Definition
Capitula itineris (Latin: "chapters of the eyre") were the formal schedules or articles of inquiry delivered to the justices in eyre before they set out on their judicial circuits through medieval England. These schedules functioned as comprehensive checklists of crimes and legal matters that the itinerant justices were empowered to investigate, hear, and determine on behalf of the crown. At the opening of each eyre, the justices would read these chapters aloud and deliver them in charge to the juries assembled from the surrounding hundreds, directing the jurors to present, under oath, any relevant matters within the scope of the inquiry. The capitula were designed to be exhaustive, covering the full range of potential criminal and fiscal offenses cognizable in the king's interest.
Common Confusion
Rapalje & Lawrence's entry conflates capitula itineris with two unrelated concepts appearing in close succession: the body of an indictment (the facts alleged following the caption) and the title of a deposition taken before a magistrate. These are distinct legal terms unconnected to the capitula. Researchers encountering this entry should treat those passages as separate definitions run together in the original printing, not as elaborations on capitula itineris. Separately, capitula itineris should not be confused with capitula de Judæis, a register of mortgages made to Jews, which Bouvier defines in immediate sequence and which is an entirely different instrument.
Why It Matters in Research
Capitula itineris appears almost exclusively in sources dealing with the medieval English eyre system, which was substantially extinct as a functioning institution by the fourteenth century. Researchers will encounter the term primarily in treatises on early English legal history rather than in case law or statutes. The key navigational point is that the eyre itself collapsed as a regular institution after the early fourteenth century, so any source using capitula itineris in a living procedural context predates that period. When tracing the term in the Law Mind corpus, look first to antiquarian legal histories and to the foundational medieval sources cited by Burrill — Bracton, Britton, and Fleta — rather than to common law reporters or equity digests. The term has no modern procedural analog; its closest functional descendants are grand jury charges and, distantly, the articles of impeachment delivered to trial bodies, but neither is a direct continuation. Corpus researchers should also note that Bouvier appends the definition of capitula de Judæis immediately after capitula itineris, a proximity that has caused confusion in secondary sources that read the two as related instruments.
Historical Dictionary Support
The four source dictionaries converge on the core meaning: formal articles or schedules of inquiry, delivered to itinerant justices, covering crimes cognizable for the crown. The agreement is substantial. Burrill is the most precise and historically grounded of the four, specifying that the chapters were read at the opening of the eyre and delivered in charge to juries from the various hundreds, and providing primary medieval citations to Bracton, Britton, and Fleta. Black's and Bouvier's are accurate but brief, both echoing Reeve's History of English Law as a secondary authority. Rapalje & Lawrence's entry is the least reliable for this term specifically: the text runs together at least three separate definitions in a manner that obscures each, and the passage noting that "jurors on their oaths presented... the facts alleged in the indictment" appears to belong to a definition of the body of an indictment, not to capitula itineris. No source dissents on the substantive meaning; the differences are depth and accuracy of presentation rather than doctrinal disagreement. All sources confirm that the purpose of the capitula was comprehensiveness — the schedules were intended to embrace, as Bouvier puts it, "all possible crimes."
Jurisdictional Note
Capitula itineris is an institution of medieval English law with no direct equivalent in American law. It is irrelevant to American jurisdictions as a living legal concept and appears in American legal dictionaries solely for historical and antiquarian completeness.