¹ Chronicles of London, ed. Kingsford, C. L. (1905), pp. 207–8. The new Serjeants were: John Boteler, Robert Constable and Richard Heigham of Lincoln's Inn, Humphrey Coningsby and Thomas Frowyk of the Inner Temple, John Kingsmill and John Mordaunt of the Middle Temple, Thomas Oxenbridge and John Yaxley of Gray's Inn.Google Scholar

² Bacon, Francis, Historie of the raigne of King Henry the seventh, ed. Lumby, J. R. (1882), p. 131.Google Scholar

¹ Holdsworth, W. S., Some Makers of English Law: the Tagore lectures, 1937–38 (1966), pp. 88–89;Google Scholaridem, History of English Law, 3rd edn. (1945), iv, pp. 217–93.Google Scholar

² ibid., iv, p. 270.

³ Plucknett, T. F. T., ‘The legal profession in the history of English law,’ Law Quarterly Review, xlviii (1932), pp. 328–40.Google Scholar

⁴ In 1523, 152 lawyers of the inns of court and chancery, clerks of the King's Bench and Common Pleas, judges, barons of the Exchequer and serjeants-at-law were rated for the anticipation of the subsidy.Cal. Inner Temple Records, ed. Inderwick, F. A. (1896), i, pp. 455–66.Google Scholar There were usually 11 judges and barons, fewer than 10 Serjeants and about 50 barristers. Lawyers on the clerical staff of the Westminster courts numbered about 50, bringing the total to about 120. To this must be added the attorneys and miscellaneous clerks. Nearly 60 of these appear in the subsidy anticipation, but four times that figure seems a reasonable allowance to take in the very small fry. This would bring the overall total for the Westminster lawyers to the region of 400. There certainly does not seem to be evidence of a massive population of petty lawyers in the inns of court, and some inns of chancery were desperate for numbers in the sixteenth century; Furnival's Inn numbered only 20 in Edward VI's reign. Williams, E., Early Holborn and the Legal Quarter of London, ii (1927), para. 488;Google ScholarIves, E. W., ‘The reputation of the common lawyer in English society, 1450–1550’, University of Birmingham Historical Journal, vii (1960), pp. 146–7.Google Scholar Cf. for the early fifteenth century, Bland, D. S., Early Records of Furnival's Inn (Newcastle upon Tyne, 1957).Google Scholar

¹ Between 1480–4 and 1523^7, the five yearly average of all inns of court admissions, calculated on a running mean, was almost always below 60. The normal course for a student lasted for three years, so that, at most, there were 180 students at the greater inns. Inns of chancery were smaller (Fortescue suggests half the size) and so an estimate of 120 for their students is generous.

² Fortescue, JohnDe Laudibus Legum Anglie, ed. Chrimes, S. B. (1949), pp. 116–19; B[ritish M[useum], Lansdowne Ms. 47, fo. 114.Google Scholar

¹ In the diocese of Norwich, more than fifty individuals are listed.

² Valor Ecclesiasticus, i, pp. 16, 22, 26, 359; his fees totalled £21. 13s. 5d.Google Scholar

³ L[etters] and P[apers, Foreign and Domestic of the Reign of Henry VIII], 2nd edn, i, no. 438 (1) m. 16, (2) m. 31.Google Scholar

⁴ ibid., i, no. 438 (2) m. 10; hostre = hostrey, an inn.

⁵ ibid., nos. 438 (1) m. 15, 1803 (2) m. 6; Cal. Patent Rolls, 1494–1509, p. 498.Google Scholar

⁶ L. and P., i, no. 438 (2) m. 27; P[ublic] R[ecord] Offfice] C 1/424/8.

⁷ It is premature to introduce the category of professional solicitor into the discussion. The prominence of lawyers in business has led enquirers to conclude that a class existed of ‘solicitors in all but name’. Birks, M., Gentlemen of the Law (1960), pp. 88–9;Google Scholar cf. Harding, A., A Social History of English Law (1966), pp. 176–7. But lawyers of all sorts acted as business agents (see below), and the noun ‘solicitor’ indicates an activity, not a profession; it is improper to isolate any prototypes of that later branch of the profession. James Gresham, often taken as a solicitor in embryo was, in fact, an attorney of the common pleas. P.R.O., CP 40/802, roll of attorneys, mm. 2, 2^d, 3^d.Google Scholar

¹ L. and P., i, no. 438 (2) m. 5.

