A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



matters of land tenure ; i6 out of its 24 chapters 

 deal with customs of inheritance, alienation and the 

 rights of the feudal lord. The witness of the ' men 

 of the pleas ' is frequently mentioned* as necessary for 

 transfers of land in the town court (undoubtedly the 

 husting), while the baihffs and coroners seem to be 

 needed to authorise seisin.* No records of the court 

 survive, but a large number of deeds, at Northampton 

 and elsewhere, register transfers of land that took 

 place in it, and illustrate the special customs of the 

 town. If a kinsman wished to assert his right of first 

 purchase, he had to make his ofiEer before three court 

 days had passed, after the feoffment of the stranger.' 

 In one early 13th century deed the court in which the 

 plea of land had been held is called the porthimoth' de 

 Norhant'.* No other instance of the use of this term 

 at Northampton has been found ; at Leicester and 

 Ipswich the court at which transfers of land took 

 place was called the portmannmot.^ Both baihffs and 

 prepositi are mentioned in connection with the court,* 

 and John's charter appoints coroners to see that the 

 prepositi do justice. At the end of the 12th century, 

 then, the weekly court was a court of record for land 

 cases and a court for the collection of debts and prob- 

 ably enforcement of contracts,' at which the prepositi 

 presided, royal writs were pleaded,* and the ' good 

 men of the pleas ' made the judgments. 



The charter of 18 Jan. 1257 authorised a number of 

 jurisdictional privileges, some of which had certainly 

 been exercised before without express sanction.* 

 In consequence, probably, of the general enquiry into 

 royal rights in 1255, Thomas Kin, mayor of Northamp- 

 ton, appeared at the Exchequer and declared that the 

 burgesses of Northampton had always had the return 

 of writs, and the sheriff of Northants said that he had 

 found the town in possession of that right.** It was 

 this, probably, that led to the burgesses purchasing 

 their new Charter, in which, in common with some 

 seventeen other boroughs in the years 1255 to 1257,1* 

 they obtained the right to exclude the sheriff from 

 executing summons or distresses in the town and to 

 serve writs and summons of the Exchequer by their 

 own officials. Henceforth the baihffs took the sheriff's 

 place in the borough, and he could only intervene if 

 they neglected their duties. The charter also granted 

 that burgesses should not be convicted by strangers in 

 any trespass, appeal or criminal charge brought against 

 them, but only by their fellow-burgesses, unless con- 

 cerning matters touching the borough community. 

 Infangthef was also granted. Thus the town 

 courts now had jurisdiction over criminal matters, 

 excepting only those pleas of the crown whicli the 

 coroners kept against the coming of the justices in 

 eyre. The eyre roll of 1247 shows that even before 

 this grant thieves who admitted their crime had been 

 hanged by the judgment of the town court.*' The 



eyre roll of 1285 mentions a case of appeal for defama- 

 tion in 'he court of Northampton.** In 1274 the 

 jurors said that the sheriff had never held his tourn 

 in Northampton, and that the town had a free court 

 with gallows, pillory, tumbril, assize of bread and ale 

 and all other liberties belonging the crown by royal 

 grant.** Both the custumal and the eyre rolls of 

 1253 and 1285 show that the frankpledge system was 

 operative in the borough. The mayor and baiUff 

 must have held what was later called a court lect,** 

 whilst the rights of infangthef, etc., would constitute 

 the town court a court baron. Both these names 

 survived into the 19th century and are mentioned in 

 1835. The ordinary business of the town court is 

 well illustrated by a cancelled account of its pleas and 

 perquisites for one whole year,** which shows that 

 payments were taken for trespass, for hamsoken, for 

 hue unjustly raised, for contempt done to the bailiffs 

 and their Serjeants, for default, for false claims and 

 for claims not prosecuted, for licence to agree, for 

 unjust detention of chattels, for entering a tithing, 

 for having a place to sell bread in, and for selling un- 

 sealed or baaly baked bread. Judging by the names 

 of the townsmen, the date of this estreat is between 

 1285 and 1300 It would seem to be the accounts of 

 the court during a period when the liberty was in the 

 king's hands, possibly after the eyre of 1285, when the 

 borough was convicted of having exceeded its rights 

 of infangthef by hanging a Dunstable man.*' In 1329 

 a custos of Northampton was appointed for similar 

 reasons. The second custumal, with its frequent 

 references to the baihffs' power of amercement,** and 

 its numerous mercantile regulations,** which must 

 have been enforced in the town courts, belongs to the 

 same stage. A plea of 1307 shows that the bailiffs 

 of Northampton had no jurisdiction in pleas of debt 

 over 40s.'* The court was described in 1315 as ' the 

 King's court of Northampton.' '* In the eyre of 1329 

 the mayor and commonalty claimed jurisdiction in a 

 case of dower before the justices, asserting that by 

 their charter no plea of tenements within Northamp- 

 ton ought to be held except before tlie mayor and 

 bailiffs within the walls. This led to a long discussion 

 as to the jurisdiction of the mayor, who soon shifted 

 his ground, asking only that the justices should sit 

 within the walls (as they had done in 1285) and not 

 at the Castle. Justice Scrope and the King's Counsel, 

 however, pointed out that the charter under which 

 jurisdiction was claimed made no mention of a mayor, 

 and asserted that the town had no mayor in the reign 

 of Henry III. From the coroners' roll, also, it was 

 clear that the king's lieges had been arraigned and 

 put to death for felonies committed outside the town, 

 the franchise of infangthef having thus been executed. 

 The justice also condemned the irregularity of the 

 coroners keeping a joint record, when each of the four 



' Bat«ton, Boro. Cmloms (Seidell Soc.), 

 1,245,272-3; ii, 63, 102. 



• Ibid, ii, 63-4. 



• Ibid, ii, 63. Mill Batcion interpret! 

 tbii ai referring to lix-monthly ' great 

 court!.' Ibid, ii, p. Ixuix. 



•Marl. Chart. 86, D. 45 (1231-330. 



' Bateion, Rtr. »/ Hero, of Lcia. i, 8 ; 



Bateion, Boro. Cutiemi (Sclden Soc), i, 



• Ibid. I, 103, 292-3. 

 ' Ibid, i, 215. 



' Harl. Ch. 86, D. 45. 



• In 1221 the Exchequer w.i8 complain- 

 ing that the burgemei had failed to 

 execute Exchequer writs and sumiuons, 

 Mem. R. (K. R), 4, y,„is Vic. Norhanl. 



'" M.ndox, Firma Burfi, p. 159. 



" Ballard and Taif, Boro. Charirn, ii, 

 15^-60, 171-3. 



" Ajiiie R. 614 B. m. 48d. 



" Ibid. O19, m. 75. 



'« Rot. l/unj. ii, 2, 4. 



'• The petition of Richard Stormei- 



worth in 1303 refcri to indictment! by the 

 ' Dosouns ' (i.e. tithing men) before the 

 m.iyor. V.C.H. Northants. ii, 29. 



I' Ct. R. (P. R. O.), I95'57; printed 

 Northanli .V. and Q. [New Scr.), vol. v, 

 pp. 203-11. 



" Auiie R. 6iq, m. 7;. 



"Clause! 9, 14, 15, 21, 22. 



" Thirty-three of it! 42 clauiei are 

 concerned with trade. 



•• Abbrtv. Plac. (Rec. Com.), p. 300. 



" De Bine. R. 2o3 m. 62d. 



10 



