per andersen While the uneven survival of documents means that it is not possible to say how commonly utilised the king’s court was as a court of first instance or as a court of appeal in the Middle Ages, it is of course entirely different for the period 1537-1660. We learn from the act books that the Royal Court was used as a court of first instance in 3,606 cases (mainly disputes among nobles),31 while 3,735 cases were appeal cases, of course to the overwhelming part civil suits. Thus, only 12 percent of the appeal cases were appeals against criminal convictions (of which only about 20 percent were changed).32 Among the 3,735 appeal cases the Royal Court was the second court of instance in 1,904 cases, approximately one-half of all the appeal cases, meaning that the case had been decided at a district court or a peculiar court followed by a provincial court prior to the arrival at the Royal Court.33 Until around the year 1600, however, only 30 percent of all cases were appeal cases and for this reason the Royal Court was clearly primarily one amongst several parallel courts during the first period following the Reformation.34 So we may see an increased hierarchy during the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but it was not until the Supreme Court was established in 1661 that this process was completed. From the act books it is also clear that decisions made by provincial judges were appealed in 2,539 cases, meaning that about one-third of all cases (and two-thirds of the appeal cases) were appeals against decisions passed by provincial judges while approximately 1200 cases were appeals against other first instance decisions. In approximately 90 percent of appeal cases concerning the landsting decisions, i.e. in about 2,300 cases, the provincial judges were supported by the Royal Court so that the decision of the provincial court was confirmed.35 However, these figures 30 Tamm, Ditlev 2003 pp. 10-11; Tamm, Ditlev – Johansen, Jens Chr. V. 1992 pp. 79-80. 31 Tamm, Ditlev 2003 pp. 6-9. 32 Johansen, Jens Chr. V. 2001, p. 559. 33 Kongens retterting vol. 1, pp. 70-1. The index on p. 271 mentions 3754 references to appeals in these sentences, but this high number is probably caused by the fact that appeals were mentioned in cases that were not appeals. See in addition Tamm, Ditlev – Johansen, Jens Chr. V. 1992 p. 81. 34 Tamm, Ditlev 2003 p. 12. 35 Kongens retterting vol. 1 p. 278, and Tamm, Ditlev 2003 p. 12. 261
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