[577] Innocentius, &c. ... Præterea cum in Angliæ, Scotiæ, Walliæ regnis, causæ laicorum non imperatoriis legibus, sed laicorum consuetudinibus decidantur, fratrum nostrorum, et aliorum religiosorum consilio et rogatu, statuimus quod in prædictis regnis leges sæculares de cætero non legantur. Matt. Par., p. 883, ad ann. 1254, et in additamentis, p. 191.
[578] Et quod ipsi quos ad hoc elegerint, curiam sequantur, et se de negotiis in eadem curia intromittant, et alii non. Et videtur regi et ejus concilio, quod septies vigenti sufficere poterint, &c.—Rolls of Parl. 20. E. 1. vol. i. p. 84, No. 22.
[579] Dugd. Orig. Jurid., cap. xxxix. p. 102.
[580] Ante, p. 118. Mace-bearers, bell-ringers, thief-takers, gaolers, bailiffs, public executioners, and all persons who performed a specific task for another, were called servientes, serjens, or serjeants. —Ducange Gloss.
[581] Pasquier’s Researches, liv. viii. cap. 19.
[582] Will. Tyr., lib. i. p. 50, lib. xii. p. 814.
[583] Dugd. Hist. Warwickshire, p. 704.
[584] Et tunc Magister Templi dedit sibi mantellum, et imposuit pileum capiti suo, et tunc fecit eum sedere ad terram, injungens sibi, &c.—Acta contra Templarios. Concil. Mag. Brit., tom. ii. p. 380. See also p. 335.
[585] It has been supposed that the coif was first introduced by the clerical practitioners of the common law to hide the tonsure of those priests who practised in the Court of Common Pleas, notwithstanding the ecclesiastical prohibition. This was not the case. The early portraits of our judges exhibit them with a coif of very much larger dimensions than the coifs now worn by the serjeants-at-law, very much larger than would be necessary to hide the mere clerical tonsure. A covering for that purpose indeed would be absurd. The antient coifs of the serjeants-at-law were small linen or silk caps fitting close to the top of the head. This peculiar covering is worn universally in the East, where the people shave their heads and cut their hair close. It was imported into Europe by the Knights Templars, and became a distinguishing badge of their order. From the freres serjens of the Temple it passed to the freres serjens of the law.
[586] Ex cod. MS. apud sub-thesaurarium Hosp. Medii Templi, f. 4. a. Dugd. Orig. Jurid. cap. 43, 46.