the behest of his subject landowners, remains significant today for its eloquent defense of the rule of law: "No freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or disseized, or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor shall we go upon him, nor send upon him, except by the lawful judgment of his peers, or by the law of the land."

The collection also features an early printed set of Justinian’s Institutes, published in 1507. Originally compiled in the early sixth century, the Institutes represent the Emperor Justinian’s attempt to codify Roman law and arrange it in a logical and accessible fashion. Heavily used for centuries, the Institutes are still cited today.

Among other significant works in the collection are Henri de Bracton’s De Legibus, St. Germain’s Doctor and Student, Fitzherbert’s Natura Brevium and Abridgement, and very early compilations of English statutes and yearbooks.

This generous donation strengthens the Law Library’s collection of works owned by practicing lawyers in the fifteenth through nineteenth centuries. The books will be on display in the Law Library’s Daniel R. Coquillette Rare Book Room in late 2001.

Legal Reference Librarian Karen Beck contributed to this story.

An early printed yearbook

First Printed Edition of Register of Writs