the svea court of appeal in the early modern period 246 Court of Appeals of Sweden proper. The institution was, it seems, also used quite similarly. As far the prohibition of appeals in criminal cases is concerned, the Svea Court seems to have been less dogmatic in its application than the Dorpat Court. Both in Sweden and in Livonia, the courts of appeals strove for a judicial monopoly in their geographical jurisdictions. No enclaves were to be left. Instead, all lower court decisions were to be at least potentially appealable or reviewable (as in the case of serious crimes) to the Court of Appeal. Two major exceptions figure in European legal history: manorial courts and (other) patrimonial courts. I will treat these separately here. I will start with manorial courts, the lowest level of patrimonial court. The history of these courts is intimately linked to the experts in customary law, law-finders (Rechtsfinder), sitting in these courts. Law-finders had been had been threatened with extinction in the European legal world since the appearance of the university-educated, professional lawyer in the High Middle Ages. They had been gradually replaced by universitytrained legal professionals, first in southern parts of Europe in the Middle Ages and then in Germany from the late fifteenth century onwards.672 Instead of laymen, best capable of applying customary law and transmitting it to new generations, legal professionals were now needed to master the Europeanius commune and the increasing masses of statutory law.673 We do not know the history of the LivonianRechtsfinder well before the Swedish era well, but as I have suggested elsewhere,674 the institution was alive and well when the Swedes restructured the Livonia legal administration in the 1630s. As elsewhere in Europe, however, the law-finders had been pushed out of the regular judiciary and into the manorial courts, in which they found their last safe haven. Laymen had traditionally dominated the Swedish courts, but Swedes were less familiar with manorial courts.675 The Swedes themselves were 672 On law-finders in Germany, see Schartl, Reinhard 2006 673 See Dawson, John P. 1960: 674 Pihlajamäki, Heikki 2003. 675 This is said despite the fact that I consider the history of Swedish manorial courts badly in need of fresh research with a comparative outlook. I think it is relatively clear that Patrimonial Courts
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