Gentlemen and Barristers: The Inns of Court and the English Bar 1680-1730

This is the first detailed analysis of English barristers and the inns of court in the period 1680-1730. The four inns of court have constituted the principal institutional home of common lawyers since medieval times, and by the ealy modern period were regarded as a "third university". Barristers were the preeminent professional men of Augustan England, and as such, they played a disproportionate role in the business of the Commons. Lemmings shows how the inns declined from their former splen…