d A.D.
1266, (Sanut, l. iii. p. ii. c. 5, 8.) The family of Ibelin, which
descended from a younger brother of a count of Chartres in France, long
flourished in Palestine and Cyprus, (see the Lignages de deca Mer, or
d'Outremer, c. 6, at the end of the Assises de Jerusalem, an original
book, which records the pedigrees of the French adventurers.)]

[Footnote 136: By sixteen commissioners chosen in the states of the
island: the work was finished the 3d of November, 1369, sealed with four
seals and deposited in the cathedral of Nicosia, (see the preface to the
Assises.)]

The justice and freedom of the constitution were maintained by two
tribunals of unequal dignity, which were instituted by Godfrey of
Bouillon after the conquest of Jerusalem. The king, in person, presided
in the upper court, the court of the barons. Of these the four most
conspicuous were the prince of Galilee, the lord of Sidon and Caesarea,
and the counts of Jaffa and Tripoli, who, perhaps with the constable and
marshal, [137] were in a special manner the compeers and judges of
each other. But all the nobles, who held their lands immediately of
the crown, were entitled and bound to attend the king's court; and each
baron exercised a similar jurisdiction on the subordinate assemblies of
his own feudatories. The connection of lord and vassal was honorable
and voluntary: reverence was due to the benefactor, protection to the
dependant; but they mutually pledged their faith to each other; and the
obligation on either side might be suspended by neglect or dissolved
by injury. The cognizance of marriages and testaments was blended with
religion, and usurped by the clergy: but the civil and criminal causes
of the nobles, the inheritance and tenure of their fiefs, formed the
proper occupation of the supreme court. Each member was the judge and
guardian both of public and private rights. It was his duty to assert
with his tongue and sword the lawful claims of the lord; but if an
unjust superior presumed to violate the freedom or property of a vassal,
the confederate peers stood forth to maintain his quarrel by word and
deed. They boldly affirmed his innocence and his wrongs; demanded the
restitution of his liberty or his lands; suspended, after a fruitless
demand, their own service; rescued their brother from prison; and
employed every weapon in his defence, without offering direct violence
to the person of their lord, which was ever sacred in their eyes. [138]