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Government in Norman and Angevin England

Feudalism

Not in article:
Check out Warren page 33 last paragraph on the changes to the trinoda necessities that Norman introduction of feudalism and private castles created

The standard knights fee was five hides, similar in size to a thegn's estate.

Crown

Becoming king

In regards to English kingship, however, primogeniture did not become the norm until the reign of Henry II.

Norman succession

Not in article:
There were still no definitive rules regarding inheritance.

In the Anglo-Saxon period, the witan had a role in at least nominally electing a new monarch.

Interregnum and coronation

Not in article:
Needs a source: It also explains why Empress Matilda was styled "Lady of the English" during the Anarchy.

Central administration

Exchequer

Not in article:
At the end of the 12th century, it moved from Winchester to a chamber adjacent to Westminster Hall.

Royal income

Not in article:
Geld after the Conquest, last paragraph of WArren page 35.

After the Norman Conquest, the geld was inefficient as a regular tax, Warren page 38

The Danegeld or geld levied on land was replaced by dona (gifts) and auxilia (aids) levied on groups outside of the feudal nobility (such as freemen, boroughs, royal demesne, sheriffs, and England's Jewish community).

The royal boroughs form part of the king's demesne as much as the royal manors do.

Curia Regis

Great council

Not in article
Henry II (r. 1154–1189), England's first Angevin king, introduced a new form of legislation, the assize. An assize was an agreement between the king and his feudal tenants to clarify or alter existing custom. Examples of such legislation include the Assize of Arms of 1181 and the Assize of Bread and Ale.

In 1212–1213, King John summoned representative knights from each county. While these knights were summoned to receive and carry out royal orders, their role as representatives of their counties was novel.

Local government

Counties

Not in article:
Changes to the shire court under the Normans, Warren p. 62–63

Only border earls retained king-like power. On the Welsh border were the palatine counties of Herefordshire, Shropshire, and Cheshire. In the north, the County Palatine of Durham was ruled by the bishop of Durham.

In the Norman period, many of the sheriff's judicial powers were transferred to the royal justices, officials with power to hear crown pleas (cases reserved to the Crown). William the Conqueror and William Rufus occasionally commissioned trusted barons to hear cases at county courts. Under Rufus, these judicial commissions were supplemented by itinerant justices. Under Henry I, judicial circuits were organised. For crown pleas, the itinerant justices presided over the county court, and the sheriff's only job was to preserve order and produce the necessary people. Justices were chosen from among  prelates and barons of the royal household, and they played an important role in ensuring the king had accurate information regarding local events.

Vills and manors

Not in article: 
"Manor" is not a term used in England before 1066.

Royal forests

This section is not in the article
When kings were weak, they made concessions to limit the Forest. But when they were strong, these concessions were forgotten.

Chief Forester see Bartlett page 170.

Legal system

Anglo-Norman law

Not in article

After the Norman Conquest, Anglo-Saxon law was largely left intact, and French-speaking royal advisers did much to understand and preserve the pre-existing legal system. During the reign of Henry I, a collection of Anglo-Saxon laws called the Quadripartitus was compiled. Later, the Leges Edwardi Confessoris was produced. The Leges Henrici Primi, c. 1118, attempted to describe the legal situation at the time. It notes that there were distinct legal systems for Wessex, Mercia, and the Danelaw. In addition, each of the 32 counties had their own customs.

The king was the fount of justice. He could judge important cases coram rege (Latin: "in the presence of the king himself") with the advice of his curia regis. He could also delegate judicial power to royal justices.

Local courts

Not in article

The lord of a manor automatically enjoyed the right to hold a manorial court over his vassals and tenants. Manorial courts had jurisdiction over "debt under forty shillings, contracts and conventions made within the power of the lord, cattle wounding [and other sorts of things], damage to crops by animals, assault not leading to bloodshed, trespass or damaging of timber where the king's peace was not involved ..." Tenants-in-chief possessed fiefs called "honours" made up of many different manors scattered over several shires. The honour court had jurisdiction over all the honour's manors.

