SOURCE: Introduction to Frederic William Maitland: Historian, edited by Robert Livingston Schuyler, University of California Press, 1960, pp. 1-45.

In the following excerpt, Schuyler provides an overview of Maitland's works.

During Maitland's lifetime he came to be generally regarded by those best qualified to judge his work as the greatest historian English law had ever known, and in the half century that has passed since his death his stature as a legal historian has not diminished. His writing, however, was not confined to the field of legal history. Whatever its subject, it is permeated with a spirit that is the essence of the historical mind. He has a message for everyone who is interested in history, whether professionally or not and no matter in what branch of history or in what particular subjects. His own interests and the character of his historical materials were such that he was often...