With the establishment of judicial branches of the curia regis
in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, the king found
himself in the position of an appellate judge. He was the "author
of justice," and he was chosen "that he might do justice to
everyone." ¹ Consequently, he retained responsibility for the
judgments of his courts whether he was present or not. Miscar-
riages of justice in the royal courts could always be corrected by
appeals to the monarch.

English judges had before them the example of canon law
with its machinery for appeals from lower courts to higher
courts. This hierarchy of ecclesiastical courts culminating in the
papal curia at Rome became familiar to increasing numbers as
appeals from the English church courts multiplied. The English
king and his royal servants must have envied the pope's position
at the head of a graduated hierarchy of courts having a regular
process of appeal, and indeed parallels were drawn between the
role of the pope in the system of church courts and that of the
king in the lay courts. ² Despite the example of the ecclesiastical
courts, the English royal courts failed to develop a rational sys-
tem for the appeal of judicial decisions. Maitland clearly ex-
pressed the problem facing medieval English legal minds when
he wrote, "The idea of a complaint against a judgment which is

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