Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-07T01:51:30.539Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Pleadable Brieves, Pleading and the Development of Scots Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 October 2011

Hector L. MacQueen
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Until recently there was a depressing consensus about Scottish legal history in the medieval and early modern periods. It was accepted that in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Scots had gone some way to building a legal system on the model found in contemporary England, involving the holding of courts in the localities by sheriffs and justiciars on ayres, the use of royal writs or brieves to commence litigations, and the determination of cases by juries or assizes. The fullest account of Scottish law, Regiam Majestatem, was based on the twelfth century English text Glanvill. The wars and other skirmishes with England which began in 1296 and continued into the sixteenth century brought an end to the development of the ‘Scoto-Norman’law and legal system however. Cut off from its basic inspiration and lacking either a central court structure or a legal profession, Scots law regressed throughout the later middle ages. Demands for better justice led the king by the end of the fifteenth century to establish a group of royal councillors to hold judicial sessions or sittings at which such complaints might be heard. The councillors—the lords of council and session—might be either ecclesiastics or laymen; the former were more numerous and possessed greater legal skills. The procedure of the emerging court thus followed that of the ecclesiastical courts and the substantive law which developed was also canonical and civilian in character. By the mid-sixteenth century the Session was established as the main civil court in Scotland and Scots law had made a fresh start, severed from its original roots.

Type
Articles
Information
Law and History Review , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , Fall 1986 , pp. 403 - 422
Copyright
Copyright © the American Society for Legal History, Inc. 1986

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. For this picture see especially Cooper, T.M., ‘The Dark Age of Scottish Legal History’, Selected Papers 1922-1954 (Edinburgh, 1957) 219–36Google Scholar; Dickinson, W.C., ‘The Administration of Justice in Medieval Scotland’, Aberdeen University Review xxxiv (1951-1952) 338–51Google Scholar; and Paton, G.C.H., ed., Introduction to Scottish Legal History, Stair Society, vol. 20 (Edinburgh, 1958) 3–24Google Scholar.

2. See e.g. McKechnie, H., Judicial Process upon Brieves 1219-1532 (Glasgow, 1956Google Scholar); Duncan, A.A.M., ‘Regiam Majestatem: A Reconsideration’, Juridical Review vi (1961) 199–217Google Scholar; Willock, I.D., The Origin and Development of the Jury in Scotland, Stair Society, vol. 23 (Edinburgh, 1966Google Scholar) [hereinafter cited as Willock, Jury]; Harding, A., ‘The Medieval Brieves of Protection and the Development of the Common Law’, Juridical Review xi (1966) 115–49Google Scholar; MacQueen, H.L., ‘The Brieve of Right in Scots Law’, Journal of Legal History iii (1982) 52–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar and ‘Dissasine and Mortancestor in Scots Law’, ibid. at iv (1983) 21-49; Sellar, W.D.H., ‘Courtesy, Battle and the Brieve of Right 1368 - A Story Continued’, Miscellany II, Stair Society, vol. 35 (Edinburgh, 1984) 1–12Google Scholar.

3. See A.A.M. Duncan, ‘The Central Courts before 1532’in Introduction to Scottish Legal History, supra note 1 at 321-40; Chalmers, T.M., ‘The King's Council, Patronage and the Governance of Scotland 1460-1513’(unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Aberdeen, 1982) 152–317Google Scholar; MacQueen, H.L., ‘Pleadable Brieves and Jurisdiction in Heritage in Later Medieval Scotland’(unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Edinburgh, 1985) 249–79Google Scholar.

4. Maitland, F.W., English Law and the Renaissance (Cambridge, 1901) 19-20, 69–70Google Scholar.

5. See MacQueen, H.L., ‘Pleadable Brieves and Jurisdiction in Heritage in Later Medieval Scotland’, supra note 3 at 280–311Google Scholar; and ‘Jurisdiction in Heritage and the Lords of Council and Session after 1532’, Miscellany II, supra note 2 at 61–85.

