Oxford LibGuides: Legal history: England & common law tradition: 1066-1216

Legal History in England 1066-1216

Regnal Years

Normans 1066 - 1154
William I 25 Dec 1066 - 9 Sept 1087

William II 26 Sept 1087 - 2 Aug 1100

Henry I 5 Aug 1100 - 1 Dec 1135

Stephen 26 Dec 1135 - 25 Oct 1154

Angevins (aka Plantagenets) 1154-1216 (descendents of Counts of Anjou)
Henry II 19 Dec 1154 - 6 July 1189

Richard I 3 Sep 1189 - 6 Apr 1199

John 27 May 1199 - 19 Oct 1216

English legal memory starts from 3 September 1189. A tradition arising from royal compromise in the Statute of Quo Warranto (1290)

England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 1075-1225 by Robert Bartlett
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this book online via title link
ISBN: 0199251010
Publication Date: 2002
Print copy is in Lower Radcliffe Camera Open Shelves DA195 BAR 2000
Medieval Law and the Foundations of the State by Alan Harding
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this book online via title link
ISBN: 019821958X
Publication Date: 2002
Print copy is at General 510 H262a
The Formation of the English Common Law: law and society in England from King Alfred to Magna Carta by John Hudson
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link
ISBN: 9781138189348
Publication Date: 2nd edn 2017
Print copy at Legal Hist H885b2

Regesta Regum Anglo-Normannorum by David Bates (Editor)
Call Number: Bodleian History Faculty Lib, Upper Gladstone Link: KD530 ENG 1998
ISBN: 9780198206743
Publication Date: 1999
The complete texts of all William I's charters from England, Normandy, and France + commentary and full summaries in English, and detailed notes,

Leges Henrici Regis
Requires Oxford SSO for remote access
Early English Laws Project
Open Access. A project to publish online and in print new editions and translations of all English legal codes, edicts, and treatises produced up to the time of Magna Carta 1215. Search function can be filtered by language, king, and topic; some also link to digitised manuscripts.
The First Legal System: 1176 to 1348 (AALT)
Open access. Overview "Before 1176: Litigation in England prior to 1176 was not centralized; every major form of litigation was primarily in the more local courts of the county, hundred, or the lord ... "
Anglo American Legal Tradition (AALT)
Open Access.From the University of Houston. Digitised images of court records surviving in the National Archives, Kew. Together with useful tools to help with the language, handwriting and layout.
Click on the name of each monarch (Richard 1 to Victoria) to see what is available. Track down left hand column for year (1176-1879), then across to the courts. Coverage varies with the years but courts included are: PC Privy Council, CP Common Pleas, KB Kings Bench, E Exchequer, C Chancery, RE Requests, DL Lancaster

The Selden Society editions are at Legal Hist S464.4a. (For online access to these volumes see link below)

Select Pleas of the Crown	1 Selden Society
Select Civil Pleas	3 Selden Society
Introduction to the Curia Regis Rolls	62 Selden Society
Pleas Before the King or His Justices	67, 68, 83 & 84 Selden Society
English Lawsuits from William I to Richard I	106, 197 Selden Society

HeinOnline
Remote access requires Oxford SSO. Includes Selden Society annual volumes and many other works on English legal history
Alternative names: Hein Online ; HOL

HeinOnline includes five major collections:
The Law Journal Library includes over 500 U.S., U.K., Australian and International Law Journals. For most journals the date coverage starts very early (in many cases at the first issue). However the most recent editions (within the last calendar year) are sometime unavailable due to licensing restrictions. HeinOnline makes these journals available on a rolling yearly basis.
The Treaties and Agreements Library includes all U.S. treaties and agreements including those in force, expired or yet to be published.
The U.S. Supreme Court Library includes all U.S. Supreme Court opinions as published in the U.S. Reports
The Federal Register 1936-1995, and indexes to the register.
Legal Classics Library. Full text of over 100 legal texts including Blackstone's Commentaries (1803), Cardozo's Growth of the Law (1924), and Story's first edition of Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1833). Provincial Statutes of Canada includes Provincial Statutes for ten of the Canadian provinces. Contains public and private acts passed by Canadian provincial governments. Current, revised, and historical content is now available for Alberta, British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Ontario. Historical and revised content only is available for Manitoba, Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, and Saskatchewan.
All content consists of scanned images of the original printed editions. This allows you to view the content as it originally appeared in print complete with page numbers and pictures.
To save or print articles from HeinOnline choose PRINT OPTIONS followed by DOWNLOAD AS PDF. You will then be able to print out and/or save articles using Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Palgrave's Rotuli Curiae Regis v.1 6 RI to accession of J
Free resource. Pdf of LawBod's copy thanks to Google books
Palgrave's Rotuli Curiae Regis v.2 1 J I
Free resource. Pdf of LawBod's copy thanks to Google books
English historical documents, 1042-1189
Requires Oxford SSO for remote access. Print copy at Legal Hist E58.4
English historical documents, 1189-1327
Requires Oxford SSO for remote access Print copy at Legal Hist E58.4

