Archeologie práva jako metafora

Anotace: This article uses archeology as a metaphorin order to conceptualize anthropological practices ofsignificance within the anthropology of law, employedmostly after personal fieldwork. Taking the gradualclarification of the meaning of the Western legal con-cept of vis major as an example, the article tracesits various permutations at different times and places,from 18th and 19th century Europe to the contem-porary Peruvian Andes, where mountain and glacierdeities are seen as analogies to vis major, and toChina during the Ming dynasty, where the Mandateof Heaven was identified as a true alternative to theWestern concept of supreme or natural force. In con-clusion, the archeological imagination is seen as a moreappropriate process than conventional anthropologicalcomparison, juxtaposition and generalization.