Presumptions during the age of artificial proofs.
A study of Jacopo Menochio’s De praesumptionibus (1587)
![](https://i0.wp.com/adolfogiuliani.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/bub_gb_5hKTz1B7YeYC_0004.jpg?resize=391%2C625&ssl=1)
Based exclusively on primary sources, this study charts the reformulation of judicial proof in the late 16th c. following the introduction of the dualism of artificial/inartificial proofs in Jacopo Menochio’s treatise De praesumptionibus (1587). This study is a textual analysis of the theoretical section of this treatise and of the network of texts recalled by this work.
Although methodologically this is a strictly historical study, it shows the relevance of historical judicial proof (and broadly of the question of fact) to the formation of some basic legal categories (e.g. dualism fact/law, general category of contract, interpretation).
This study is meant to be a contribution to the growing field of historical epistemology.
![](https://i0.wp.com/adolfogiuliani.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/image-2.png?resize=498%2C104&ssl=1)
The major doctrines of 16th c. legal science (dualism direct/indirect proofs, distinction law/fact, contract theory, interpretation) are shaped around this rhetorical basis.