Dubbed by the "New York Times" as "one of the most sought-after legal academics in the county," William Ian Miller presents the arcane worlds of the Old Norse studies in a way sure to attract the interest of a wide range of readers. "Bloodtaking and Peacemaking" delves beneath the chaos and brutality of the Norse world to discover a complex interplay of ordering and disordering impulses. Miller's unique and engaging readings of ancient Iceland's sagas and extensive legal code reconstruct and illuminate the society that produced them.
People in the saga world negotiated a maze of violent possibility, with strategies that frequently put life and limb in the balance. But there was a paradox in striking the balance one could not get even without going one better. Miller shows how blood vengeance, law, and peacemaking were inextricably bound together in the feuding process.
This book offers fascinating insights into the politics of a stateless society, its methods of social control, and the role that a uniquely sophisticated and self-conscious law played in the construction of Icelandic society.
"Illuminating." Rory McTurk, "Times Literary Supplement"
"An impressive achievement in ethnohistory; it is an amalgam of historical research with legal and anthropological interpretation. What is more, and rarer, is that it is a pleasure to read due to the inclusion of narrative case material from the sagas themselves." Dan Bauer, "Journal of Interdisciplinary History"
"
- ISBN10 661208992X
- ISBN13 9786612089923
- Publish Date 15 February 1997 (first published 15 December 1990)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 18 January 2012
- Publish Country US
- Imprint University of Chicago Press
- Format eBook
- Pages 421
- Language English