Year: 1895
Type: article
Abstract: The Office of Constable mHE officer who in later times has been generally known as -L petty constable or parish constable may be viewed in two lights.In the first place he may be regarded as the officer of a manor or a township, locally appointed for a special purpose, as the hay-ward, the ale-taster, or the beadle might be.In this capacity no special importance is attached to him by the investigators of early English village communities.Neither in Mr. Seebohm's ' English Village Commnnity' nor in Professor VinogradofFs ' Villainage in England' is the constable so much as mentioned, and in other writings of the same class few references to the office occur.In the ' Eecords of the Norwich Leets,' published by the Selden Society (p. 18), one Simon de Melton is said to have been amerced in 1287 for having refused to take oath of office as sub-conetaindariut, after having been chosen per omnes jttratores; and at p. 1 of the same volume a constabrdariut is also mentioned, and a certain offender described as having been arrested and imprisoned at his suit.But here and elsewhere the references to the constable in connexion with early village history are quite incidental, and throw but little light on his status as an officer of law.In legal writings, on the other hand, the duties and privileges of the office have been considered worthy of much discussion and a considerable display of learning.In books like those of Serjeant Hawkins or Sir Matthew H^to on the history of the Fleas of the Crown the constable as an executive officer takes a very prominent place next to the sheriff and the justices of the peace.Blackstone, again, looks at him from a somewhat different point of view.High constables, he says (L 856), were first appointed by the Statute of Winchester (18 Ed.I, stat.2), and at some unknown period in the reign of Edward HI petty constables were appointed to assist them.
Source: The English Historical Review
DOI: 10.1093/ehr/x.xl.625
Author: H. B. SIMPSON
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2008190666