CHICHESTER DIOCESE COURT ACT BOOKS (later INSTANCE BOOKS)

Ep/I/10

CHICHESTER DIOCESE COURT ACT BOOKS (later INSTANCE BOOKS)

1506-1557, 1560-1798

These are the records of the three ecclesiastical courts:

(i) The Consistory Court sitting in Chichester, including acts of the Bishop's Audience court, hearing cases from all over the diocese, but mostly from the Archdeaconry of Chichester.

(ii) The Bishop's Commissary court for the Archdeaconry of Chichester, hearing cases at first instance from the rural deaneries of Arundel, Midhurst and Storrington.

(iii) The Bishop's Commissary Court for the Archdeaconry of Lewes, hearing cases at first instance from the Archdeaconry of Lewes.

The Archdeacons' courts did not exercise separate jurisdiction from the episcopal courts between 1508 and 1520-1.

By the late 1550s the Consistory and Commissary Archdeaconry of Chichester courts had ceased to exercise separate jurisdiction in the Archdeaconry of Chichester, and the structure of the courts was established, as it was to remain until the nineteenth century.

Up to 1557 the two series of office and instance act books often had overlapping business. Detection or office cases are included in the following act books:-

Ep/I/10/1-7 for the period 1506-1537

Ep/I/10/8-10 for the period 1544-1557

In the mid 16th century correction causes came to be called detection causes (see Ep/I/10), and during the 18th century miscellaneous acts replace detection causes

<span class="wrapper"><p>Ep/I/17/1,2 for the period 1538-1541</p> <p>BM Add Mss. 33410 (now in the British Library), 1541-1542.</p> <p>STC III/A 1556-1557</p></span>

English