Rise and Fall of the English Ecclesiastical Courts, 1500-1860 »

Late Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge.

Tracing the history of growth and then the slow disappearance of English law and social regulation.

Foreword   R. H. Helmholz     vii
Preface     xi
Table of parliamentary statutes     xiii
List of abbreviations     xv
The ecclesiastical courts: structures and procedures     1
The business of the courts, 1500-1640     15
Tithe causes     23
Wills and testamentary causes     33
Defamation suits     40
Marital suits and marriage licences     47
Office causes     57
The roots of expansion and critical voices     64
Charting decline, 1640-1830     78
Explaining decline     95
The bills of 1733-1734     104
Snips and repairs: small steps to reform, 1753-1813     119
Royal commissions and early fruits, 1815-1832     129
Reform frustrated     145
Reforms thick and fast, 1854-1860     157
Select bibliography     174
Index     187