Juízo das Capelas da Coroa (Court of the Crown Chantries) (1643-1832)

Chronological span

In the early seventeenth century, the crown began to take measures to create a permanent and exclusive body, within the central administration, responsible for compiling, registering, and judging cases and suits concerning the chantries that had been alienated from the crown, and collecting their income. This specific group of entails was characterised by the right of the crown to nominate their administrators, due to the extinction of the founders’ lineage, the non-fulfilment of pious legacies, or the deficient management or alienation of the entailed assets.

Filipe II considered it necessary to proceed with the rehabilitation of the regulatory and moralising system of the fulfilment of the pious legacies of the chapels with vacant administration, which had been initiated by King Manuel¹, but also to optimise the management of an important branch of state revenue, which would be used, above all, as an instrument of remuneration for services.

The initial phase of this body’s existence is still somewhat obscure due to the dispersal of its normative and regulatory documents, as well as its registry, evidence of a legal praxis that is essential for an in-depth understanding of how it worked². The basic legislative framework are the Ordenações Filipinas, published in 1603 and in force until the nineteenth-century reforms, although they were recurrently complemented by extraordinary laws, whose originals are today difficult to locate as they are scattered across countless archival collections, despite being replicated, albeit with some variations, in different legislative compilations.

In any case, through the analysis of the legal provisions currently available, and also through case-by-case observation, we know that this body dedicated specifically to the litigation involving entails would have an intrinsic connection, possibly subordinate, to the Casa da Suplicação, a superior court of justice³. Nevertheless, we recognise the existence, until a late stage, of information flows and even a certain overlapping of functions, as far as the crown chantries are concerned, which occurred with other central administrative bodies such as the Desembargo do Paço, the Casa da Relação do Porto, the Conselho da Fazenda (treasury council), the Conselho Ultramarino (council for the overseas colonies), and the Torre do Tombo⁴.

The warrant (alvará) of 2 December 1791⁵ refers to the creation of the Comissão do Juízo das Capelas da Coroa (royal commission on the crown chantries) on 10 September 1604 (the content of which we do not know, despite the research conducted), but we believe that the process of creation of the body went through several stages. For the whole of the seventeenth century the only consistent work was carried out by the commission led by Tomé Pinheiro da Veiga, between 1619 and 1643, and which was due to the commitment and competence of that magistrate (see heading Comissão do Tombo das Capelas da Coroa). The subsequent phases are largely secondary to the intense work carried out at that time, as attested by the compilation and registry of 672 chantries and morgadios, as well as a large number of writs of petition, property claims, sequestration of assets, and deeds of possession, which were produced and transmitted en bloc to the officials who succeeded the aforementioned commission after 1643. In other words, the Juízo das Capelas da Coroa was built on the practices developed by Tomé Pinheiro da Veiga’s Commission. No less important was the specific legislation then produced and whose jurisprudence constituted the fundamental basis for the activity of the Juízo das Capelas da Coroa, which would not have a consistent and consolidated regulation until 23 May 1775⁶. Until then, the court would have functioned based on the same legal device of the commission led by Tomé Pinheiro da Veiga, whose application was ordered by the decree of 17 October 1698, although the nominations of judges, prosecutors, solicitadores, and scribes contained specific and complementary instructions for immediate application, as required.

According to the prologue of the warrant (alvará) of 23 May 1775, after the end of Pinheiro da Veiga’s Commission, the same practices continued, appointing other judges of the Casa da Suplicação, although the work was not carried on with the same regularity and even the compilation book of the chantries was lost, as well as its copy. The number of vacant chantries had increased substantially due to the extinction of the founders’ families, while the state of many of them was unknown and many of their assets were alienated. Many provedores and contadores of the comarcas also failed to comply with their statutes, failing to review the accounts of the chantries and inform the Judge of the need to take possession of them⁷.

Between what seem to have been the first two commissions, between 1604 and 1619 (see heading Comissão do Tombo das Capelas da Coroa), with interspersed periods of interruption in activity, the specialised court seems to have been in permanent operation from 1643 until 1832, during which time three distinct phases can be recognised:

The first was between 1643 and 1775, when the judicial body functioned with the Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa and the normative and regulatory device of the commission of Pinheiro da Veiga, as attested by the royal orders issued in the warrant of 1 December 1620⁸ and renewed by the decree of 17 October 1698⁹.
The second phase, which began with the regulations of the Juízo das Capelas da Coroa of 23 May 1775 and ended on 25 October 1828, the date of King Miguel’s decree ordering the transfer of the archive of the crown chantries (Cartório das Capelas da Coroa) to the treasury council, with the court still responsible for cases in litigation¹⁰;
The third between 25 October 1828 and 16 May 1832, the date of Decree no. 24, with which Mouzinho da Silveira carried out the reform of justice, abolishing the Casa da Suplicação and the private and specialised courts¹¹. As recompense, on 11 December 1830, a department of crown chantries (Repartição das Capelas da Coroa) was created within the treasury council, which stripped the court of its competences and submitted the treatment of property claims of the crown chantries to the fiscal criteria of the same council¹², which would only be abolished on 31 July 1833¹³.

