Law or treaty? Defining the edge of legal studies in the early and high medieval periods

This article is an attempt to define treaties in a legal context, thereby re-aligning the medieval historiography with its modern counterpart, and to explore some of the textual and practical possibilities and problems of this context. It considers why some treaties in the early and high middle ages have been regarded as laws while others have not and argues that while the modern concept of international law is based on the three principles of treaties, practice and custom, and general principles of law (including canon or Roman law), medieval scholars have only looked to the latter principle, thereby disregarding the treaties themselves and legal practice