courts of appeal in norway dle minor legal issues between local inhabitants of the same or at least comparable social status, the regional courts were often used to solve more complicated legal questions or conflicts in which noblemen were involved. For the last group it was plainly and simply unthinkable to allow country-folk to interfere with their affairs and thus they submitted their claims to the king and his council. Eventually the nobility stipulated the privilege to handle their claims directly before an assembly dominated by noblemen that convened regularly from the sixteenth century onwards.28 Even though the king’s authority had been gradually consolidated at the end of the Middle Ages, in Norway this legal order did not change substantially before the end of the sixteenth century. When Norway entered the Union of Kalmar with Denmark and Sweden in 1397, and came under the rule of the Danish Crown after Sweden left the union, this had no immediate impact on the Norwegian legal system.29 Consequently, the hierarchical order of courts also developed somewhat independently. While the first steps to an appellate-system were made in Denmark with the Kolding Recess of 1558,30 in Norway a comparable court system was not established before the end of the sixteenth century.31 In the two decades following 1590 several specific measures were taken to reform the institutional and also intellectual foundations of the Norwegian judiciary. Both the lawman’s and thelagting’s task were modified and in addition most of the Norwegian appeal court judges were replaced by officials recruited from the lower nobility in Denmark. The background of this development was that the existing judiciary could no longer match the needs of the early modern society. The inefficiency of the pre-existing legal order becomes obvious when considering the large number of legal 28 The so-called Herredag was established after the reformation. The nobility received a renewal of the privilege in the administration of justice that guaranteed the members of the noble houses the exclusive right to be sued before this institution in the electoral capitulation (Håndfestning) from 1483. 29 Robberstad, Knut 1976 p. 214; Nissen, Gunnar 1966 p. 35; Falkanger, Aage Thor 2007 p. 91. 30 Cf. art. 8 of the so-called Kolding Recess issued by King ChristianIII in 1558. 31 Instansbrevet from16 August 1590. For the critical reaction by the nobility, seeAdelssuplikkbrev 31 July 1591. Despite this opposition of the nobility, the new rules were maintained. 288
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