Penal symbolism in Serbia in the first half of the 19th century

Abstract

The author explores a scarce and unusual phenomenon for the 19th century Serbia, of the emphasized nexus between crime and penalty. The author marks that special, symbolical relation of penalty, on the one hand, and sanction on the other, as 'penal symbolism'. This term refers to penalization which reflects the ties between crime and punishment by copying crime in terms of modus or place of execution, or by 'punishing' those body parts which partook in committing a crime. The author classifies the examples of preserved judgments and legislations containing penal symbolism to those referring to modus or place of execution of death penalty, those which are examples of penal symbolism related to other sanctions, and those which are examples of the symbolic talion. The author raises the questions of the origin of this phenomenon, as well as of its justification, and aims at providing answers by reconstructing legal and social framework of Serbia in the first half of the 19th century. With this objective in mind, she discusses the development of Criminal Law and its basic features, as well as the development of judiciary, the systematic institutionalization of the network of criminal courts, and, especially, the composition thereof. In the conclusion, the author rejects the possibility that penal symbolism is a product of legal transplantation or that of the continuity of Serbian medieval law. She asserts that the scarcity of material criminal law sources led to judging by 'justice and fairness', and that those facts created conditions for the primitive sense of justice to find its way into judgments and legislations as penal symbolism.

Keywords

• penal symbolism
• Serbia in the first half of the 19th century
• criminal law
• judiciary