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THE TEAM
CONTACT
In the path thus outlined, a natural law discipline, "common to both Faculties," was immediately established in the first year, encompassing not only "natural law in the strict sense" but also "universal public law" and the "law of nations." In parallel, a discipline of the history of Roman law and national law was established, officially titled "Civil History of Peoples, and Roman and Portuguese Law." This path continued into the second year, through a discipline of church history and canon law. The Pombaline legislator was truly innovative when, in the final year of the course, he mandated that legal scholars and canonists attend a national law discipline which had made its way into academic life for the first time since the university's foundation. The fact that until then national law had remained in shameful and profound silence was criticised. Since Portuguese law was a privileged source in the legal sphere, national laws should "be always visible and imprinted in our minds", not only to be applied in practice, but also to be taught and explained in theory.
On the other hand, the Statutes of 1772 did not merely incorporate the teaching of national law and its history. Thereafter, the traditional magister dixit was replaced by a far more powerful master, a true doctrinal legislator, whose opinions held the undeniable force of law. Indeed, the master of all masters uncompassionately set the curriculum for the various disciplines and did so in such detail in the realm of national law history that the set of precepts dedicated to the subject by the Statutes of 1772 represented, as has been duly emphasised, "the first serious attempt at systematizing the history of Portuguese law." In short, the teacher was to begin "with the History of Laws, Customs, and Legitimate Traditions of the Portuguese Nation: Moving then to the History of Jurisprudence, Theory or the Science of the Laws of Portugal: And concluding with the History of Practical Jurisprudence, or the Practice of Laws; and the way of managing, and dispatching cases and affairs in the Courts, Courts of Appeal, and Tribunals of these Kingdoms."
