Search results
above, p. 36. 28 On Langland's apocalypticism and its derivation from a variety of sources, including oral ones, see Kathryn Kerby-Fulton, Reformist Apocalypticism and Piers Plowman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). 29 For details of medieval law courts, see Anthony Musson, Medieval
(Chicago, 1985), pp. 28–33, 66–9: ‘Whether the bench questioned juries at gaol delivery . . . remains unclear’ (ibid., p. 68 n8). 69 For example: JUST 3/117 m7d. 70 Two such instances reached the Court of King’s Bench: Sayles (ed.), Select Cases, VI, pp. 21–5, 133. 71 JUST 3/49/2 m8d. 72 JUST 3/48 m33. 55 Anthony Musson 73 For example: JUST 3/48 m11d; 49/1 m2. 74 JUST 3/125 m1. 75 For a more detailed discussion see A. Musson, Medieval Law in Context: The Growth of Legal Consciousness from Magna Carta to the Peasants’ Revolt (Manchester, 2001), pp. 154–6 and on changes
as proverbial or commonsensical. 24 Among the ancient sources noticed by early modern lawyers was Publius Syrus who, during the late Republic, had observed in his Sentences that ‘necessity gives law, but does not receive it.’ 25 Also influential for later common lawyers was Seneca the Elder’s assertion that ‘necessity is the law of the moment.’ 26 The impact of these classical writers on medieval law is speculative, but Frank Roumy has reconstructed how canonists widely discussed necessity as a limited exception to the positive law. 27 The most popular of the
, pp. 341–50, 359–61; H. G. Hanbury ‘The legislation of Richard III’, AJLH , 6 (1962), 95–113. 21 N. Saul, Richard II (New Haven, Yale University Press, 1997), pp. 366–404; A. Harding, Medieval Law and the Foundations of the State (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 263
. Historians have, over past decades, characterised the medieval world as one where ‘everything from the most trivial insults to serious questions of rights and property [was] settled by homicide’. 1 Certainly, the records of medieval law and order abound with examples of numerous felonies, including murder and assault, as well as disorder and misbehaviour at less severe levels. But these records in fact stem from the extensive efforts of governments and officials to punish and control misbehaviour. The resulting impression is that
’, JLH , 6 (1985), pp. 65–7, 74–6. 4 Year Books of Edward III: 14 and 15 Edward III , ed. L. O. Pike (London, RS, 1889), pp. 258–63; Musson, Medieval Law , pp. 57–9. 5 Maddicott, Law and Lordship , pp. 40
pacti emendaret’. 21 Treaty of Pavia , c. 1. The two-fold compensation also existed in Roman law, as well as a number of early medieval laws, including the laws of Æthelberht of Kent. Digest , 47: 2.46,1; Abt , cc. 6
the procedure of courts also changed over time. 68 Generalisations are thus hazardous, but some observations may be offered. Medieval law distinguished between the most serious offences, including homicide, arson, rape, robbery, and grand larceny (i.e. theft of goods valued in excess of a shilling [12 d = 5p]), which were normally classed as felonies, and other lesser
promises. We see that Britain's image as an imperial nation bound by law formed alongside the violence and the restriction of rights in both colonial and metropolitan settings. Equality before the law? What did equality before the law mean in practice? Medieval law had created a patchwork of jurisdictions, many of which were overlapping, awarding certain privileges to particular
fulfilling the present meaning of ‘trial’, whereas so-called ‘trials’ in the medieval courts of love cannot. 4 This is well described in A. Musson, Medieval Law in Context. The Growth of Legal Consciousness from Magna Carta to the Peasants’ Revolt (Manchester and New York, 2001), especially chapters 1–3. 5 Probably so called because of the ‘pieds poudrés’ of the travelling traders who appeared before them. See T. Plucknett, Concise History of the Common Law (fifth edition, London, 1956), p. 660; W. Holdsworth, A History of English Law (17 vols, London, 1903–1972), I