Church Courts and Their People

Abstract The church court was responsible for administering spiritual justice in England. It adjudicated a range of disputes including where people sat in church, defamation allegations, and disagreements over probate, and it pursued its own suits in the regulation of sex, marriage, and the clergy. This chapter begins by outlining patterns of litigation over time and place in the five diocesan courts of Bath and Wells, Exeter, Gloucester, Hereford, and Winchester. It sets out the participation of litigants and witnesses according to gender, age, marital and occupational status, and geography. It shows that legal agency in these courts was not equally available to all. It was contingent on patriarchal norms and constrained by age- and status-related ideas around authority. The second part of the chapter sets female servants within this picture by focusing on their interactions with the court. It demonstrates how issues of consent, obedience, and obligation that underpinned servants’ position further complicate their place within this legal institution. Despite social and legal barriers that made their participation household-centred, female servants could and did come to court to pursue legal justice and their testimonies speak to more than just their positions as household servants.