Overview

This is the story of how disputes of all kinds were managed in England between AD 1154 and the first signs of the Common Law, and 1558 when a new period started in the development of the English legal system. Primary sources, including private papers like the Paston Letters , show how disputes were managed in practice. Mediation and arbitration were then natural and widespread. Their aim was to produce peace through compromise. Parties turned to the community for help: hundred and shire, magnates, city and borough guilds, university, the Church and the Jews. The king's Council and even Parliament offered mediation and arbitration. The scope included disputes not arbitrable today ownership of freehold land, status, even rape, murder and riot. Arbitration centres in London, York and Bristol offered services to all comers. Foreigners brought disputes with no connection to England. In 1484 a labourer, defended his interests in an arbitration arranged by the York authorities. The Mayor of Bristol kept an office open every day to arrange arbitrations. The Privy Council sat on a Sunday morning in February 1549 for that purpose. And women were parties almost as often as men - and occasionally mediators and arbitrators.

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9780954405632

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'Roebuck's method is an engaging series of polymathic raids into the territories of geographers, ethnographers, linguists, lawyers, historians and archaeologists', (Stephen Sedley London Review of Books.)

Author Information

Derek Roebuck is a lawyer, retired from practice in international commercial disputes; formerly professor of law in Australia, Papua New Guinea and Hong Kong; now senior associate research fellow, Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London. Mediation and Arbitration in the Middle Ages: England 1154 to 1558 is the fourth in his series of volumes on the history of dispute resolution, following Ancient Greek Arbitration (2001), Roman Arbitration (with Bruno de Loynes de Fumichon) (2005) and Early English Arbitration (2008), all HOLO Books.

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