Assize in Europe

Definition of Assize

A sitting or session of a Court of justice ; later, the enactments of such a Court
An assize passed in the reign of Henry II provided for the trial of questions of seisin and title to land by a recognition or inquiry of sixteen men sworn to speak the truth, called the Grand Assize. Hence the proceedings, and the jurors themselves, became known as the assizes.
Magna Charta provided that assizes of novel disseisin and mort d’ancestor should be taken only in the shires where the land lay, and for this purpose justices were sent into the country once a year ; hence they were called justices of assize. Afterwards, the Statute of Nisi Prius (13 Edw. 1, c. 30) enacted that the justices of assize should try the issues in ordinary actions in the counties in which they arose and return the verdict to the Court at Westminster. In addition, criminal matters are tried at assizes under commissions of oyer and terminer, gaol delivery and the peace
The assize Judges are called commissioners of assize, and are appointed by the Crown by Letters Patent (Judicature Act, 1925, s. 70)

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Definition of Assize is, temporally, from A Concise Law Dictionary (1927). This page needs to be proofread.

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