La Graunde Abridgement

by Sir Robert Brooke

Broke is remembered in the legal profession chiefly for La graunde abridgement, which was published posthumously in 1573 by Richard Tottell, and reprinted in smaller format in 1576 and 1586. (Supposed earlier editions of 1568 and 1570 are ghosts.) This was more ambitious even than Fitzherbert's Graunde Abridgement, containing over 20,000 entries digested under a wider range of titles, and had useful marginal notes guiding the reader more readily to the contents. Contemporaries found it easier to use than Fitzherbert, and it is still a valuable reference tool. Although the abridgement was primarily derived from the medieval year-books, Broke added a number of cases from his own observation, some statutes and other sources, and even a few extracts from readings in the inns of court. The contemporary cases, though only briefly noted, may be considered as original law reports. They were extracted by Richard Bellewe and published separately, in a chronological rearrangement, as Ascuns Novell Cases (1578), an enterprise which placed Broke among the canonical-law reporters; the volume was reprinted several times, most recently in 1873. A different version of the cases, in alphabetical order, was published in English translation (as Some New Cases) by John March in 1651; this was reprinted in The English Reports in 1907. Broke gave to his colleague Sir Anthony Browne ‘a greate written booke of presidentes’, which Browne bequeathed to Robert Mordaunt; these precedents were probably entries of pleading, reflecting Broke's clerical training, rather than reports or abridged cases.

Bibliographic Information

Author: Sir Robert Brooke (d. 1558)

Title: La Graunde Abridgement.

Publication Info: London: R. Tottyl, 1576.

Edition:

Description of the Wolf Law Library's copy

Bound in later calf with blind rules to boards and renewed endpapers. Recently rebacked with raised bands and lettering piece and mended hinges. Title page printed within woodcut architectural borders with woodcut initials. Purchased from The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.