to a period nearly half a century later than the compilation of Domesday Book. It contains, however, internal evidence, in the shape of references to earlier accounts, that it was not the first of its series, though its predecessors may have perished, like the earliest of its successors. From the second year of the reign of Henry II, however, until the system was abolished in the reign of William IV there is (with two exceptions only) a 'Great Roll' for every year of every reign during a period very little short of 700 years.
Profits from judicial proceedings.Primarily these 'Great Rolls'[1] were made up for fiscal reasons, so that the King's revenue from each of the King's shires might be known. Incidentally, however, the earliest of them are of great value for other purposes. A not inconsiderable portion of the King's income was derived from profits on judicial proceedings from fines, from various kinds of licences, from various writs which the Sheriffs had to carry into effect. We are thus able to discern something of the nature of the Courts of Justice which were in existence, where no records of those Courts have come down to us.
- ↑ These are often called 'Pipe Rolls', but incorrectly so far as the earliest of them (extending over considerably more than a century) are concerned. Down to the twelfth year of the reign of Edward I, or later, there was a process relating to matters entered upon the Great Roll which was described in statutes and elsewhere as the 'Summons of the Exchequer'. Not very long afterwards its place was taken by two distinct summonses, one called the Summons of the Pipe, the other the Summons of the Green Wax. There then came to be a Clerk of the Pipe, and a Pipe Office, in which the Great Roll was engrossed and kept. Then, and not before, the later Great Rolls acquired the alternative colloquial title of 'Pipe Rolls', which is inapplicable to those in existence before the Summons of the Pipe was invented. A disquisition on the distinctive meaning of the 'Summons of the Pipe' would here be out of place.
