Catalogue description Palatinate of Lancaster: Chancery Court: Pleadings, Replications etc

Replications were filed by the plaintiff in reply to the defendant's answer. These were normally formulaic in nature and contained little material of consequence. They were short general denials of the defendant's answer coupled with an assertion of the validity of the plaintiff's original complaint, the substance of which was often restated. However, early in the life of the court replications could, on occasion, contain more detailed refutations of the opponent's case.

Replications were mainly submitted on parchment, although paper was also used, especially in the 19th century. They were often annotated with the names of the counsel involved in drafting them. From the reign of James I they were annotated with the date they were delivered into the court. This is useful as the normal wording of a replication did not include any dating clause. By the 19th century the names of the parties to a dispute were included at the top of the replication. When copies of the replication were made for the use of the parties in the dispute this was noted on the original.

It was possible for the defendant to respond to a replication with a rejoinder, which was a formal restatement of the defendant's case. Such action was rare.

If the plaintiff believed that the defendant's answer was not a sufficient response to his complaint, he could file a point by point criticism of the answer, asking for it to be amended. Such complaints were known as exceptions. They were prepared by the plaintiff's legal advisors and signed by them. They were also dated when they were filed with the court. The filing of exceptions to an answer did not exclude a plaintiff from filing a replication after the exceptions had been heard by the court. Exceptions filed in the Lancaster Chancery appear to become more common from the 18th century.

On some occasions the defendant could reply to a bill of complaint without submitting an answer to the court. Instead the reply was made by way of a demurrer, a plea or a disclaimer. A demurrer challenged the jurisdiction of the court to properly hear the case, or argued that the plaintiff's bill was technically insufficient and therefore that the defendant was not required to make further answer. A plea raised an objection based on a point of law which was not apparent from the contents of the bill itself but which, if established by the court, nevertheless made an answer to the bill unnecessary. A disclaimer was a statement by the defendant denying any right to the thing demanded in the plaintiff's bill.

In the course of a normal suit, after the claims and counterclaims of the pleadings were completed the court heard evidence presented by witnesses for both parties and a decision was made.