La biblioteca di un avvocato corfiota, Altavilla Calichiopulo (1673-1701)

Altavilla Calichiopulo, a Corfiot nobleman, belonged to one of the oldest families on the island. He studied at the University of Padua and practiced as a lawyer in Corfu. He was the owner of a rich book collection: this was not merely a “professional library”, but gathered philological, theological, philosophical and, of course, legal books. The latter in particular offer a rare view on the legal tools of a practising attorney in the Venetian Dominio da Mar. It includes a selection of the major authors of traditional comments to ius commune, both civil and criminal, but also works adopting the historical methods introduced during the Renaissance. A number of books, moreover, pertain to the idiosyncratic Venetian legal system. Such a diverse assembly of legal literature offered its owner a wide choice of solutions and quotations, useful in defending cases in Corfu, where jurisdiction applied often incomplete and uncertain legal rules.