The hundred court had jurisdiction over minor offenses and property disputes. Before the reign of Henry II, the shire or county court had a wide-ranging jurisdiction. Most land disputes and serious criminal cases were heard there. Henry I mandated that land disputes between vassals of two different lords were also to be heard in county court.

County courts met twice a year in Anglo-Saxon times, but some were meeting every three weeks by the 13th century. Local custom and tradition played a large role in the functioning of the county courts, and these customs varied from county to county. The court was presided over by the sheriff. Those required to attend court were called "suitors". The suitors were divided between large landowners ("barons of the shire" or barones comitatus in Latin) and small landowners (lesser freemen). The large landowners passed judgment, and the lesser freemen deferred to them.

Cases could be transferred from a manorial court to the county court through a process called tolt. A case could be transferred from county court to the royal justices by a writ of pone. Royal justices often presided over special sessions of the county court.

Trial procedure

Not in article

In Norman times, court procedure involved the pleadings of the parties, information supplied by juries, documentary evidence, and witness testimony. In many cases, a compromise settlement was reached. When this was not possible, conclusive proof was sought through methods invoking divine intervention: trial by oath (compurgation) and trial by ordeal.

In criminal cases, three forms of ordeal were used: trial by hot iron, trial by cold water, and trial by combat. Trial by combat was introduced by the Normans and was frequently used when one person accused another of theft or murder. Civil cases involving property over 10 shillings were determined by battle as well.

Angevin legal reform

Not in article

The growth of the legal system required specialization, and the judicial functions of the curia regis were delegated to two courts sitting at Westminster Hall. The Court of Common Pleas split from the Exchequer of Pleas in the 1190s. It had jurisdiction over civil cases (such as debts, property rights, and trespass). It was staffed by a chief justice of the Common Pleas and several other justices of the Common Pleas.

Henry II instituted the general eyres in which a group of between two and nine itinerant justices were assigned a circuit of counties to visit. These circuits covered the whole country with the exception of Chester and Durham, which were exempt due to their special status. The eyre justices would stay in one county for several weeks to hear cases under their jurisdiction before moving on. Their jurisdiction included among other things the pleas of the Crown, cases initiated by royal writ, criminal cases, and issues touching the rights of the Crown (wardships, etc.). By 1189, there were around 35 itinerant judges, seven to nine judges per circuit.

Henry II introduced a number of legal reforms that mark the origins of the common law. In particular, the role of juries in both criminal and civil cases was expanded. A jury was a group of men who swore to give a truthful answer (a verdict) to a question asked of them. The Assize of Clarendon of 1166 required that juries of presentment identify those "accused or notoriously suspect of being a robber, murderer or thief" and provide this information to the itinerant judges when they visited the county. The jury did not yet decide innocence or guilt, which was still proven by ordeal.

In civil cases, such as land disputes, the Grand Assize of 1179 gave defendants the option of having the matter settled by a jury of twelve knights instead of trial by battle. Henry also introduced the petty assizes—procedures to allow speedy resolution of land disputes. These include novel disseisin, mort d'ancestor, and darrein presentment. Under the petty assizes, a plaintiff initiated proceedings by purchasing a writ from the chancery. The writ instructed the sheriff to choose a jury of 12 free men. The next time a royal justice was in the county, the parties and the jury would appear before him. For novel disseisin, the jury was to answer, "Was the plaintiff evicted unjustly and without judgment from an estate of which he was in peaceful possession?"

In 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council forbade clergy participation in trial by ordeal. In 1219, the Crown ordered justices to find an alternative and the jury trial was chosen. The first recorded criminal jury trial occurred at Westminster in 1220. The first juries differed from modern juries in that early jurors were local men with knowledge of the case. Their job was not to weigh evidence but to decide the facts of a case using their own knowledge.

