4 - Professional advancement

Summary

Legal education in late-medieval England was a matter of private concern to the inns and the courts. Not until the religious legislation of 1563 did statute recognise the rank of outer barrister as a ‘degree of learning in the common laws’ and not until 1590 was it established that call to the bar was an essential qualification for practice as counsel. In Kebell's day, therefore, status depended on advancement to public office within the legal system. The most numerous openings were to be found in the three great royal courts at Westminster, but there were substantial opportunities elsewhere. The highly developed legal system of the duchy of Lancaster had a court at Westminster and two provincial courts at Lancaster, while the county palatine of Chester, the quasi-independent palatinate of Durham, the duchy of Cornwall, the royal franchises in Wales and the Marches, and the households of members of the royal family also offered scope for the lawyer, as did the arrangements increasingly being made for regions of special difficulty, the north, Wales and the west.

A number of the posts offered were primarily of local significance and could be a virtual monopoly of a nearby dynasty–the Birkenhead family occupied the post of chief clerk and prothonotary at Chester for more than a century. Other positions were of value for the contact they gave with royalty and the chance that favour would result in more considerable rewards.