6. Chalmers, T.M., ‘The King's Council, Patronage and the Governance of Scotland 1460-1513’, supra note 3 at 237-38, 287-89Google Scholar. But Chalmers regards the ecclesiastics as nevertheless a dominant group.

7. In addition to the literature cited supra note 1, see Robertson, J.J., ‘The Development of the Law’, in Brown, J.M., ed., Scottish Society in the Fifteenth Century (London, 1977) 136-52 at 152Google Scholar; and ‘Canon Law as a Source [of Stair's Institutions]’, in Walker, D.M., ed., Stair Tercentenary Studies, Stair Society, vol. 33 (Edinburgh, 1981) 112-27 at 119–20Google Scholar; Ollivant, S.D., The Court of the Official in Pre-Reformation Scotland, Stair Society, vol. 34 (Edinburgh, 1982) 97 and 131–32Google Scholar, (hereinafter cited as Ollivant, Official); Robinson, O.F., Fergus, T.D. and Gordon, W.M., An Introduction to European Legal History (Milton Keynes, 1985) 204Google Scholar.

8. The topic was briefly discussed by Napier, M., ‘The Lanox of Auld’: An Epistolary Review of ‘The Lennox’by William Fraser (Edinburgh, 1880) 28Google Scholar. His account seems to be derived from the misleading ones of Skene, Stair and Erskine.

9. H. McKechnie, Judicial Process upon Brieves, supra note 2 at 6; and see Skene's, J.De Verborum Signification (Edinburgh, 1597Google Scholar) s.v. ‘Breves pleadable’.

10. Harding, A., ‘The Medieval Brieves of Protection’, supra note 2 at 126.Google Scholar

11. Willock, Jury, supra note 2 at 105-32.

12. Ibid. at 106.

13. Dalrymple, James, Stair, Viscount, (Walker, D.M., ed.) The Institutions of the Law of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1981) Bk. IV, iii, 10 and 17Google Scholar; Erskine, John, (Nicholson, J.B., ed.) An Institute of the Law of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1871) Bk. IV, i, 3Google Scholar; and see J. Skene's De Verborum Significtione supra note 9, s.v. ‘Breves pleadable’.

14. McKechnie, H., Judicial Process upon Brieves, supra note 2 at 8-9, 19–22Google Scholar; Willock, Jury, 122-32.

15. Regiam Majestatem Bk. I, ch. 4. I have used the editions of Regiam and of Quoniam Attachiamenta contained in Thomson, T. and Innes, C., eds., Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland 12 vols. (Edinburgh, 1814-1875Google Scholar) [hereinafter APS] i.

16. Quoniam Attachiamenta, ch. 33.

17. The treatise was edited by Bateson, Mary and is published in The Second Miscellany of the Scottish History Society, Scottish History Society, first series vol. 44 (Edinburgh, 1904Google Scholar). The passage quoted is at 31-32. As to date see Barrow, G.W.S., The Kingdom of the Scots (London, 1973) 93Google Scholar and note 32.

18. For the foregoing see Thomson, J.M., The Public Records of Scotland (Glasgow, 1922) 62–68Google Scholar; Duncan, A.A.M., ‘The Acta of Robert I’, Scottish Historical Review xxxii (1953) 1–39Google Scholar at 7; Webster, B., ed., Regesta Regum Scottorum VI: The Acts of David II 1329-1371 (Edinburgh, 1982) [hereinafter RRS vi]; 19, 25, 28Google Scholar; T. Chalmers, ‘The King's Council, Patronage and the Governance of Scotland 1460-1513’, supra note 3 at 33. For the contrast between letters de gratia and de cursu see Stevenson, J., ed., Documents Illustrative of the History of Scotland 1286-1306 (Edinburgh, 1870) i: 169Google Scholar, Stones, E.L.G. and Simpson, G.G., eds., Edward I and the Throne of Scotland 1290-1296 (Oxford, 1979) ii: 97Google Scholar, and RRS vi, no. 306.

