Composition of the court
The Haute Cour was a combination ofDuties of the court
The court levied taxes on the inhabitants of the kingdom, and voted on military expeditions. A formal vote for war would mobilize all the vassals of the kingdom. The court was the only judicial body for the nobles of the kingdom, hearing cases of murder, rape, assault, wardship, debt, recovery of slaves, sales and purchases of fiefs and horses, default of service, inheritance, and treason. Punishments included forfeiture of land and exile, or in extreme cases, death. It was possible to escape punishment from the court by challenging all the appointed judges to aFactions within the court
There tended to be two factions within the court, a so-called "court party," consisting of the royal family, theThe ''Assise sur la ligece''
Perhaps the most important piece of legislation passed by the court wasThe court in the 13th century
There was also a ''Cour des Bourgeois'' in the kingdom but in the 12th century the two do not seem to have met together. They began to do so in the 13th century when the capital of the kingdom had been moved to Acre, and the leaders of the merchant colonies in the coastal cities were also allowed to sit (but not vote). By this time central authority had eroded so much that the more powerful nobles often had their own courts. Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II opposed the authority of the court while he was staying in Acre during theSignificance
Most of our information on the court comes from John of Ibelin's description of it, written in the 1260s. His description was an idealized explanation of the laws and procedures, based on the idea thatSee also
*Sources
*Peter W. Edbury, ''John of Ibelin and the Kingdom of Jerusalem''. Rochester, New York: 1997. *John L. La Monte, ''Feudal Monarchy in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 1100-1291''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: 1932. *