² Rutland MSS. (Historical] M[anuscript]s Commission], 12 Rep. iv), p. 12; L. and P., i,no. 1593; ibid., iii, nos. 1090,1195 et passim; ibid., Addenda, i, no. 389 et passim.

³ Ives, E. W., ‘Andrew Dymmock and the business papers of Antony, Earl Rivers, 1482–3’, forthcoming in the Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research.Google Scholar

¹ Serjeant-at-law 1486, ob. 1500. This and subsequent reference to the career of Thomas Kebell is taken from a book in preparation, ‘The Common Lawyers of Pre-Reformation England—Thomas Kebell, a case study’.

² The identification of trained lawyers is much hampered by lacunae in the admissions registers of the inns. Lists for Lincoln's Inn are known from 1420, the Middle Temple from 1501 to 1524, Gray's Inn from 1521, the Inner Temple from 1547 and the Middle Temple again from 1550. No lists are known for any of the inns of chancery.

³ Ives, E. W., ‘Promotion in the legal profession of Yorkist and early Tudor England’, Law Quarterly Review, 75 (1959), pp. 353–4.Google Scholar

¹ Scargill: L. and P., i, no. 438 (3) m. 12; Somerville, R., Duchy of Lan caster (1953), i, pp. 515, 524.Google Scholar Blount: L. and P., i, no. 1803 (2) m. 2; Cal. Inner Temple Rec., i. 10, 17. Hasilwode: L. and P., i, no. 438 (1) m. 26; P.R.O. C 1/571/15; Middle Temple Records, Minutes of Parliament, ed. Martin, C. T. (1904), i, pp. 3, 4, 63.Google Scholar

² Kylham: L. and P., i, no. 438 (1) m. 10. Goche: ibid., i, no. 438 (3) m. 7, 2222 (12). Stepeneth: ibid., i, no. 438 (3) m. 6. Marbury: ibid., i, nos. 438 (3) m. 8, 414 (21).

³ Plucknett, T. F. T., The Medieval Bailiff (Creighton lecture, 1953, pub. 1954), p. 9. The clergy also would keep manorial courts at times, e.g. MSS. Wells Cathedral (Hist. MSS. Comm., 10 Rep. iii), ii, pp. 154, 165, 216.Google Scholar

⁴ Attorneys of the central courts also frequently had provincial practices, e.g. Andrew Pawe, clerk of the peace and the mayoralty at Norwich (P.R.O. C 1/125/4; L. and P., i, no. 438 (2) m. 9), Leonard Spencer, clerk of the peace of Norfolk (ibid., i, no. 438 (4) m. 2) and Thomas Sneth, court-holder (ibid., i, no. 438 (4) m. 23), all of whom were attorneys of the common pleas. See above p. 148 n. 7.

¹ P.R.O. SP 1/10 fos. 50, 51 and 52 (transcribed).

¹ Somerville, , Duchy of Lancaster, i, pp. 391–4. The exceptions were Sir John Say, 1477–8, Sir Reynold Bray, 1485–1503, Sir Henry Marny, 1509–1523.Google Scholar

² Roskill, J. S., The Commons and their Speakers, 1376–1523 (1965), pp. 341–2, notes the importance of lawyers as speakers, but gives a continuous run only from 1484 to 1512. The speaker in 1515, Sir Thomas Neville, was also a lawyer (P.R.O., C 82/474/36) and with Sir Thomas More the speaker in the next parliament, the sequence was unbroken thereafter.Google Scholar

¹ Of the eight leading figures among the general surveyors between 1511 and 1542, Edward Belknap, Robert Blagg, John Daunce, John Hales, Thomas Moyle, Richard Pollard, Robert Southwell, Bartholomew Westby (Richardson, W. C., Tudor Chamber Administration (Baton Rouge, 1952), p. 488)Google Scholar, only Belknap and Daunce were not lawyers. For the council learned see Somerville, R., ‘Henry VII's “Council learned in the law”’. E[nglish Historical] R[eview], liv (1939), pp. 427–42;CrossRefGoogle ScholarSelect Cases in the Council of Henry VII, ed. Bayne, C. G. (Selden Society 75, 1956), pp. xxv-xxviii.Google Scholar

