ABSTRACT
The power of the legal system approximates very closely to our first sense of the concept of power. A number of key international practitioners have emerged in this research field, and useful glosses and summaries of their publications may be found in the now plentiful introductions to forensic linguistics. The remit of Forensic Linguistics is wide, with linguists being tasked to report on all areas where language intersects with the legal process. Roman Law is the lineal descendent of the legal system of the Roman Empire and is practised in most of continental Europe and in parts of the world such as South America and Southeast Asia where the European countries have had colonial influence. One of the most significant contributory factors in the development of modern-day legal language has been the preservation of words and expressions from different periods of linguistic history, a feature, incidentally, that is common to the legal discourses of many nations.
