This article discusses a role played by Libanius, the sophist of Antioch, utilizing letters he wrote to dignitaries in Constantinople. While the sophist's correspondence has been generally considered as a product of patronage to date, this article first discusses three cases concerning persons familiar to Libanius, in order to show that this correspondence was not motivated by the exigencies of patronage and that Libanius was rather making petitions for individuals or Eastern cities to the imperial government in accordance with administrative procedures. Then the author proceeds to analyze the whole corpus of Libanius' correspondence written during the reign of Theodosius, concluding that, independent of patronage, the sophist supported various people, among whom were included orphans, women and farmers who had no direct access to power nor any paideia that was a key element for unitng the social elite in Late Anfiquity. Thus, the author suggests that Libanius, who heretofore has been regarded only as an educational figure or public rhetor, played another role, by virtue of his public chair, of reporting individual problems occurring in local societies to the central government, regardless of the social background of the plaintiffs. Finally, the author offers a different interpretation of the relationships between the sophist and two praetorian prefects of the East. While emphasis has been put on the religious convictions of these prefects and on a radical fluctuation occurring in Libanius' political emergence, the author interprets the sophist's correspondence within cultural and social contexts and argues that despite regime changes Libanius maintained contact with the imperial government, which, in turn, shows that he could play the part of a social channel continually through the reign of Theodosius.

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At the beginning of the sixteenth century, many peasants of southwest Germany and Switzerland were subjected to serfdom and deprivation of their personal freedoms, including freedom of movement, freedom to marry and forced (corvee) labor. Inspired by the new theology of the R formation, the common people began demanding the abolition of serfdom, justifying their appeal for redress of grievances by using the law of God as written in the Bible. They also appealed directly to the Reformers for a fair adjudication of their claims, but Martin Luther and his colleagues were not moved by such their zeal. However, Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam had already taken a negative view of feudal servitude in his work, Institutio principis Christiani (The Education of a Christian Prince), even before the German Peasant War broke out in 1525. Some historians have argued that the German version of Erasmus' work influenced the ideological development of the peasants who rose up. The purpose of this paper is to clarify the historical background to the work and the characteristic features of the political and social ideas of Erasmus, in order to discover the rationale behind his severe criticism of serfdom, thus answering the question of why he openly expressed views radical enough to overturn the ideology of the traditional feudal order. Erasmus, a cleric who was respected for his spirit of concord and moderation, was interested in the realization of harmony among all of humankind through education based on reason and Christian brotherhood, and envisioned the realization of a peaceful world on Earth. Consequently, he concluded that serfdom was an obstacle to the fulfillment of vision and more fundamentally believed that personal freedom was necessary for salvation of the human soul, since rigid subordination via violence and fear disrupted the free human growth. Erasmus drew many of his ideas from the Greek and Latin classics, adapting them to the conditions of early modern society. That is why his ideas played such an important role in the birth of a new modernity.

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Keijo Imperial University (hereinafter KIU) was established in colonial Korea as the sixth imperial university under the Imperial University Proclamation. This article is an attempt to focus anew on the operation of the University's Faculty of Law and Literature from the viewpoint of 1) its founding academic principles, which paid special attention to Oriental culture and Korean studies, and 2) its relationship to surveys conducted by the Japanese Governor-General of Korea, concluding that KIU was a national policy institution concerned with Korean administrative affairs. Focusing particularly on the Law Department, which has been overlooked in the research to date, the author sets out to reconsider the personality and significance of the Faculty at KIU via its curriculum and activities of those who gathered to learn at the institution. Although the majority of the students were enrolled in the Law Department, the setting up of such a department was never considered during the planning leading up of the establishment of the University. This is because there was a strong consciousness among Korean administrators that the study of law should be avoided as an environment requiring the consideration of conceptual problems. In general, the law faculty members are characterized as younger in age and having no academic experience before their appointments at KIU. Instead, they had previously served as lawyers and judges and were active as teachers in preparing aspirants to Imperial Japan's higher civil service examinations, which was not a part of the University's planned curriculum. However, shortly after its opening, students began to ask their teachers to tutor them personally for the examination ; and later, this tutoring came to be reflected in the overall curriculum of the Law Department. It is a fact that KIU produced a larger number of students taking the higher civil service bar examination than the imperial universities in Japan, and with a higher success rate. The success of Korean students was due to their traditional legal consciousness and the common belief that becoming a civil servant meant personal success. The author concludes that this point is essential when considering the real function and role of KIU in Korean colonial society ; that is, the University produced a framework for Koreans to attain upward social mobility under a colonial situation.

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