Catalogue description Palatinate of Lancaster: Court of Common Pleas: Plea Rolls

This series consists of rolls maintained by the Prothonotary of the Palatinate court of Common Pleas on which were recorded progress in common pleas (mainly trespass, debt and land) including pleadings, judgments, writs of process, recognizances, essoins and warrants of attorney; common recoveries; some private conveyances; and judges' commissions. Before 1587 some details of fines and final concords were also enrolled, as well as licences to agree and payment of the King's silver; thereafter details of fines were enrolled separately.

The main sequence runs from 1441 to 1848, with two earlier rolls of 1401 and 1429. The series is very incomplete until 1462, after which gaps are few and only small. No subsequent regnal year is entirely un-represented, and after 1660 there are very few gaps indeed; there are apparently none at all after 1760.

Until 1501 the rolls record Crown business (which included the possessory assizes and nuisance) as well as common pleas. Initially all entries were in a single sequence; later, Crown business appeared at the end of the roll.

Two sessions a year were normally held, one in Lent and one in late July, August or early September. The rolls are identified in the catalogue by the feast day mentioned in their headings, not the precise days on which the sessions were held. Lent of course lasted nearly six weeks, but the summer session days were always close to the feast days cited, the main ones being St Peter ad Vincula (1 August), St Lawrence (10 August), Assumption of the Virgin Mary (15 August), St Bartholomew (24 August) and the Nativity of the Virgin Mary (8 September). The feast days are entirely replaced by months after 1605, immediately after the Gunpowder Plot.

For the years 1-14 and 20-30 Henry VI 'memoranda negociorum' (PL 25/1-2) act as a means of reference to Crown business in PL 15/2, 4-18.

For common pleas heard while the Palatinate was in abeyance between 1361 and 1377, see CP 40

W K Boyd's notes on PL 15 are in PRO 66/1/9

Rolls for years 1848 to 1868 were left behind at Preston for use in current business when most Palatinate records were transferred to the Public Record Office in 1873, but their present location is unknown. A judgment roll for years 1869-1873, which probably continued the plea rolls, was also left behind, and is now in the Lancashire Record Office (reference: DDCM/1/236). Sessions were held between 1351 and 1361, when Henry, Duke of Lancaster exercised palatinate powers, but surviving rolls are divided between:

Records of the Duchy of Lancaster DL 35

Records of eyres and assizes kept at Westminster JUST 1

Imparlance or remembrance books are an indirect means of reference after 1696; see PL 24