Central courts

Not in article
He also could delegate justices and commissioners to try cases. Because kings were frequently overseas, the office of chief justiciar developed. The chief justiciar acted as the king's viceroy in judicial and other matters.

By the 1190s, the Court of Common Pleas had split from the Exchequer and was sitting permanently at Westminster Hall. This court, commonly called the Bench, heard civil cases.

The justices of the Bench and the eyre became increasingly professionalized during the Angevin period as new legal procedures introduced by Henry II led to an increase in court business.

Unlike oath-helpers, jurors were summoned by royal officials and, in theory, would have no personal involvement in the case.

Itinerant judges traveled from county to county on general eyres (circuits) to hear pleas of the Crown. By 1189, there were around thirty-five itinerant judges, seven to nine judges per circuit. These royal judges did not merely preside over the court, but "From 1176 the royal justices in eyre made judgments themselves in what was a local session of a national royal court."

Henry's reforms mark the origins of the common law and reduced the importance of non-royal courts by making royal justice readily available.

Local courts

Not in article
Hundred and county courts, presided over by the sheriff or his bailiff, continued to meet as they had before the Conquest. Most disputes in these courts concerned land claims, violence, or theft. Certain cases called pleas of the Crown could only be heard by the king or his representative. So that royal pleas could be heard across the kingdom, the chief justiciar sent itinerant judges out to the counties; however, these royal judges did not decide cases as that was still the responsibility of the suitors to the court, who were overwhelmingly landowners.
 
The laws concerned with royal forests (i.e. royal hunting preserves) were adjudicated by forest courts, and jurisdiction over cases involving marriage, wills, legitimacy, and crimes committed by clerics were transferred to church courts.

In the time of Henry I, some royal justices were permanently based in the counties. Other justices were sent out to the counties to try special cases.

Henry de Bracton called these barons of the shire the buzones.

Bibliography

• Baker, John (2019). An Introduction to English Legal History (5th ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-254074-4.
• Bartlett, Robert (2000). England Under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 1075-1225. New Oxford History of England. Clarendon Press. ISBN 9780199251018.
• Burt, Caroline (2013). Edward I and the Governance of England, 1272–1307. Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781139851299.
• "Coram Rege". West's Encyclopedia of American Law. 2024.
• Downer, L. J., ed. (1972). Leges Henrici Primi. Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press. OCLC 389304.
• Fitzroy, Almeric (1928). The History of the Privy Council. London: John Murray.
• Green, Judith A. (1986). The Government of England under Henry I. Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought: Fourth Series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511560248. ISBN 9780511560248.
• Huscroft, Richard (2016). Ruling England, 1042–1217 (2nd ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-1138786554.
• Jolliffe, J. E. A. (1961). The Constitutional History of Medieval England from the English Settlement to 1485 (4th ed.). Adams and Charles Black.
• Lyon, Ann (2016). Constitutional History of the UK (2nd ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-20398-8.
• Lyon, Bryce (1980). A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England (2nd ed.). W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0-393-95132-4. 1st edition available to read online here.
• Maddicott, John (2009). "Origins and Beginnings to 1215". In Jones, Clyve (ed.). A Short History of Parliament: England, Great Britain, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Scotland. The Boydell Press. pp. 3–9. ISBN 978-1-843-83717-6.
• Maddicott, J. R. (2010). The Origins of the English Parliament, 924-1327. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-199-58550-2.
• Potter, Harry (2015). Law, Liberty and the Constitution: A Brief History of the Common Law. Boydell Press. ISBN 9781783270118.
• Richardson, H. G.; Sayles, G. O. (1963). The Governance of Mediaeval England from the Conquest to Magna Carta. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
• Warren, W. L. (1987). The Governance of Norman and Angevin England, 1086–1272. The Governance of England. Vol. 2. Stanford, CA, US: Stanford University Press. ISBN 0-8047-1307-3.

• Ranulf de Glanville (1932). Woodbine, George Edward (ed.). De legibus et consuetudinibus regni Anglia. Yale University Press.