² The post of chancellor of the exchequer was held by a common lawyer for 56 years between 1485 and 1558, the post of master of the wards between 1503 and 1540 for 15 years; the surveyor of liveries, 1514 to 1542, was always a lawyer. Lawyers were also prominent in the council. One third of the commoners on Edward IV's council were lawyers (Lander, J. R., ‘Council, administration and councillors, 1461–1485’, Bulletin of the Institute of Histori cal Research, xxxii (1959),Google Scholar list of councillors, pp. 166–80, revised according to known training). Among Henry VII's 225 recorded councillors, 31 (37% of the commoners) were lawyers (Bayne, , op. cit., p. xxxi,Google Scholar revised according to known training). Lawyers made up singly the largest group among Henry VIII's councillors, 1509–27, 36 as against 30 knights and esquires, 29 ecclesiastics and 22 peers (Dunham, W. H., ‘Members of Henry VIII's whole council, 1509–1527’, E.H.R., lix (1944), pp. 207–10, revised according to known training).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³ Questions Worthy to be Consulted on for the Weak Publique (n.d.), Cat. of Printed Broadsides, ed. Lemon, R. (Soc. of Antiquaries, 1866), no. 15;Google ScholarDudley, Edmund, The Tree of Commonwealth, ed. Brodie, D. M. (1948), p. 37.Google Scholar

¹ See above p. 154 n. 2. The regular choice of a lawyer to lead the commons began under Edward. Of 31 speakers, 1399 to 1470,11 at most were lawyers; after 1470, only the speaker in 1483 was not a lawyer.

² The existence of the inns in the fourteenth century does not imply that later educational patterns were fully formed; cf. Thorne, S. E., ‘The early history of the Inns of Court’, Graya, 50 (1959), pp. 79–96.Google Scholar The earliest Lincoln's Inn records, from 1422, suggest that the system was in its infancy.

³ Sir John Williams, treasurer 1544 to 1547. Of the ten men appointed to share the seven senior posts of the second court of augmentations in 1547 (Richardson, W. C., History of the Court of Augmentations (Baton Rouge, 1961), p. 155), seven were common lawyers.Google Scholar

¹ Bromley, C.J.K.B., Montague, C.J.C.P., Sir Edward North, Chancellor of the Augmentations.

² As the council reverted under Edward to being a large amorphous body, so the number of lawyers increased: 1540, 19 councillors, 2 lawyers; 1547, 26, 6; 1553, 40, 9.

³ Opus Epistolarum Des. Erasmi Roterodami, ed. P. S., and Allen, H. M. (1906), iv, no. 999, p. 17,Google Scholar trans. Chambers, R. W., Thomas More (1938), p. 85.Google Scholar

¹ Fortescue, , De Laudibus Legum Anglie, p. 118. Fortescue no doubt intended nobilis to be glossed ‘gentry’ not ‘gentle’.Google Scholar

² Boteler, John: Cal. Close Rolls, 1485–1500, no. 715;Google ScholarLincoln s Inn Records, Black Books, (1897), i, p. 48;Google Scholar Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Probate Register 22 Ayloffe. John Kingsmill: Wedgwood, J. C., History of Parliament, Biographies of M.P.s. 1439–1509 (1936), pp. 516–17.Google Scholar Humphrey Coningsby: Hastings, M., The Court of Common Pleas (Ithaca, 1947), pp. 266–267.Google Scholar John Mordaunt: R. Halstead (pseud. Henry Mordaunt, 2nd Earl of Peterborough), Succinct Genealogies (London, 1685);Google ScholarWedgwood, , op. cit., pp. 607–8.Google Scholar

³ Heigham: his brother Thomas was commissioned regularly as J.P. in Suffolk, 1465 to 1490, Cal. Patent Rolls, 1461–67, p. 573,Google Scholaribid., 1477–77. p. 631, ibid., 1476–85, p. 574, ibid., 1485–94, p. 501. Yaxley: his father Richard was commissioned as J.P. in Suffolk in 1467 and 1468, ibid., 1461–6y, p. 573, ibid., 1467–77, p. 631. Frowyk: Thrupp, S. L., The Merchant Class of Medieval London (1948), p. 343.Google Scholar

