Revenge and law, revenge as law: Notes on the anthropology of vengeance

Relying on Giuseppe Lorini and Michelina Masia’s insightful book Antropologia della vendetta (2015), this essay concisely reflects upon the twofold dimension of the rela-tionship between the institution of revenge and state law: section 2 takes on the topic of the coexistence of “institutional” revenge and state law as different legal systems (i.e., as a case of legal pluralism), while section 3 touches upon the theme of the persistence of “institutional” revenge within state law, particularly focusing on the institution of puni-tive damages.