The common law tradition emerged in England during the Middle Ages and was applied within British colonies across continents.
The common law tradition emerged in England during the Middle Ages and was applied within British colonies across continents. At the same time, the civil law tradition developed in continental Europe and was applied in the colonies of European imperial powers such as Spain and Portugal. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, it was also applied in countries formerly possessing distinctive legal traditions, such as Russia and Japan, that tried to reform their legal systems in order to gain economic and political power comparable to that of Western European nations.