Merilo Pravednoye

Merílo Právednoye or Just Measure ("measure of righteousness") (Russian: Мерило Праведное, Old Church Slavonic: мѣрило праведноѥ) is Old Russian legal collection of the end of the 13th or the beginning of the 14th century, preserved in the copies of the 14th to the 16th centuries. The name was given in the modern literature, it was taken from the first words of this text: "this books is just measure, true weighing..." ("siya knigi merilo pravednoye, izves istin`nyi..." or "сиѩ книги мѣрило праведноѥ. извѣсъ истиньныи..."). Just Measure was written in Old Church Slavonic and Old Russian.

Contents

• Editions
• Sources
• References

Trinity (Troitsky) copy is the oldest surviving one of the 14th century. The materials of the old legal collection of the beginning of the 12th century might be used during compilation of Merilo Pravednoye. Just Measure was to serve both as a moral precept and a legal guide book for the judges; and as transmission of several old texts. The text consists of two parts: the first contains the Words and the lessons (poucheniya) both translated and original, on the just and the unjust courts; the second part (so-called collection of 30 chapters) is translations of Byzantine church and secular laws, borrowed from Kormchaia Book, and the oldest Slavic and Russian legal texts (Vladimir`s Church Statute, the Judicial Law for People, Russkaya Pravda, "Legal rule on the church people" - "Pravilo zakonno o tserkovnykh liudiakh").