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Legal Medievalism In Lex Mercatoria Scholarship, Ralf Michaels

Faculty Scholarship

This short reaction piece to an article by Emily Kadens asks why a long-refuted story of an alleged uniform medieval lex mercatoria is still being maintained. The answer is that the story serves not as an actual history but instead as a foundation myth. Attempts to falsify the myth with historical data are therefore futile: the myth derives its value not from its truth value but from its symbolic power.