⁴ Oxenbridge, : Sussex Archaeological Collections, viii (1856), pp. 217, 230; lxxvi (1935), 90.Google Scholar Constable: Constable, Robert, Tertia Lectura on Prerogative Regis, ed. Thorne, S. E. (New Haven, 1949), p. xlvi;Google ScholarWedgwood, , op. cit., p. 213.Google Scholar

¹ John Vavasour, J.C.P., ob. 1506. Testamenta Eboracensia, iv (Surtees Society, 53, 1868), 88–91.

² See above p. 150 n. 1.

³ Mordaunt, settlement on marriage with Edith, daughter and coheiress of Nicholas Latimer, kt., Cal. Close Rolls, 1476–85, no. 1379. Boteler married Anne, daughter and coheiress of William Elys, ibid., 1485–1500, no. 222. Oxenbridge married Anne or Alice, daughter and eventual coheiress of William Blount, son of Walter, Mountjoy, Lord, G.E.C., Complete Peerage ed. Gibbs, V. (1910-1953), ix, pp. 336–37;Google Scholar see above, p. 157, n. 4. Constable married Beatrice, widow of Ralph, Greystock, Lord, Cal. Patent Rolls, 1494–1509, p. 256.Google Scholar Heigham married Emma, widow of Henry Torell esquire, Cal. Inquisitions Post Mortem Henry VII, i, no. 859.Google Scholar

⁴ Coningsby names his first wife as Isabel, P.C.C. F 29 Hogen. The visitation only gives ‘—daughter and -heiress of—Fereby of Lincolnshire’, but as all similar notes for Coningsby's sister and his children can be con firmed, this entry is likely to be reliable, Visitation of Worcestershire, 1569, ed. Phillimore, W. P. W. (Harleian Soc. 27, 1888), p. 43.Google Scholar Coningsby was a feoffee for John Ferby in Kent, , Cal. Ing. post Mortem, i, no. 393,Google Scholar cf. wood, Wedg, op. cit., pp. 319–20.Google Scholar Coningsby’s second wife, Alice, was daughter and co-heiress of John Fraunces, kt., and Isabel, daughter and heiress of John Plessington and widow of Worseley, John and Staveley, William, Cal. Ing. post Mortem, i, nos. 418, 1062, 1172, 1257; ii, no. 388; iii, nos. 105, 543, 604.Google Scholar His third wife, Dame Anne, was the daughter and heiress of Christopher Moresby, kt., and widow of James Pickering esq., ibid., ii, nos. 88. 90; Cal. Patent Rolls, 1494–1509, p. 365;Google ScholarCal. Close Rolls, 1500–1509, no. 627;Google ScholarL. and P., i, no. 438 (2) m. 11; ibid. iii, nos. 3395, 3396, 3429, 3474.

¹ Rutton, W. L., ‘Cheney of Shurland’, Archaeologla Cantiana, xxiv (1900), p. 122.Google Scholar

² Guy Fairfax, J.K.B., ob. 1495; Roger Townshend, J.C.P., ob. 1493; Robert Brudenell, C.J.C.P., ob. 1531.

³ See above p. 150 n. 1.

¹ For the importance of the merchants see Thrupp, , Merchant Class of London, chapters vi and vii, passim.Google Scholar

² Idem, pp. 210–18. A majority of lawyers were eldest sons.

³ P.R.O. C 82/474/36.

⁴ But see the variant opinion in Thrupp, , op. cit., pp. 225–26.Google Scholar

⁵ Lincoln's Inn Records, Admissions (1896), i, p. 12 et passim. The last of the lawyer-Townshends, Henry, second justice at Chester, died in 1621, so that the dynasty lasted in the law for 167 years.Google Scholar

⁸ P.R.O. C 82/474/36.

¹ For the inter-relationship of the lawyers see Ives, E. W., ‘Some aspects of the legal profession in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries’, University of London, Ph.D. Thesis (1955), tables I to VII.Google Scholar

² Sebastian Brandt, Ship of Fools, trans. Alexander Barclay (1509), fo. xvi^r.

