Everything about Curia Regis totally explained
Curia Regis is a
Latin term meaning "Royal Council" or "King's court".
The Curia Regis in the
Kingdom of England was a council of tenants-in-chief and
ecclesiastics that advised the king of England on legislative matters. It replaced its Anglo-Saxon predecessor, the
Witenagemot, after the
Norman invasion of
1066.
William the Conqueror brought to
England the
feudal system of his native
Normandy. Thus, he granted land to his most important military supporters, who in turn granted land to their supporters, thus creating a feudal hierarchy. Those who held lands directly from the King were known as tenants-in-chief, and the territories they held were called
manors. William I was an absolute ruler, but, as a matter of course, he sought the advice of the curia regis, before making laws.
The tenants-in-chief often struggled with their spiritual counterparts and with the King for power. In
1215, from
John they secured
Magna Carta, which established that the King may not levy or collect any taxes (except the feudal taxes to which they were hitherto accustomed), save with the consent of this council. It was also established that the most important tenants-in-chief (the
earls and the
barons), as well as the ecclesiastics (
archbishops,
bishops and
abbots) be summoned to the council by personal writs from the Sovereign, and that all others be summoned to the council by general writs from the
sheriffs of their counties. John later repealed Magna Carta, but
Henry III reinstated it.
The royal council slowly developed into a
Parliament. In
1265,
Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, who was in rebellion against
Henry III, summoned a parliament of his supporters without any royal authorisation. The archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls and barons were summoned, as were two
knights from each shire and two burgesses from each
borough. Knights had been summoned to previous councils, but the representation of the boroughs was unprecedented. De Montfort's scheme was formally adopted by
Edward I in the so-called "
Model Parliament" of
1295. At first, each
estate debated independently; by the reign of
Edward III, however, Parliament had been separated into two Houses and was assuming recognisably its modern form.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Curia Regis'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://curia_regis.totallyexplained.com">Curia Regis Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
