Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/340

 318 THE DECLINE AND FALL plished in the year thirteen hundred and sixty-nine, for the use of the Latin kingdom of Cyprus. ^^^ Court of peers Thejustice and freedom of the constitution were maintained by two tribunals of unequal dignity, which were instituted by Godfrey of Bouillon after the conquest of Jerusalem. The king, in person, presided in the upper court, the court of the barons. Of these the four most conspicuous were the prince of Galilee, the lord of Sidon and Caesarea, and the counts of Jaffa and Tripoli, who, perhaps with the constable and marshal,^^^ were in a special manner the compeers and judges of each other. But all the nobles, who held their lands immediately of the crown, were entitled and bound to attend the king's court ; and each baron exercised a similar jurisdiction in the subordinate assemblies of his own feudatories. The connection of lord and vassal was honourable and voluntai'y : reverence was due to the benefactor, protection to the dependent ; but they mutually pledged their faith to each other, and the obligation on either side might be suspended by neglect or dissolved by injury. The cognisance of marriages and testaments was blended with religion and usurped by the clergy ; but the civil and criminal causes of the nobles, the inheritance and tenure of their fiefs, formed the proper occupation of the supreme court. Each member was the judge and guardian both of public and private rights. It was his duty to assert with his tongue and sword the lawful claims of the lord ; but, if an unjust superior presumed to violate the freedom or property of a vassal, the confederate peers stood forth to maintain his quarrel by word and deed. They boldly affirmed his innocence and his wrongs ; demanded the restitution Lignages de de-ga Mer, or d'Outremer, c. 6, at the end of the Assises de J(?rii- salem, an original book, which records the pedigrees of the French adventurers). 1-*^ By sixteen commissioners chosen in the states of the island, the work was finished the 3d of November, 1369, sealed with four seals, -and deposited in the cathedral of Nicosia (see the preface to the Assises). i-'='The cautious John d'Ibelin argues, rather than affirms, that Tripoli is the fourth barony, and expresses some doubt concerning the right or pretension of the constable and marshal (c. 323 [c. 269, cp. c. 271]). [Tripoli was the fourth fief of the ki?!i^nioin of Jerusalem, but it was not a barony of the principality of Jerusalem. The four fiefs of the kingdom were : (i) the principality of Jerusalem ; (2) the principality of Antioch ; (3) the county of Edessa ; (4) the county of Tripoli. The four baronies of the principality were : (i) the principality of Galilee ; (2) the lord- ship of Sidon and Ca^sarea (Ca:'sarea being held as a fief of Sidon); (3) the county of Jaffa and Ascalon ; (4) the principality of Hebron or St. Abraham, to which was afterwards joined the lordship of Kerak and Montreal beyond the Jordan (includ- ing all the south of Palestine exxept Ascalon). There is a good map of the Prin- cipality of Jerusalem in the Eng. tr. of Beha ad-din in the Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society.]