¹ Year Book 1 Hen. VII, Trin. no. 1, fo. 2 (1486).

² The decision on sanctuary was at the special request of the council. Bayne, , Select Cases in the Council, p. 8.Google Scholar

³ Y.B. I Hen. VII, Mich. no. 3, fo. 3 (1485). Hussey specifically dates the oath while he was attorney, i.e. 1471–8, and states that it was to observe a group of specific statutes, including the statute of ‘signes and liveries’, which must, therefore, be 8 Edw. IV, c. 2. The conjectures that Hussey was re ferring to the oath of 1461, or that the 1468 statute was not, at an early stage, understood to apply to the peers, do not seem to be supported. Dun-ham, W. H., ‘Lord Hastings’ Indentured Retainers’, Trans. Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, 39 (1955), pp. 72 ff.Google Scholar, 92. Bayne, , Select Cases in the Council, p. 1.Google Scholar

⁴ For the details of the oath see idem, p. 1; Dunham, , op. cit., p. 91;Google ScholarEnglish Historical Documents, v, 1486–1558, ed. Williams, C. H. (1967), pp. 532–34.Google Scholar

⁵ The objective and the terms of reference of the 1487 act both tally with the advice of the judges in 1485. (i) The problem posed by Hussey was specifically that of the co-operation of the peers which necessitated their being afraid ‘de Dieu, ou de Roy’; the 1487 act was directed to the punishment of offenders unreached by common law, i.e. persons of power and prestige, (ii) The list of statutes proposed by the judges (rather than the 1485 oath) is the basis of the list of offences tackled by the Pro Camera Stellata court. The judges took the list drawn up under Edward IV (see above p. 162 n. 3) and added the statute of sheriffs, 23 Hen. VI, c. 9. The 1487 act added the corollary of bribe-taking by juries and omitted vagabondage, presumably because the statute 7 Ric. II, c. 5 needed revision. (This was done by 11 Hen. VII c. 2, and enforcement was specially entrusted to individuals who overlap with the 1487 judges by 19 Hen. VII, c. 12.)

¹ Y.B. 2 Ric. III, Mich, no. 22, fos. 9, 10 (1484), cf. Cal. Patent Rolls, 1476–85, p. 546. The record mentions ‘Consilio Regis in Lege erudito’, suggesting, perhaps, a Yorkist origin for the ‘Council Learned’.Google Scholar

² Ives, E. W., ‘The genesis of the Statute of Uses’, E.H.R., lxxxii (1967), pp. 685–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³ ‘Spelman's Reports’, B.M., Hargrave MS. 388, fos. 96–97. The need to supervise in person the judicial discussions in chancery and the exchequer chamber, probably explains the brief appointment of Thomas Cromwell as master of the rolls. Us was appointed 8 Oct. 1534, only a few weeks before he is known to have discussed the case with judges (Ives, , E.H.R., lxxxii, p. 691). He resigned 2 July 1536, seven weeks after the statute-of uses became law.Google Scholar

¹ Cf. Hastings, , Common Pleas, pp. 92–95.Google Scholar

² Letters of Stephen Gardiner, ed. Muller, J. A. (1933), pp. 268–69, 390–92;Google ScholarElton, G. R., The Tudor Constitution (1960), pp. 26–27.Google Scholar

¹ P.R.O., Indexes 1324 to 1338, Easter 23 Henry VI-Trin. 29 Hen. VI, Mich. 1 Hen. VII-Trin. 4 & 5 Philip and Mary.

