2 B. The Norman period (1066–1154+)

William the Conqueror (1066, Hastings): feudalism imposed — all land held of the king (the Salisbury Oath); the Domesday Book (1086) — the great survey: every manor, plough and villager counted (administration by record — the state's first database); royal forests law; church reform; but continuity of local courts and English custom where not replaced. Henry II (1154–89) — the legal revolution (the paragraph every law student must know): the royalcourts at Westminster (the King's Bench, Common Pleas, Exchequer); the writ system (a royal command starting an action — "no writ, no remedy" forms of action crystallising); the itinerantjustices (assizes — royal law carried to counties); the jury of presentment (the Assize of Clarendon, 1166 — neighbours reporting crimes: the grand jury's ancestor); a common law — one law common to the realm — emerging from royal supervision over local custom: the crown's justice as business, and as sovereignty.