Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- GENERAL EDITOR'S PREFACE
- Preface
- Introduction
- Abbreviations
- CHAPTER I FAMILY AND ESTATES: History of the Shareshull family and of their landed estates, with special reference to the chief justice
- CHAPTER II PROFESSIONAL CAREER: Shareshull's elementary and legal education; his career as pleader and as judge; his appointments to common pleas, king's bench and exchequer, also to innumerable commissions, special and general
- CHAPTER III PUBLIC AFFAIRS: Shareshull's relations with the king on diplomatic missions and in parliament and council; his work on the private domains of the Black Prince
- CHAPTER IV LEGISLATION: Shareshull's part in framing ordinances and statutes, especially the legal and economic enactments of 1349-52
- CHAPTER V LAW ENFORCEMENT: Shareshull's policy of law enforcement, and of the imposition of huge financial penalties by means of commissions of oyer and terminer and of eyres, by the development of the justices of the peace and of the justices of labourers, and by a novel use of the king's bench
- CHAPTER VI STAFF AND EXPENSES: The enrolment and the preservation of proceedings before Shareshull; his group of trained clerks; arrangements for travelling and for transporting documents, for housing, food and clothing; annual stipends and daily fees
- CHAPTER VII SHARESHULL AND SHARDELOW: An account of the confusion between William Shareshull and his colleague John Shardelow; an attempt at disentangling them
- CHAPTER VIII LEGAL DOCTRINE:Shareshull's judicial pleadings and opinions: his legal thought in general, his learning, his doctrines of private law and of criminal law
- CHAPTER IX VINDICATION OF CHARACTER: Analysis of the charges against Shareshull and of the attitude of his contemporaries towards him; reasons for his retirement to a Franciscan convent
- CHAPTER X His PLACE IN HISTORY: An estimate of Shareshull's personality and of his significance for legal, economic and administrative history
- APPENDIXES
- NOTES
- List of statutes cited
- List of reports of cases cited
- Index
CHAPTER V - LAW ENFORCEMENT: Shareshull's policy of law enforcement, and of the imposition of huge financial penalties by means of commissions of oyer and terminer and of eyres, by the development of the justices of the peace and of the justices of labourers, and by a novel use of the king's bench
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2016
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- GENERAL EDITOR'S PREFACE
- Preface
- Introduction
- Abbreviations
- CHAPTER I FAMILY AND ESTATES: History of the Shareshull family and of their landed estates, with special reference to the chief justice
- CHAPTER II PROFESSIONAL CAREER: Shareshull's elementary and legal education; his career as pleader and as judge; his appointments to common pleas, king's bench and exchequer, also to innumerable commissions, special and general
- CHAPTER III PUBLIC AFFAIRS: Shareshull's relations with the king on diplomatic missions and in parliament and council; his work on the private domains of the Black Prince
- CHAPTER IV LEGISLATION: Shareshull's part in framing ordinances and statutes, especially the legal and economic enactments of 1349-52
- CHAPTER V LAW ENFORCEMENT: Shareshull's policy of law enforcement, and of the imposition of huge financial penalties by means of commissions of oyer and terminer and of eyres, by the development of the justices of the peace and of the justices of labourers, and by a novel use of the king's bench
- CHAPTER VI STAFF AND EXPENSES: The enrolment and the preservation of proceedings before Shareshull; his group of trained clerks; arrangements for travelling and for transporting documents, for housing, food and clothing; annual stipends and daily fees
- CHAPTER VII SHARESHULL AND SHARDELOW: An account of the confusion between William Shareshull and his colleague John Shardelow; an attempt at disentangling them
- CHAPTER VIII LEGAL DOCTRINE:Shareshull's judicial pleadings and opinions: his legal thought in general, his learning, his doctrines of private law and of criminal law
- CHAPTER IX VINDICATION OF CHARACTER: Analysis of the charges against Shareshull and of the attitude of his contemporaries towards him; reasons for his retirement to a Franciscan convent
- CHAPTER X His PLACE IN HISTORY: An estimate of Shareshull's personality and of his significance for legal, economic and administrative history
- APPENDIXES
- NOTES
- List of statutes cited
- List of reports of cases cited
- Index
Summary
A study of Shareshull's achievements in law enforcement must not overlook his persistent activities in holding the land assizes, fully documented by huge rolls still in existence. Since land cases make up so large a proportion of all law cases in the fourteenth century, it is inevitable that a distinguished judge like Shareshull should have given a correspondingly large proportion of his time to the circuits of assize on which he acted, the north-western, the south-western, and Oxfordshire and Berkshire, usually included in the latter. His work as a justice of assize was vitally important. It necessitated incessant journeyings at certain seasons into far-distant regions; it also involved intricate problems of land law as is proved by the number of assize cases begun before him on circuit and brought into common pleas or king's bench, or adjourned to Westminster before himself and his colleagues.
But it is of course true that the taking of land assizes by Serjeants and judges of the upper courts was so much a matter of routine that it represented nothing unique in Shareshull's case; nor did the pecuniary advantages to the crown bulk large either in real actions before justices of assize or even in the formidable Quo Warranto proceedings before justices in eyre. Rather, it was in the maintenance of law and order and the enforcement of the new statutory regulations on economic matters that the great opportunity came for the profits of jurisdiction. Further, although the conviction or the flight of felons meant the confiscation of their chattels by the crown, on the whole it was the amercements and fines for trespasses, either common law or statutory, that were the veritable gold-mine: large sums, often beyond belief, from the great offenders, particularly the ‘ ministers’ of the king; small sums from innumerable petty offenders, especially from those found to be infringing the new economic legislation. These distinctions will help to make clear the significance of Shareshull's judicial work and to explain the changes in its character at successive stages in his career.
By the accession of Edward III Shareshull had been busy in the upper courts for several years as a serjeant-at-law, and had served on a few special commissions for which unfortunately no proceedings seem to have been preserved.
- Type
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- The Place in Legal History of Sir William ShareshullChief Justice of the King's Bench 1350–1361, pp. 59 - 78Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2013