had been appointed by the king to protect the rights of churches and the
poor.^55 The king’s writing (scriptum) communicated in 1196 the judg-
ment of his court (judicium curie nostre) that the free tenants of the
cathedral of Noyon, not the scabiniof the town, should decide suits
between bishop and burgesses.^56 Asked in 1199 to arbitrate between
Pierre de Courtenay and Hervé de Gien, Philip pronounced a detailed
dictum: ‘for the sake of good peace and the advantage of the land’ Peter
should hold his property at Tonnerre and Auxerre as long as he lived,
but after his death it should all go to Harvey and his wife Matilda (who
was Peter’s daughter) and their heirs. Peter and his heirs should con-
tinue to hold the castle of Mailly jure hereditario, however, along with
any new lands he acquired, while another property should go to Harvey
since it was surrounded by his land.^57
With increasing frequency judgments were given after testimony
by sworn jurors assembled by baillisor other royal officials. In 1190
Philip, king of the French, and Richard, count of Anjou and about to
become king of the English, held an inquest to discover from a jury of
the more honest clerks and burgesses of Tours the respective rights
which Richard and the chapter of Saint-Martin of Tours enjoyed
in Touraine, as the jury had seen their exercise or heard of it from
ancestors.^58 At Compiègne in 1200 the king ascertained to whom rights
of advocacy belonged from a jury of lawful men which he had ordered
to be assembled at the request of the parties.^59 A year or so later Philip
notified his appointment of his bailliGuillaume de la Chapelle to
inquire as to ‘who had the greater right’ in a dispute about an elm tree
between the abbey of Saint-Denis, the church of Saint-Aignan, and
Gaucher de Joigny; a jury of men of the country specified not to be
tenants of any of the parties found for Saint-Denis.^60 The Registers of
royal government which began to be compiled in 1204, probably under
the stimulus of the conquest of Normandy, contain many inquisitions
into royal rights, particularly in the forests, which inevitably involved
judgments on the rights of the king’s subjects. Records of a few acts
before 1204 were entered, such as an inquest of about 1201–2 on the
respective rights of the king and the lord of Montfort in the forest of
Yveline near Rambouillet: in this case the jury was composed of seven-
teen ‘knights and servants’ of Philip along with fourteen of Mont-
fort’s.^61 The use of the sworn inquest was especially fostered by the need
Justice on complaint to the king of France 121(^55) Recueil des Actes de Philippe Auguste, i, nos. 273, 384–5.
(^56) Ibid.ii, no. 525
(^57) Ibid. ii, no. 619.
(^58) Ibid.i, no. 361.
(^59) Ibid.ii, no. 641.
(^60) Ibid.ii. 689.
(^61) Les Registres de Philippe Auguste,50–2 (no. 7).