19. APS i: 473, ch. 25.

20. APS ii: 100, ch. 9. See also Willock, supra note 2 at Jury, 234-36.

21. APS ii: 101.

22. See Grierson, P.J. Hamilton, ‘Falsing the Doom’, Scottish Historical Review xxiv (1926) 1–18Google Scholar.

23. APS ii: 254, ch. 41.

24. APS ii: 18, chs. 5 and 7. For ‘borgh’ meaning ‘pledge, security’, see Robinson, M., ed., The Concise Scots Dictionary (Aberdeen, 1985) 55Google Scholar.

25. For all the foregoing see APS ii: 101, 117 and Thomson, T., ed., Acta Dominorum Auditorum: The Acts of the Lords Auditors of Causes and Complaints, 1466-1496 (Edinburgh, 1839Google Scholar) [hereinafter ADA] 12, 66.

26. Miscellany of the Spalding Club, 5 vols. (Aberdeen, 1841-1852) ii: 319Google Scholar.

27. APS i: 505.

28. Scottish Record Office, Edinburgh (henceforth S.R.O.) Acta Dominorum Concilii, call no. CS 5/16, ff. 144 v.—145r. This case illustrates a third appellate mechanism, ‘wrongful and inordinate procedure’, which operated alongside falsing the doom and actions of error and which was of general application.

29. S.R.O., Crown Office Writs, call no. AD 1/60.

30. For what follows see Giuliani, A., ‘The Influence of Rhetoric on the Law of Evidence and Pleading’, Juridical Review vii (1962) 216-51 at 229Google Scholar.

31. Ibid. at 233.

32. For the foregoing see Caenegem, R.C. van, ‘The History of European Civil Procedure’, in the International Encyclopedia of Comparative Law vol. xviGoogle Scholar, ch. 2; Ollivant, Official, 108-13; and Adams, N. and Donahue, C., eds., Select Cases from the Ecclesiastical Courts of the Province of Canterbury c. 1200-1301, Selden Society, vol. 95 (London, 1981), introduction, 41–43Google Scholar.

33. Pollock, F. and Maitland, F.W., The History of English Law before Edward I, 2 vols., (Cambridge, 2nd. edition, 1896Google Scholar; reprinted ed. S.F.C. Milsom, Cambridge, 1968, ii: 611-16 [hereinafter: P. and M.]; Woodbine, G. E., ed., Bracton's De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae trans, by Thorne, S.E., 4 vols. (Harvard, 1968-1977), ff. 399Google Scholar b. (iv 245) and 400-400 b (iv, 247)[hereinafter Bracton].

34. Milsom, S.F.C., ‘Law and Fact in Legal Development’, University of Toronto Law Journal xvii (1967) 1-19 at 15–16Google Scholar; Milsom, S.F.C., Historical Foundations of the Common Law (London, 2nd. edition, 1981) 42–44Google Scholar.

35. P. & M., ii: 613.

36. Ibid. at ii: 614-15.

37. Baker, J.H., Introduction to English Legal History (London, 2nd. edition, 1979) 68Google Scholar.

38. Baker, J.H., ed., The Reports of Sir John Spelman, Selden Society vols. 93 and 94 (London, 1977-1978) ii: 144–50Google Scholar.

39. P. & M., ii: 614; Baker, J. H., Introduction to English Legal History, supra note 37 at 67.Google Scholar

40. P. & M., ii: 614.

41. Bracton ff. 399-438 (iv: 245-362).

42. Published by the Scottish Text Society in three volumes (Edinburgh, 1920-26). See the introduction: vol. iii: 62-70.

43. See Regiam Majestatem Bk. I: chs. 10 and 11; Quoniam Attachiamenta ch. 35.

44. APS i: 470-71, chs. 14-16.

45. APS ii: 17, ch. 3.

46. APS ii: 17-18, chs. 1-7.

47. APS ii: 10, ch. 10.

48. See the appendix to this article.

49. APS i: 505 and supra, 406.

50. P. & M. ii: 616.

51. Willock, Jury, 119-21.

52. Ibid. at 122-32.

53. Ibid. at 127-28.

54. Ibid. at 126-27.

55. APS ii: 252, ch. 22.

56. Ibid. at ii: 253, ch. 40.

57. For the cases see e.g. ADA 48-49, 54, 59, 124* and Thomson, T., ed., Acta Dominorum Concilii I: The Acts of the Lords of Council in Civil Causes 1478-1496 (Edinburgh, 1839Google Scholar), thereinafter: ADC i]. For the act of parliament see APS ii: 100, ch. 9, and supra, 404.

