Culture, History, and Inheritance Law: a Comparative Legal Analysis

Inheritance is the most conservative sub-branch of civil law. As a result, it reflects the cultural and historical type of the society and is very conservative. In fact, it contains a lot of archaic norms that express out-of-date social relations. However, inheritance law is extremely reluctant to get rid of these legal anachronisms, probably, because their rigorism reflects the national identity of the people. The present research used the civilizational classification of legal systems developed by N. Ya. Danilevsky and applied it to the inheritance law as the most conservative sub-branch of civil law. After comparing Russian and Anglo-American inheritance laws, the author proved that each state adheres to its cultural and historical type by preserving some archaic institutions. These institutions lost their social relevance long ago but survived as a formal reflection of a once-relevant rigorous moral code. Some legal anachronisms persisted for so long that, having outlived their time, they suddenly acquired a new meaning in completely new circumstances.