News: You don’t just learn about law in the lecture theatre.

As part of the lectures on criminal procedure and local government law, Prof. Dr. Walter, former judge at the Higher Regional Court of Bavaria (RiBayObLG), and Prof. Dr. Hartmann, LL.M. (Virginia), took their students on an excursion to Regensburg’s Old Town Hall. During the guided tour, the historian and author Matthias Freitag, M.A., brought to life both the history of local self-government and the history of criminal prosecution in Regensburg. Particularly interesting were the insights into Regensburg’s development into a Free Imperial City in 1245, as well as into the ‘Fragstatt’, where historical criminal proceedings and the questioning of defendants were brought to life in a vivid and accessible way. The excursion impressively demonstrated the added value that historical learning sites offer to legal education: law is understood not only through legal texts, but also through an understanding of its historical roots. An interesting side note: the idiom ‘to put something on the back burner’ is also frequently associated with the Perpetual Imperial Diet in Regensburg. Our heartfelt thanks go to Matthias Freitag for his thoroughly informed and inspiring guided tour, which brought history and law together in a fascinating way.