Reformation,Regulation and the Image: Sumptuary Legislation and the Subject of Law

This article considers the development of the individual subject of law and his constitutional status in the early modern English State, within the context of sumptuary legislation enacted by the Crown and the Inns of Court. During the sixteenth century, the legal community took upon itself the role of exemplifying the correct use of symbols and of elucidating the purpose of sumptuary law. The image of the lawyer was manipulated to represent the inherent divinity of common law. The reformation of the image was inevitably influenced by the doctrinal concepts of the European Reformation and is a graphic indication of the centrality of Anglicanism to the development of early modern common law. I discuss these developments with reference to theories of the image proposed by Goodrich, Legendre and Marin. I refer also to Carlyle's satirical treatise on the symbolism of clothes,Sartor Resartus. The constitution of clothes represents the idea of citizenship and the centrality of reason to the body-politic. The rediscovery of classical texts during the Renaissance was instrumental in shaping a constitution in which an embryonic social contract was apparent, as represented in the sumptuary legislation of the Inns of Court. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.