Medieval and Early Modern Sources Online (MEMSO)
Alternative name: MEMSO

Medieval and Early Modern Sources Online (MEMSO) provides a large and growing resource of essential medieval and early modern sources online. It is an excellent way to access a large library of books essential to the study of medieval and early modern England, Scotland and Ireland. Includes selections of annals and chronicles, calendars and registers, saints’ lives, Rolls’ Series and HMC reports and Statutes of the Realm.

English Medieval Legal Documents: A Compilation of Published Sources AD 600 -1535
The goal of this project is to create a collaborative database on the published sources of English medieval legal documents, and to provide links to the growing number of online sources currently being developed. Open access.

Dialogus de Scaccario, and Constitutio Domus Regis by Emilie Amt (Editor); S. D. Church (Editor)
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link
ISBN: 9780199258611
Publication Date: 2008
For an OA translation see below

The Dialogue Concerning the Exchequer (Dialogus de Scaccario). c.1180
Open Access. Part of Avalon Project, Yale University
A translation of Glanville On the laws and customs of England
Requires Oxford SSO for remote access. By John Beames, to which are added notes ; with an introduction by Joseph Henry Beale, Jr. (1900)
Section from Glanvill translated
Free resource. From History Faculty, Houston University.
Early English Laws Project
Open Access. A project to publish online and in print new editions and translations of all English legal codes, edicts, and treatises produced up to the time of Magna Carta 1215. Search function can be filtered by language, king, and topic; some also link to digitised manuscripts.

Don't neglect articles in journals - please see special Journals page in this guide for help with finding these.

The Oxford History of the Laws of England volume II 871-1216 by John Hudson
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link
ISBN: 9780198260301
Publication Date: 2012
Print copy is at Legal Hist O98q/2 if preferred
The birth of the English common law by RC van Caenegem
Call Number: Legal Hist C127a2
ISBN: 0521356822
Publication Date: (2nd ed., 1988)
English justice between the Norman conquest and the Great Charter, 1066-1215 by DM Stenton
Call Number: Legal Hist S826.3c
Publication Date: (1965)
Jayne Lectures for 1963
History English Law before the time of Edward I by Sir Frederick Pollock and Frederic William Maitland
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link.
ISBN: 9780521070614
Publication Date: 2nd edn 1952 reprint
Note at Legal Hist P776c2 is a 1969 reprint of the second edition which also has an introductory essay and a select bibliography by S. F. C. Milsom
Making of English law: King Alfred to twelfth century by P.Wormald
Call Number: Legal Hist W928a
ISBN: 0631227407
Publication Date: 1999

Wormald: Papers Preparatory to the Making of English Law: King Alfred to the Twelfth Century, vol. II: From God's Law to Common Law
OA resource. edited by Stephen Baxter and John Hudson (University of London: Early English Laws, 2014) Download as pdf.

The English judiciary in the age of Glanvill and Bracton, c.1176-1239 by RV Turner
Call Number: Legal Hist T950b
ISBN: 052126510X
Publication Date: (1985)

Domesday Book

Domesday Book (The National Archives)
How and Why Was Domesday Made? (Baxter)
OA article (2020) 135 EHR 1085–1131

Domesday Book and the Law society and legal custom in early medieval England by Robin Fleming
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link.
ISBN: 9780521630382
Publication Date: 1998-08-13
Print copy is at Legal Hist F598a

Lands of the Normans in England (1204-44)
Free resource. Legacy of AHRC Funded project

Exploring the impact on the Anglo-French aristocracy of the collapse of the 'Anglo-Norman realm' in 1204 through the families and properties recorded in contemporary documents.
Background to the beginnings of tenure.