ACTIVE BRIBERY IN CROATIAN MEDIEVAL AND MODERN LAW

Abstract

When it comes to writing about the history of punishment, it is always
linked with critically re-thinking and better understanding of the contemporary
system of punishment, as a result of its long historical development. In such a way,
„contemporary criminal law cannot be seen as a result of an effort made by a certain
nation or in a certain epoch“. „Permanently faced with social changes, in its long
historical development, criminal law has been modifying its fundamental principles
and categories, by building new institutes and instruments, in order to become less
cruel and more human, but not less efficient than in earlier stages of its development,
characterized by rudeness, cruelty and exemplarity of its sanctions.
Although it is not easy to answer the question, if there is the measure, in which
social understanding of punishment and its purpose, determines the civilizational
level in the society, there is no doubt about the fact that civilizational and legal point
of view towards punishment derives from a waste range of factors: general, cultural,
sociological, psychological, religious, political and other factors that should be taken
altogether in their historical dimension.
The genesis of criminal law is linked with the moment of establishing the public
authorities and the state. According to different criteria, it is possible to introduce
different periodization of criminal law. When it comes to the historical criterion,
there can be made a historical division into periods of ancient, medieval, modern
and contemporary criminal law (punishment), which periods should not be taken as
absolutely inseparable. The point of this paper is to present a review and development
of punishing active bribery in the Croatian medieval and modern law.