Hendrik Jacob Hamaker

Hendrik Jacob Hamaker (1844 to 1911) was a Dutch jurist and scholar, born in Hilversum. His father Hendrik Gerard Hamaker, a humanist and graduate of Leiden, published the first Latin edition of Hugo Grotius's De Jure Praedae in 1868. After studies at Leiden Hamaker practised law there, and from 1877 he taught civil law at the University of Utrecht; after 1895 he co-edited the Weekblad voor Privaatrecht, Notarisambt en Registratie, a leading journal of civil law. He is noted for his work on judicial methodology, arguing for a substantial independence of judges from positive law, and he was elected a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1889. He died at Utrecht in 1911.