Englishry

Englishry (Englescherie), a legal name given, in the reign of William the Conqueror, to the presentment of the fact that a person slain was an Englishman. If an unknown man was found slain, he was presumed to be a Norman, and the hundred was fined accordingly, unless it could be proved that he was English. Englishry, if established, excused the hundred. Dr W. Stubbs (Constitutional History, i. 196) says that possibly similar measures were taken by King Canute. Englishry was abolished in 1340.

See Select Cases from the Coroners’ Rolls, 1265-1413, ed. C. Gross, Selden Society (London, 1896).

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