Sollom Emlyn (27 December 1697 – 28 June 1754) was an Irish legal writer.
Life
Emlyn was the second son of
Thomas Emlyn
Thomas Emlyn (1663–1741) was an English nonconformist divine.
Life
Emlyn was born at Stamford, Lincolnshire. He served as chaplain to the presbyterian Letitia, countess of Donegal, the daughter of Sir William Hicks, 1st Baronet who married ...
. He was born at Dublin, where his father was at the time settled, on 27 December 1697. He studied law, entered as a student at
Leiden University
Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; nl, Universiteit Leiden) is a Public university, public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. The university was founded as a Protestant university in 1575 by William the Silent, William, Prince o ...
17 Sept. 1714, became a member of
Lincoln's Inn
The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of the four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. (The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn.) Lincoln ...
, and rose to be of great reputation as a
chamber counsel. Emlyn was anxious for reforms of the law, and very forcibly pointed out the defects in the system as then practised. He remarked in 1730 on the 'tediousness and delays' of civil suits, 'the exorbitant fees to counsel, whereto the costs recovered bear no proportion,’ the overgreat 'nicety of special pleadings,’ the scandal of the ecclesiastical courts. In criminal law he objected to the forced unanimity of the jury, the Latin record of the proceedings, the refusal of counsel to those charged with felony, the practice of pressing to death obstinately mute prisoners, capital punishment for trifling offences, 'the oppressions and extortions of gaolers,’ and generally the bad management of gaols.
[Preface to ''State Trials''.]
He continued the edition of
Thomas Salmon's A Complete Collection of State Trials, which was subsequently expanded by
Francis Hargrave
Francis Hargrave (c.1741–1821) was an English lawyer and antiquary. He was the most prominent of the five advocates who appeared on behalf of James Somersett in the case which determined, in 1772, the legal status of slaves in England. Although t ...
and then
Thomas Bayly Howell
Thomas Bayly Howell FRS (6 September 1767 – 13 April 1815) was an English lawyer and writer who edited and lent his name to ''Howell's State Trials''.
Life
Thomas Bayly Howell was born in Jamaica. His family returned to England in 1770 to set ...
.
Emlyn died 28 June 1754. He was interred in
Bunhill Fields
Bunhill Fields is a former burial ground in central London, in the London Borough of Islington, just north of the City of London. What remains is about in extent and the bulk of the site is a public garden maintained by the City of London Cor ...
burying-ground, where there is an inscription to his memory. He married on 10 November 1729 Mary, daughter of Rev. William Woodhouse, by whom he had two sons: Thomas, a chancery barrister, who died in 1796; and Sollom (d. 1744).
Works
* (ed.) ''
Sir Matthew Hale
Sir Matthew Hale (1 November 1609 – 25 December 1676) was an influential English barrister, judge and jurist most noted for his treatise ''Historia Placitorum Coronæ'', or ''The History of the Pleas of the Crown''.
Born to a barrister and ...
's
History of the Pleas of the Crown
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...
'', 1736.
* ''Queries relating to
Elizabeth Canning
Elizabeth Canning (married name Treat; 17 September 1734 – June 1773) was an English maidservant who claimed to have been kidnapped and held against her will in a hayloft for almost a month. She ultimately became central to one of the most fa ...
's Case, with Answers'', 1754.
* (ed.) ''State Trials'', 2nd ed., printed with a preface in six volumes folio in 1730
*
A Complete Collection of State Trials, vol VII (supplement): 1549–1688(1735)
* (ed.) ''Works'' of Thomas Evelyn, with a prefatory biography (4th ed. 3 vols. 1746).
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Emlyn, Sollom
1697 births
1754 deaths
18th-century Irish writers
Irish legal writers
Lawyers from Dublin (city)
Leiden University alumni
Members of Lincoln's Inn