58. APS ii: 254, ch. 41; MacQueen, H.L., ‘The Brieve of Right in Scots Law’, supra note 2 at 58.Google Scholar

59. See McKechnie, H., Judicial Process upon Brieves, supra note 2 at 30.Google Scholar

60. APS ii: 253, ch. 40.

61. See e.g. a case of c. 1476 recorded in Fraser, W.The Lennox, 2 vols. (Edinburgh, 1874) ii, no. 72Google Scholar where dilatory exceptions against the judge, court, brieve, day, place, petition and the points of the brieve were proposed against a brieve of inquest; also ADA, 14, 19, 44, 74 and ADC i: 10, 212, 223 and 243.

62. Regiam Majestatem Bk. I, ch. 10; APS i: 471, ch. 19.

63. Quoniam Attachiamenta ch. 34, 36 and 40.

64. APS i: 505.

65. P. & M., ii: 609.

66. APS i. 471.

67. Ibid. at i: 470-71, and supra, 43.

68. Dickinson, W.C., ed., Early Records of the Burgh of Aberdeen 1317, 1398-1407 Scottish History Society, third series, vol. 49 (Edinburgh, 1957) 10–11Google Scholar.

69. APS i: 504. For pleading in the sheriff court see Dickinson, W.C., ed., The Sheriff Court Book of Fife 1515-1522 Scottish History Society, third series, vol. 12 (Edinburgh, 1928) 315–16Google Scholar.

70. Baker, J. H., Introduction to English Legal History, supra note 37 at 69–70.Google Scholar

71. See the appendix to this article.

72. S.R.O., Crown Office Writs, call no. AD 1/60.

73. See APS ii: 18, and supra, 404. For ‘weir’ meaning ‘defence’ see The Concise Scots Dictionary, supra note 24 at 781. The modern Scottish term is ‘a plea to the relevancy’.

74. See the references in ADA, index, ‘Dilator defences or exceptions’and ‘Exceptions’; ADC i: index, ‘Dilatory exceptions’.

75. Donaldson, G., ‘The Legal Profession in Scottish Society in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries’, Juridical Review xxi (1976) 1–17Google Scholar at 8.

76. See e.g. Donaldson, G., ‘Legal Profession’, supra note 75 at 1–9Google Scholar; Brown, A.L., ‘The Scottish “Establishment” in the Fifteenth Century’, Ibid. at xxiii (1978) 89–105Google Scholar; APS ii: 8, 18, 19, 43.

77. It should be noted that David Guthrie of Kincaldrum was a graduate in Arts of the Universities of Cologne and Paris. For his remarkable career see Murray, A.L., ‘The Lord Clerk Register’, Scottish Historical Review liii (1974) 124 at 133Google Scholar; Macdougall, N.A.T., James III: A Political Study (Edinburgh, 1982) 100Google Scholar; Borthwick, A. and MacQueen, H.L., ‘Three Fifteenth Century Cases’ Juridicial Review xxxi (1986Google Scholar) forthcoming; Lyall, R. J., ‘Scottish Students and Masters at the Universities of Cologne and Louvain in the Fifteenth Century’, Innes Review xxxvi (1985) 55-73 at 61Google Scholar.

78. Barrow, Kingdom of the Scots, supra note 17 at 122. The comment is made of the Scottish justiciar, another medieval import from England, but could be applied to many other Scottish institutions and legal rules dating from this period.

79. See Cooper, T.M., ‘The Dark Age of Scottish Legal History’, supra note 1 at 231-32Google Scholar and Donaldson, G., ‘Legal Profession’, supra note 75 at 7.Google Scholar