Ellis, was published in 1833, in two volumes 8vo.*

The code of laws ascribed to Henry I., though, not believed to have been compiled by authority, "preserves many fragments of Anglo-Saxon law, of which traces nowhere else are known to exist, either in original or translation." With this code or treatise, a transcript of which is deposited in the Exchequer, the era of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence is said to be terminated. Henry I. acquired the surname of “The Lion of Justice," from his successful exertions in abolishing the system of rapine prevalent among the aristocracy. This was effected by subjecting the great proprietors of land to the supreme government of the law, and by enforcing with vigour the adjudications of his court of justice.

The laws of the Anglo-Saxon monarchs were first collected by William Lambard, an eminent lawyer and antiquary in the time of Queen Eliza

* During the last few years fac-similes of this ancient record, in separate counties, reproduced by the photozincographic process, have been published under the direction of Colonel Sir Henry James, at the Ordnance Survey Office; and a literal extension, with an English translation, has been published of several counties.

Preface to "Ancient Laws of England," by Mr. Thorpe, p. xv. 8vo.

Sharon Turner's History of England.

beth, and published under the title of Archaionomia in 1568, 4to. They were afterwards published by Abraham Whelock, Professor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge, in 1644, folio; again, with additions, by Dr. Wilkins, in 1721, folio; and more recently by the Record Commission, with a Preface by the late Mr. Benjamin Thorpe, who was eminently distinguished by his knowledge of the AngloSaxon language.

A few fragments of legislation in the troubled reign of Stephen are preserved by Sir Henry Spelman in his "Codex Legum" appended to Dr. Wilkins' edition of the Anglo-Saxon Laws.

The reign of Henry II. is distinguished by the enactment of the "Constitutions of Clarendon" (so called from the palace of Clarendon, in Wiltshire,

* This edition was printed in 1840, in folio, and also in two volumes, 8vo. An edition of these laws was also published at Leipzig in 1832, and again in 1858, 8vo, with a translation into German and notes by Dr. Reinhold Schmid, Professor of Law at Jena. The first edition by Lambard does not contain the laws of the kings of Kent, nor those of William I. and Henry I.; that by Professor Whelock contains the laws of William and Henry; and in the edition of Dr. Wilkins, the laws of the Kentish kings appear for the first time, and to these is added Spelman's Codex Legum Veterum Statutorum Regni Angliæ, containing the laws from William I. to 9 Henry III. The laws of Canute, edited from the Colbert MS., with observations by the learned Jan. Laur. Andr. Kolderup-Rosenvinge, were printed at Copenhagen in 1826, 4to.

where the council or parliament was held), by which a check was placed on the pretensions and encroachments of the clergy.* Justices itinerant were also first appointed in this reign, and great improvements made in the municipal laws. It is said of this monarch, that "his exactness in administering justice had gained him so great a reputation, that even foreign and distant princes made him an arbiter, and submitted their differences to his judgment."+

The oldest treatise extant on the laws of England was compiled in this reign, and has been generally attributed to Ranulph de Glanville, chief justiciary of England, but there is much controversy respecting the authorship. Another treatise, entitled "Dialogus de Scaccario," which contributed greatly to illustrate the state and history of our law, was also compiled in this reign. It is attributed by Mr. Madox to Richard Fitz-Nigel, Bishop of London.

The celebrated code of maritime laws known by the name of the "Laws of Oleron," and adopted by most of the nations of Europe, has been often ad

* The "Constitutions of Clarendon " are to be found in Wilkins' Concilia, I. 435; Spelmanni Concilia, II. 63; and in Matth. Paris. Hist. 84, edit. 1684. There is also an English translation in Lyttelton's Life of Henry II., vol. iv. 31. 83.

Hale's Hist. of the Common Law.-Note by Mr. Serjeant Runnington, 163.

duced as a specimen of the legislative capacity of Richard I., being supposed to have been compiled by that prince in the island of Oleron, in the bay of Aquitaine, on his return from the Holy Land. This statement, repeated by most legal historians from Coke and Selden till a recent period, is manifestly disproved by the well-known fact of Richard's shipwreck and captivity, and the evidence of his return to his own dominions, on his liberation, by way of Flanders. In the Introduction to the "Black Book of the Admiralty," the text of which has lately been printed among the historical publications of the Master of the Rolls, a suggestion is made by the learned editor, Sir Travers Twiss, in his examination of the arguments relating to the tradition, that the proper construction of a certain document or memorandum in the Roll, entitled "Fasciculus de Superioritate Maris," hitherto relied upon in support of the tradition, is probably this-viz., that King Richard I., upon his return to England from the Holy Land, sanctioned those judgments which had been previously published at Oleron, as rules proper to be observed by the admirals of his fleet for the punishment of delinquencies and the redress of wrongs committed on the seas.* Other speci

* THE BLACK BOOK OF THE ADMIRALTY, edited by Sir Travers Twiss, 8vo. 1871. Introd. p. lviii. In this edition

mens of the legislation of this monarch may be found in the work of Sir H. Spelman before mentioned.

Magna Charta is of itself sufficient to confer celebrity on the reign of John in the annals of legislation; yet it is not to that Great Charter as originally promulgated, but as confirmed by his successor, Henry III., and afterwards by Edward I., that reference is made as the "palladium of liberty," and the basis of our laws and constitution. Sir James Mackintosh, in his animated eulogium on the Great Charter and its authors,* says:—' -"To have produced it, to have preserved it, to have matured it, constitute the immortal claim of England on the esteem of mankind. Her Bacons and Shakespeares, her Miltons and Newtons, with all the truth which they have revealed, and all the generous virtue which they have inspired, are of inferior value when compared with the subjection of men and their rulers to the principles of justice; if,

the Laws of Oleron are printed, with the ancient English translation of these judgments, contained in a very rare book, called "The Rutter of the Sea," printed at London in 1536. The English version of these laws in Godolphin's "View of the Admiral Jurisdiction," is translated from “Le` Grant Routier de la Mer," published by Pierre Garcie alias Ferrande, and contains many more articles than that in the "Black Book," from which it differs in several respects.

* History of England, I. 222.