"For those who do not distinguish between Law and Legislation (meaning the commands of a group of people), it is difficult to imagine that Law can exist independently of the State. Meanwhile, Law is older than any state. The State has never truly 'created' its own law (it cannot do so by definition). Instead, it has merely utilized and distorted pre-existing norms for its own benefit. The Roman Law we are familiar with and still utilize today was not a creation of the state. Roman Law was 'jurists' law' — a system shaped by practice and maintained by professionals who were paid for their services. Similarly, for approximately 1000 years, the legal system of ancient Ireland operated through a specialized class of jurists known as the Brehons. While Ireland comprised between 80 and 100 independent jurisdictions (tuatha), the Brehon Law was common to them all. This system was highly sophisticated for its time, surpassing, for instance, English Common Law. Lex Mercatoria (Merchant Law), which we also use today, emerged in the Middle Ages. It was created by merchants themselves for their mutual interactions. Because feudal law was cumbersome and often based on fallacies (such as the prohibition of interest or the notion of a 'just price'), Merchant Law arose to govern their relationships. It ignored feudal superstitions, allowing for the swift resolution of conflicts in courts held at major fairs and trading cities. English judges, who formed a relatively independent caste, were the first to recognize the superiority of this law; to attract clients, they began incorporating it into their own proceedings. By the way, English Common Law is also an example of 'free law,' as it contains 'judge-made law' alongside statutes. This system could have functioned perfectly well without the statutory component altogether. From the book of Vladimir Zolotariev: 'Why fix what wasn't broken?'"