The rejuvenating approach to Roman law taken by the German Pandectist School in the
19th century exerted a great influence far beyond the boundaries of Germany. This phenomenon
can really be seen as one of the “centralising forces” of European legal history,
especially considering the simultaneous emergence of national codifications, which led to an increasing gap between the various legislations issued by European countries. Within
Europe, the influence of the Pandectist School was particularly strong on Italian legal
culture. The development of translations of German legal handbooks was particularly
encouraged by Italian Romanistic scholars after the national unification, as an emblematic
component of a general project for the diffusion of German legal culture in Italy. The
translations were increasingly directed to original works, especially due to the multitude
of notes provided by translators, which contributed to the critical revision of German erudition,
namely by comparing it to Italian legislation. Especially the version of the Lehrbuch
der Pandekten by Carl Ludwig Arndts, written by Filippo Serafini, and the one
of Bernhard Windscheid’s Lehrbuch des Pandektenrechts, carried out by Carlo Fadda
and Paolo Emilio Bensa, played an important role in the development of the studies of
Roman and private law in Italy.
