Norman Legal History

No real attempt to introduce
integrating laws instead use made of existing customs and laws

Henry II

Introduced jury who were at first
witnesses of fact. In other words they knew the
defendant/claimant etc

Laws issued "cum consenso et consilio"

Assize of Clarendon. 1166 An attempt to
retrieve power from the local magnates
and return it to the crown

Assize of Arms 1181. Fryd resurrected meaning that HII could dispense with baronial military service. Trusted the people more than the barons. p24 intro Stubbs? earlyenglishlaws.ac.uk

Moved Sherrif's office from barons to lawyers/soldiers

Some had already made position hereditary

Kings justice

HII's judges insisted on written evidence of land holding

Glanvill

Had "smattering of Roman law" which misled later historians

tried to formulate some general rules. If, for eg, a knight or tenant of a military fee died the oldest son would inherit. If no sone daughters inherit equally. Glanvill vii. 3 p76

No clear concepts of abstract law
such as property or freedom

Courts

Honorial

Ecclesiastical courts heard many
cases beyond their strict jurisdiction

Hundred

Breach of peace

Sac & Soc - the full right of administering
justice in a manor or lordship.

Shire

Heard claims for property

Writs

Vernacular Writs
recorded grants of land or
rights given by King to Beneficiary

Most disposals/transfers done by
witnesses. Also use of writ charters
andlandbooks but not common

Property divided into
acquisitions and patrimony

Norman customs and laws

Alod. System whereby land held by hereditary
right and did not imply full possession

Lordship powerful but feudal tenures slow
to emerge as patrimony strong

William I

Inherited working system which needed subjugation

System in place of
kinship and lordship
but Normans were to develop
Lordship. This was to influence
descent of property through
lines and also methods of law
enforcement/peace keeping

Local communities had more
effective share of maintenancxe of
law & order than the Normans had

Laws and customs saved by ecclesiastical
scribes and used by Norman Administrators esp.
Worcester and Rochester. Nothing later than
Cnut appears to have been relied upon.

Concerned mostly with criminal matters
and adapted provisions from earlier codes

Did not deal with non-criminal matters

Did not deal with inheritance but
only unlawful occupation of property

Bookland - appears to have been
based on kin rather than lordship. See p164 Chibnall

Established "pure" feudal system

Subinfeudation

Intrinsec arises from agreement between 2 persons/Forinsec e.g. obligation to king

Seperated secular and temporal courts

Compurgation or wager of law. Alternative was battle or ordeal. Justice administered by travelling magnates

William II

Writ for Collection of Relief. No opportunity to refuse.
Penalty is forfeiture of land

Henry I

Grant Concerning Scrutage 1127. Scrutage effectively Royal tax

Established national finance, Pipe Rolls

Writs show serious problems with military tenants who refused to render service to their abbots and from farmers who still believed they could pass on their family estates to their heirs

Parage see first para p174. Lead to primogeniture rule

Writ of 1108 issued by HII made it plain that land pleas between king's tenants in chief be heard in King's court. Those between vassals of different lords in county court and those between vassals of same lord in that lord's court.

Leges Henrici Primi

Evernote - Visibility of Trannsactions & p171
Chibnall - court "repository of custom"

statutum decretum keeping traditional customs meant that women could inherit and divide the land even though military tenure was developing to the advantage of the male heir

Stephen

Earliest judicial writs emanate from this reign.
Van Caenegem, writs no 45 Regesta iii 692