HENRY DE

See also:

• HENRY DE BRACTON (d. 1268)

BRACTON (d. 1268)  , English judge and writer on English law . His real name was Bratton, and in all probability he derived it either from Bratton Fleming or from Bratton Clovelly, both of them villages in Devonshire . It is only after his death that his name appears as " Bracton." He seems to have entered the king's service as a clerk under the patronage of William Raleigh, who after long service as a royal justice died bishop of Winchester in 1250 . Bracton begins to appear as a justice in 1245, and from 1248 until his death in 1268 he was steadily employed as a justice of assize in the south-western counties, especially Somerset, Devon and Cornwall . During the earlier part of this period he was also sitting as a judge in the king's central court, and was there hearing those pleas which " followed the king "; in other words, he was a member of that section of the central tribunal which was soon to be distinguished as the king's bench . From this position he retired or was dismissed in or about the year 1257, shortly before the meeting of the Mad Parliament at Oxford in 1258 . Whether his disappearance is to be connected with the political events of this turbulent time is uncertain . He continued to take the assizes in the south-west, and in 1267 he was a member of a commission of prelates, barons and judges appointed to hear the complaints of the disinherited partisans of Simon de Montfort . In 1259 he became rector of Combe-in-Teignhead, in 1261 rector of Barnstaple, in 1264 archdeacon of Barnstaple, and, having resigned the%archdeaconry, chancellor of Exeter cathedral; he also held a prebend in the collegiate church at Bosham . Already in 1245 he enjoyed a dispensation enabling him to hold three ecclesiastical benefices . He died in 1268 and was buried in the nave of Exeter cathedral, and a chantry for his soul was endowed out of the revenues of the manor of Thorverton . His fame is due to a treatise on the laws and customs of England which is sufficiently described elsewhere (see ENGLISH LAW) .

The

main part of it seems to have been compiled between 1250 and 1256; but apparently it is an unfinished work . This may be due to the fact that when he ceased to be a member of the king's central court Bracton was ordered to surrender certain judicial records which he had been using as raw material . Even though it be unfinished his book is incomparably the best work produced by any English lawyer in the middle ages . The treatise was published in 1569 by Richard Tottel . This text was reprinted in 164o . An edition (1878—1883) with Englishtranslation was included in the Rolls Series . Manuscript copies are numerous, and a critical edition is a desideratum . See Bracton's Note-Book (ed . Maitland, 1887) ; Bracton and Azo (Selden Society, 1895) . (F . W .