Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of tables and figures
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Lawyers and the royal courts in London during the reign of Elizabeth
- 3 The legal profession in the provinces
- 4 The increase in litigation
- 5 The causes of the increase in litigation
- 6 The increase in litigation and the legal profession
- 7 The attitudes of layman and attempts at reform
- 8 Clerkship, the inns of chancery, and legal education
- 9 Private practice
- 10 Public office and politics
- 11 Fees and incomes
- 12 Conclusion
- Appendix: Analysis of the social status of litigants in King's Bench and Common Pleas, 1560–1640
- Notes
- Select bibliography
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN ENGLISH LEGAL HISTORY
2 - Lawyers and the royal courts in London during the reign of Elizabeth
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 October 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of tables and figures
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Lawyers and the royal courts in London during the reign of Elizabeth
- 3 The legal profession in the provinces
- 4 The increase in litigation
- 5 The causes of the increase in litigation
- 6 The increase in litigation and the legal profession
- 7 The attitudes of layman and attempts at reform
- 8 Clerkship, the inns of chancery, and legal education
- 9 Private practice
- 10 Public office and politics
- 11 Fees and incomes
- 12 Conclusion
- Appendix: Analysis of the social status of litigants in King's Bench and Common Pleas, 1560–1640
- Notes
- Select bibliography
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN ENGLISH LEGAL HISTORY
Summary
In 1558 the English legal profession already had a long history. From the earliest years of the post-Conquest era, and probably long before, kings had made provision for the settlement of disputes between individuals and acknowledged the need for legal specialists who could aid litigants seeking redress before the royal tribunals. Prior to the beginning of the thirteenth century, most of the officials associated with the king's courts in London were still clerics, but by the end of that century the emergence of full-time lay lawyers, who were subjected to a certain degree of royal regulation and discipline, can be discerned and charted.
The most important and most highly organized of the early common lawyers were the serjeants at law. By the early fourteenth century they had become a distinctive order of lawyers who usually numbered some twelve to fifteen men at any one time. The serjeants were the senior members of the legal profession below the judges. They were nominated by royal writ, their creation was accompanied by great public ceremony, and they wore characteristic robes and a cap, the coif. In addition the serjeants enjoyed the privileged professional position of having an exclusive right to plead before the court most frequently involved in civil litigation, the Common Pleas.
However, there were other royal courts besides the Common Pleas, and although the serjeants could and did practise in tribunals such as Chancery, Star Chamber, the court of Wards, and the court of Requests, in these jurisdictions they enjoyed no monopoly and so had to share the business of pleading with another group of lawyers known as the apprentices at law.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Pettyfoggers and Vipers of the CommonwealthThe 'Lower Branch' of the Legal Profession in Early Modern England, pp. 10 - 29Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1986