Legal postition of women in the medieval City of Lastovo 1310.

Abstract

In this paper, the authors analyses some questions about the legal postition of women in the medieval city of Lastovo. The appropriate solutions of other Dalmatian statutes are referred to, in particular to those from the statute of Dubrovnik. In the introduction, the sources of Lastovo medieval law are stated. Then, questions on the legal position of women in terms of status, family (with marriage), property, criminal and procedural law are analysed. The tendency of community powers to prevent foreigners from gaining property and to prevent the division of family property by dowry were the fundamental causes for the inferior position of women in communal legal systems. In the Statute of Lastovo, the influence of Dubrovnik statute and indirect other legal systems like Venetian, Slavic, Byzantine, Croatian, Roman are clearly evident clearly pointing to the existance of legale culture interactions in the medieval statutes in Dalmatia.

Keywords

• Legal position of woman
• Statute of Lastovo
• XIVth century Croatia
• Dalmatian Statutory Law