Normative documents (main)

Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa of 6 December 1564, with the alterations introduced by the warrant (alvará) of 15 March 1566 and by the warrant of 15 December 1566¹⁴;
Warrant of 10 September 1604 creating the Juízo das Capelas da Coroa¹⁵;
Warrant of 1 December 1620 ordering the use of the Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa on the Provedoria and the nomination of a treasurer¹⁶;
Royal letter of 13 October 1621 ordering that the obligations of the sequestered chapels be paid punctually from their revenues¹⁷;
Royal letter of 1627 ordering that the claims concerning chantries be made within a year¹⁸;
Royal letter of 28 November 1628 ordering that no desembargador or minister of the Comissão das Capelas (Commission on chantries) may lay claim to any chantry for himself, servants, or relatives up to the fourth degree¹⁹;
Decree of 2 January 1651 prohibiting the ministers and judges of the crown chantries from taking cognizance of any case involving chantries belonging to the Church or ecclesiastical persons, until an agreement is reached on this particular matter with the ministers of His Holiness²⁰;
Decree of 17 July 1679, ordering the Regedor of the Casa da Suplicação not to admit any more claims involving chantries incorporated in the crown and to warn the Judge and the Procurador of the chantries that every year they must know which chantries are incorporated, who owns them, and by what title, immediately taking possession of those that do not present a valid document²¹;
Decree of 17 October 1698 ordering the Juiz das Capelas that in carrying out his functions he should observe the orders given to to Doctor Tomé Pinheiro da Veiga in a letter of 1 December 1620, namely on the use of the Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa and the nomination of a treasurer²²;
Decree no. 24 of 16 May 1832, reforming the judiciary of the Kingdom, abolishing the Casa da Suplicação and the private and specialised courts²³.

Competences

The Juízo das Capelas da Coroa was responsible for identifying all entails with vacant administrations; registering their assets; proceeding with the legitimation of administrations without a valid title; creating and maintaining an updated register of the provision of administrations of the entails, in cooperation with the central administrative bodies and the provincial, secular, and ecclesiastical administration; ordering the sequestration of assets for the completion of the registries; pronouncing sentences and drawing up deeds of possession of the entails²⁵.

Institutional organisation and the roles of its agents with regard to entails

Institutional organisation

The court maintained a reduced structure between 1643 and the end of the seventeenth century. The king would appoint a desembargador from the Casa da Suplicação to be the Juiz das Capelas da Coroa, and the regedor of the Casa da Suplicação would invest the appointee. The Juiz had the support of the crown attorney (Procurador da Coroa) and of the Escrivão dos Feitos da Coroa who, despite being agents exclusively dedicated to the defence of the rights and prerogatives of the crown, did not limit their activity to entails nor to this court. There was also a solicitador of the crown chantries, nominated by the Desembargo do Paço, and a treasurer.

The roles of its agents

Juiz das Capelas da Coroa
The position of Juiz das Capelas da Coroa, nominated by the king, was temporarily annexed to that of Juiz dos Feitos da Coroa and of Juiz da Fazenda (judge of the treasury), with the Regedor of the Casa da Suplicação having to give possession to the holder of the post⁴⁵.

It was the judge’s duty to provide information, as detailed as possible, on all the chantries in the kingdom, ascertaining which ones were vacant, who was the last possessor, by what title they were administered and who had succeeded in that administration after being incorporated in the crown. He had to send the accrued revenues to the coffer that existed for that purpose. It was also his obligation to inquire into the chantries that had been provided with administrators, using for this purpose the papers that remained from Tomé Pinheiro da Veiga⁴⁶.

The Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa (1564), transposed to the Ordenações Filipinas, which, as we have mentioned, was adopted by the warrant (alvará) of 1 December 1620 and by decree of 17 October 1698, determined the following competences of this magistrate with regard to entails:

Chantries
- Have cognizance of their founding documents⁴⁷;
- Review the accounts of their rents and obligations⁴⁸;
- Judge the cases involving the chantries and their administration⁴⁹;
- Issue interlocutory and final rulings pertaining to these foundations and even on doubts arising from the rendering of accounts, although imposing a limit (alçada) of four thousand reais on suits involving immovable property and six thousand reis on movable property, amounts up to which they could judge without appeal or review⁵⁰.
- Demarcate and measure their assets and properties⁵¹;
- Have the aforementioned patrimony recorded in a registry book, along with copies of the founding documents⁵²;
- Prepare a notebook each year of the chantries provided by the provedor and of the registries initiated, and send the said notebooks to the Desembargadores do Paço⁵³.

