Lex mercatoria

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Lex mercatoria (from Latin for "merchant law"), often referred to as "the Law Merchant" in English, is the body of commercial law used by merchants throughout Europe^{[disputed – discuss]} during the medieval period. It evolved similar to English common law as a system of custom and best practice, which was enforced through a system of merchant courts along the main trade routes. It developed into an integrated body of law that was voluntarily produced, adjudicated and enforced on a voluntary basis^{[citation needed]}, alleviating the friction stemming from the diverse backgrounds and local traditions of the participants. Due to the international background local state law was not always applicable and the merchant law provided a leveled framework to conduct transactions reducing the preliminary of a trusted second party.^{[1][full citation needed]} It emphasized contractual freedom and inalienability of property, while shunning legal technicalities^{[clarification needed]} and deciding cases ex aequo et bono.^{[citation needed]} With lex mercatoria professional merchants revitalized the almost nonexistent commercial activities in Europe, which had plummeted after the fall of the Roman Empire.^[2]

In the last years ^[when?] new theories had changed the understanding of this medieval treatise considering it as proposal for legal reform or a document used for instructional purposes^{[citation needed]}. These theories consider that the treatise cannot be described as a body of laws applicable in its time, but the desire of a legal scholar to improve and facilitate the litigation between merchants. The text^{[clarification needed]} is composed by 21 sections and an annex. The sections described procedural matters such as the presence of witnesses and the relation between this body of law and common law. It has been considered as a false statement to define this as a system exclusively based in custom, when there are structures and elements from the existent legal system, such as Ordinances and even concepts proper of the Romano-canonical procedure.^{[3][page needed]} Other scholars have characterized the law merchant as a myth and a seventeenth-century construct.^[4]