A HISTORY OF CORNWALL courts is the part played by the village tithing- men as assistants to the court bailiffs in present- ment of criminals, 1 while as regards civil suits, the stannary laws inform us that in cases which involved a bailiff the returns were made by the tithingman of the place where the venire arose, 2 and the same procedure held good when the bailiff was challenged in a civil suit on grounds of favouritism. 3 Presentments were made also by the toller, who seems to have served as connect- ing link between the stannaries and the manor. We have seen in him the servant of the lord who received from the tinners their toll. Next we find him, no doubt in his master's interests, inter- vening in the bailiff's absence to arrest ore in dispute, 4 and to commit it to custody until the contention was settled. From that it was but a step for him to be empowered to make returns for civil suits when neither bailiff nor tithingman was able to act, 5 while repeated instances also can be found of presentments of offenders by the toller of this or of that place, in the same nature as those brought by the tithingman and bailiff. 6 The two leet courts with view of frank- pledge r contained several novel features. In the stannary of Blackmore, as far back as the earliest extant court rolls, 8 eight tithingmen in the hun- dred of Powder appeared with their tithings to do suit and to present criminals, acting in the latter capacity as ex officio bailiffs. 9 Another fea- ture was the presentment of stannary offenders by a grand jury of twenty-four 10 tinners, composed in later centuries at least of the more substantial of the brotherhood. 10 The leet's functions did not cease with the ordinary business of a law court. Attended, theoretically at least, by every tinner of the district, 11 it resembled in many ways the manorial halimote, or the court of a trade guild, inasmuch 1 P. R. O. Ct. R. bdle. 156, No. 27. ' Convoc. Cornw. 12 Chas. I, c. 28. 3 Add. MS. 6713, fol. 279. Presentment of the jury of Penwith and Kerrier, 1636. 4 Harl. MS. 6380, fol. 39. 5 Add. MS. 67 1 3, fol. 246. 6 P. R. O. Ct. R. bdle. 161, No. 81. 7 Add. MS. 24746, fol. 122. The leet courts in Dean were known as the Mine Law Courts, and were held by the constable of the Castle of St. Briavel's (Houghton, The Compleat Miner, pt. ii, art. 20). In Derby they were known as the Great Barmote Courts (Compleat Mineral Laws of Derbyshire, pt. ii, art. 18, 25). 8 1355- 9 Harl. MS. 6380, fol. 3. P. R. O. Ct. R. bdle. 157, No. 13. 10 Convoc. Cornw. 30 Eliz. c. 26. Add. MS. 671 3, fol. 259. Note also that a special jury of four ' of the best sort of tinners ' was returned by the grand jury, to assess amerciaments (Convoc. Cornw. 30 Eliz. c. 27). 11 ' The Ancient Stannary of Ashburton,' by R. N. Worth, Trans. Devon Assoc. viii, 321. Fines for non- attendance appear in various court rolls. Cf. P. R. O. Ct. R. bdle. 152, No. 21 ; bdle. 159, No. 16. as it seems to have been the common meeting place of the miners, and the administrative centre of the stannary district. There the tinners chose such officers as they had within their power to elect. What the manner of pro- cedure had been in earlier times it is hard to say, but by the seventeenth century the power of choice had become vested in the grand jury. ' Thus, from the records of the Cornish mine parliament of 1636, it appears that they desig- nated, at the first law court after Michaelmas, a receiver for the stannary common funds, while, at the same time and place, the receiver for the time being accounted for his charge and turned it over to his successor. 13 There a jury of twelve decided on measures to be used against tinners who refused to pay their stannary assessments, 13 while the grand jury nominated a few petty officers of a quasi-manorial character, such as supervisors of roads and port-reeves. 14 The leet served also to register the initiation oaths of stannary officials. In open court ap- peared the head bailiff, the weigher, and the assay master and his deputies, who weighed and tested the tin at the coinage, and in the presence of the jury took oath to fill their office justly. 16 The owners of blowing-houses appeared and registered their house-marks in the steward's book, and presented their men to take an oath of honest service. 16 At the Michaelmas session came the verification of the gallon and foot-fate measures used in the dividing of the ore, which former duty was performed by the head bailiff with a few tinners empanelled for that occasion. 17 Proclamation was made by the stewards of royal ordinances or of statutes which dealt with the stannaries, 18 and presentments were occasionally made by the grand jury of the more important customs used in that district. 19 Few phases of stannary history are more obscure than the tinners' parliaments or convo- cations. The presence of similar bodies in the Forest of Dean, 20 the possible analogy of ancient tribal assemblies among the British, and the exasperating way in which all documentary evi- dence before the reign of Henry VIII has dis- appeared, tempt one to speculate as to the origin of these bodies instead of proving it. In both 11 Convoc. Cornw. 12 Chas. I, c. 36. 15 Ibid. 30 Eliz. c. 27. " P. R. O. Ct. R. bdle. 1 56, No. 2 1 , Convoc. Cornw. 22 Jas. I, c. 32. 15 Convoc. Cornw. 12 Chas. I, c. 12. 16 Convoc. Cornw. 1 6 Hen. VIII, c. 17. P. R. O. Ct. R. bdle. 156, No. 21. 17 Convoc. Cornw. 12 Chas. I, c. 20. 18 Pearce, Laws and Customs of the Stannaries, 154. The stannaries were, of course, at the mercy of an Act of Parliament. Cf. Stat. 1 6 Chas. I, c. 15; 4 Hen. VIII, c. 8, dealing with Strode's case. 9 Add. MSS. 24746, fol. 122 ; 6713, fol. 279. 10 Nicholls, The Forest of Dean, 45, 47, 49, 54, chap. iv. 534
