Born on August 15, 1822, Henry Maine received his schooling at Christ's Hospital and Pembroke College, Cambridge. He received his degree in 1844 and the following year was appointed junior tutor at Trinity College, Cambridge, which position he held until appointed regius professor of civil law at Cambridge in 1847. In 1850 he was called to the bar and two years later accepted appointment as first reader in Roman law and jurisprudence at the Inns of Court. He steadily gained in reputation as a philosopher of law and a brilliant legal antiquary until, with the publication of his first work Ancient Law (1861), he emerged on the Victorian scene as a leading scholar-intellectual.

Maine was a legal member of the Council in India (1863-1869) and served for a time as vice-chancellor of the University of Calcutta. He formulated a general scheme for the codification of Indian law and organized the legislative department of the...