Note 57 — Chapter V · Trial by Ordeal.
Reading edition
Ante idem.
The Lateran Council of 1215 forbade the clergy to take part in the ceremony of the ordeal any further and in prompt obedience to this decree in England, Henry III. abolished it in the kingdom, as England was then at the Pope’s feet, and aside from the cases of witchcraft and sorcery, in the reign of James I., the ordeal last appears, as a method of judicial trial, in the old rolls of the reign of King John. (Concil. Lateran. IV., c. 18; Foedera, i, 154; Rolls of King’s Court, Pipe Roll Soc. 80, 86, 89;) Select Pl. Cr; Note Book, pl. 592; Lea, “Superstition and Force,” (3 ed.) 421; II. Pollock and Maitland’s History English Law., p. 599 and notes.
Lord Hale informs us: “That in all the time of King John ... trial by ordeal continued, ... but it seems to have ended with this king, for I do not find it in use any time after.” (History Common Law, p. 152.)
In Nigeria the trial by ordeal still obtains in cases of witchcraft and to vindicate the chastity of women. P. Amaury Talbot’s article, in London Telegraph, July, 1912.