Conflict of Laws deals with the inter-relationships between domestic municipal laws of foreign jurisdictions. Materials on this subject are, therefore, sometimes catalogued in other libraries under the alternative title of Private International Law. The collections devoted to Conflict of Laws are to be found on the third floor of the Squire Library, but by the nature of the subject, much relevant data also occur under Foreign Law and Comparative Law, as well as various domestic jurisdictions. Apropos the latter, readers' attention should be drawn to the small, but important collections on the subject in English (1st floor) and American (2nd floor) law sections.
As early as the beginning of the twentieth century, at the time of the establishment of the Squire Law Library, John Westlake (Whewell Professor of International Law 1888 - 1908) made the first significant donations of books to the collections devoted to Conflict of Laws. These were supplemented by a further large donation of materials by H.C. Gutteridge (Professor of Comparative Law 1934 - 1941). His assistant at that time, Dr Kurt Lipstein (later Professor of Comparative Law 1973 - 1976), undertook to collate these collections, which he has tended until his death in 2006.