Morgadios
- Have cognizance of their founding documents⁵⁴;
- Review the accounts of their rents and obligations⁵⁵;
- Judge the cases concerning their obligations and respective accounts⁵⁶.

Procurador dos Feitos da Coroa (crown attorney)
It was his duty to represent the interests of the Crown in lawsuits and claims, as well as to defend its jurisdiction. The Procurador dos Feitos da Coroa represented the king, by his specific mandate, and his interests in the cases involving the crown. In particular, he was responsible for requesting from the desembargadores do Paço, the vedores da Fazenda (treasury superintendents), contadores, judges, almoxarifes and any other officials all the information that they had on the royal rights; he had to represent the monarch in the cases that were dealt with before the Juízes dos Feitos da Coroa or those touching on the royal jurisdictions, assets, and rights; he had to carry out enquiries in the name of the king; and be a plaintiff, defendant, opposing party, or assistant in cases and suits involving entails⁵⁷.

Escrivão dos Feitos da Coroa
According to the Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa (1564), the scribes were responsible for drawing up instruments pertaining to “the matters” of chantries, morgados, hospitals, hostels, and confraternities. They were also in charge of writing up the appeals that were filed with the provedor, as well as the request for their dispatch to the higher instances of appeal⁵⁸.

The Escrivão dos Feitos da Coroa⁵⁹, who exercised functions in the Juízo das Capelas da Coroa during the second half of the sixteenth century, was in charge of guarding and making an inventory of the lawsuits, ensuring they were available for consultation by the crown attorney (Procurator da Coroa) for their dispatch; preparing all the letters of any judgement for the making of enquiries and give them to be signed by the judge or whoever has to sign them and, afterwards, to the solicitador to have them sealed⁶⁰; having the final sentences signed, which would then pass through the chancery and be copied in a book. After being executed, he would give the sentences to the Guarda-mor of the Torre do Tombo to be copied into a dedicated book⁶¹. The escrivão dos Feitos da Coroa would make copies of the lawsuits, when ordered by the Judge⁶²; as well as copies of the registries of the entails⁶³.

Tesoureiro
He would be a “person of confidence” and would be in charge of the court’s income and expenditure book.

Relations with other institutions with regard to entails

At the level of central administration, there is direct contact with the King, the apex of the regulatory system, who was responsible for defining the system itself, whether in terms of appointing agents or issuing regulations defining the court’s functioning, or even directly granting the rights to chantry administration, with or without consulting the Desembargo do Paço. The king had to be informed about the vacant chantries, in the manner defined in the statute on the provedor of chantries⁶⁴.

The annual work undertaken by the provedores in the provision of chantries and the preparation of the registries had to be recorded in notebooks and sent to the Desembargo do Paço, giving an account of everything that had been done⁶⁵, bearing in mind that the Desembargo do Paço was responsible for dispatching the petitions for grace, requested from the king, in cases that might touch Justice⁶⁶.

Also according to the Regimento do Provedor das Capelas e Resíduos de Lisboa (1564) the sentences given by the Provedor and, as such by the judge of the crown chantries (Juiz das Capelas da Coroa), concerning the administrations, pious obligations of the entails, and respective accounts were subject to appeal to the Casa da Suplicação, two judges being required to produce a final sentence, with the scribe having to send the original case papers and never their copies⁶⁷.

From 1621 onwards, all sentences passed in favour of the crown had to be registered at the Torre do Tombo⁶⁸, and it is certain that a substantial part of the sentences passed by the Juízo das Capelas da Coroa were copied by authenticated certificate in the archive’s registry books (Livros do Registo)⁶⁹.

At the level of the provincial administration, a channel of communication was maintained with the regional provedores and contadores, responsible for all activity related to the management of the administration of the crown chantries, namely their identification and the seizure of assets for registration. These agents were responsible for providing copies of wills and other founding documents of entails and records of chantry accounts, sometimes in the possession of ecclesiastical institutions, as well as requesting other documents that were missing in the archives of the court and that were requested by the Juiz das Capelas da Coroa. It was also their responsibility to take possession of and safeguard the assets of the entails, and to lead the team that would conduct the registry⁷⁰.