² See graph, p. 167. Docket rolls serve as a key to the membranes of the Coram Rege rolls (P.R.O., KB 27), kept by the chief clerk of the court. They index the bulk of his business, that concerning the handling of all issue cases before the court, entries of documents which he made ‘to be of record’, marked ‘Anglia’, and certain of the writs of latitat which, although concern ing mense process, were always handled by the chief clerk. They do not record other entries of mense process which he sometimes made instead of a filacer. Although the chief clerk was engrossing business from the filacers by the latitat procedure (cf. Blatcher, Marjorie, ‘The working of the court of King's Bench in the fifteenth century’, University of London Ph.D. Thesis (1936);Google Scholaridem., ‘Touching the writ of latitat’, Elizabethan Government and Society, ed. Bindoff, S. T. et al. (1961), p. 200), this is not reflected in the docket rolls which record latitats only spasmodically and cease entirely to do so after Hilary 1549 (Index 1337 m. 9^d). Thus, to arrive at a figure of issue business only, ‘Anglia’ and ‘latitat’ entries have been excluded.Google Scholar

¹ A specimen check has been made of the Coram Rege rolls for Hilary 3 Henry VII, Mich. 3 Hen. VIII and Easter 4 Edw. VI (P.R.O., KB 27/907, 1001, 1154), against the relevant docket rolls. The possibility that the decline reflects increased efficiency is unlikely.

² E.g. P.R.O., CP 40/802, Mich. 1 Edw. IV, 298 warrants, 35 re land, 31 trespass, 179 debt; idem., 878, Mich. 21 Edw. IV, 735 warrants, 76 re land, 109 trespass, 503 debt.

³ Totals calculated from the lists of Early Chancery Proceedings (P.R.O., List and Indexes, pp. 16, 20, 29, 38, 48, 50) are as follows: May 1474 to Mar. 1478, 4,606; Mar. 1487 to Sept. 1500 (Morton), and Jan. 1504 to Dec. 1515 (Warham), 12,976; Dec. 1515 to Oct. 1529 (Wolsey), 7,434; Oct. 1529 to May 1532 (More), 2,358; May 1532 to Nov. 1538 (Audley), 7,692. Although the best evidence available, these figures must be used with caution. It is unsafe to distinguish between the work of Morton and Warham, both archbishops of Canterbury, although 1487 to 1515 makes an unsatisfactory unit. Similarly it is unsafe to rely upon the List and Index distinction between petitions to Wolsey before and after 1518. The problem of record survival bedevils the matter also; contemporary comment would suggest a greater increase of business under Wolsey.

¹ P.R.O., C 1/383/62, 63.

¹ C 1/126/99

² The following is based upon a survey of the 54 detention of deed cases out of the 157 petitions to Wolsey where action by the court is recorded (often after Wolsey's fall).

³ C 1/481/47–52.

¹ Very rarely cases are so dismissed. C 1/413/7–13.

² C 1/518/24–7; 566/84.

³ Jones, W. J., The Elizabethan Court of Chancery (1967), p. 456.Google Scholar

⁴ C 1/391/41–45, dated between 1523 when Clerk became bishop and 9 May, 18 Hen. VIII [1526] when the decree was pronounced.

¹ Cf. the contrary evidence for the early fifteenth century presented by Avery, M. E., ‘Proceedings in the Court of Chancery up to c. 1460’, University of London M.A. Thesis (1958), pp. 43–44, 58.Google Scholar

² Holdsworth, , History, 7th edn. (1956), i, pp. 459–60Google Scholar; 3rd edn. (1945), v, pp. 219–24,266–71; Jones, , Court of Chancery, pp. 466–67;Google ScholarPlucknett, T. F. T., Concise History of the Common Law, 4th edn. (1948), pp. 649–50.Google Scholar

³ L. and P., iv, no. 6075, items 20, 21, 26, 31.

¹ Pucknett, , Concise History, p. 648.Google Scholar Despite the attractions of robbing Chancery of the use, many common-law judges were reluctant to support the king in the Dacre affair. Ives, , E.H.R., lxxxii, p. 687, n.2.Google Scholar

² Jones, , Court of Chancery, pp. 450–55.Google Scholar

³ When the crown tried to regulate advocates in the Westminster courts (common law and prerogative alike), it relied heavily on the inns of court. Proclamations 27 June 1546, 28 Nov. 1547 (Tudor Royal Proclamations, ed. Hughes, P. L. and Larkin, J. F. (1964), i, pp. 371–72, 408–9).Google Scholar

¹ 32 Hen. VIII, c. 1.

² Blatcher, , in Elizabethan Government and Society, pp. 188–212.Google Scholar

³ Jones, , Court of Chancery, ch. xiii.Google Scholar