Search -
Commentaries on the Laws of England: Of private wrongs
Commentaries on the Laws of England Of private wrongs Author:William Blackstone Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: I. Court of Piepondre. court of justice known to the law of England, is the court of piepoudre; curia pedis pulverizati; so called from the dusty feet of th... more »e suitors; or, according to Sir Edward Coke," because justice is there done as speedily as dust can fall from the foot; —upon the same principle that justice among the Jews was administered in the gate of the city, that the proceedings might be more speedy as well as public.d It is a court of record, incident to every fair and market; of which the steward of him who owns or has the toll of the market, is the judge ; and its jurisdiction extends to administer justice for all commercial injuries done in that very fair or market, and not in any preceding one. So that the injury must be done, complained of, heard, and determined, within the compass of one and the same day, unless the fair continues longer. ' This court is now entirely obsolete.'8 ii. court-baron. U. The court-baron is a court incident to every manor in the kingdom, to be holden by the steward within the said manor. This court-baron is of two natures :f the one is a customary court, of which we formerly spoke,8 appertaining entirely to the copyholders, and in which their estates are transferred by surrender and admittance. The other, of which we now speak, is a court of common law, and is the court of the barons, by which name the freeholders were - 4 Inst. 272. d Harrington's Observat. on the Stat. 433, 4th ed. The etymology given us by a learned modern writer is much more ingenious and satisfactory; it being derived, according to him, from pied pvldreaux (a pedlar, in old French), and therefore signifying the court of such petty chapmen as resort to fairs or markets. (Bl. Com. v. iii. p. 32.) The court of piepoudre had cognizance of all matters ...« less