curia

curia, in European medieval history, a court, or group of persons who attended a ruler at any given time for social, political, or judicial purposes. Its composition and functions varied considerably from time to time and from country to country during a period when executive, legislative, and judicial functions were not as distinct as they were later to become. In general, the curia took care of the ruler’s personal needs (chamberlains, stewards, butlers), directed the affairs of government (chancellors, treasurers, secretaries, military leaders), or simply provided the ruler with companionship. The ruler and curia made policy decisions either ordinary or major (as on war, treaties, finances, church relations) and, under a powerful ruler—a king, duke, or count—often became active as a court of law. Indeed, curiae became so loaded down with judicial work that the work gradually came to be delegated to special groups of judges, such as the Court of King’s Bench in England or the Parlement in France; such judicial courts in medieval times were at first considered instruments of the curia, however, not independent bodies. The curia similarly turned over the growing burden of financial affairs to such bodies as the English Exchequer and the French Curia in Compotis (“Curia of Accounts”), which too remained instruments of the curia.

The evolution of the medieval curia is well illustrated in England’s Curia, also known as the Curia Regis, or Aula Regis (“King’s Court”). It was introduced at the time of the Norman Conquest (1066) and lasted to about the end of the 13th century. The Curia Regis was the germ from which the higher courts of law, the Privy Council, and the Cabinet were to spring. It was, at first, the general council of the king, or the commune concilium (i.e., the feudal assembly of the tenants-in-chief); but it assumed a more definite character during the reign of Henry I (1100–35), when its members, fewer in number, were the officials of the royal household and other friends and attendants of the king. It assisted the king in his judicial work, its authority being as undefined as his own.

About the same time, the Curia undertook financial duties and in this way was the parent of the Court of Exchequer (curia regis ad scaccarium). The members were called “justices,” and in the king’s absence the justiciar presided over the court. A further step was taken by Henry II. In 1178 he appointed five Curia members to form a special court of justice, which became known as the Court of Common Pleas. Initially, this court’s justices, like the other members of the Curia, followed the king’s court from place to place, but Magna Carta (1215) provided for the court’s establishment in one place, and it thus became a stationary judicial body. The Court of King’s (or Queen’s) Bench also developed out of the Curia Regis. This court continued to move about with the monarch until the 14th century, at which time it too lost its close connections with the king and simply became one of the superior courts of common law. The Court of Chancery was also an offshoot of the Curia Regis. About the time of Edward I (reigned 1272–1307), the executive and advising duties of the Curia Regis came to be handled by a select group, the king’s secret council, which later came to be called the Privy Council. From the Privy Council there later developed the Cabinet.