Nor did "compurgation" cease wholly till Queen Mary's reign.

A powerful man, when accused, was then attended at his trial by hosts of armed backers.
Men so unlike each other as Knox, Bothwell, and Lethington took advantage of this usage.

All lords had their own Courts, but murder, rape, arson, and robbery could now only be tried in the royal Courts; these were "The Four Pleas of the Crown." THE COURTS.
As there was no fixed capital, the King's Court, in David's time, followed the King in his annual circuits through his realm, between Dumfries and Inverness.

Later, the regions of Scotia (north of Forth), Lothian, and the lawless realm of Galloway, had their Grand Justiciaries, who held the Four Pleas.

The other pleas were heard in "Courts of Royalty" and by earls, bishops, abbots, down to the baron, with his "right of pit and gallows." At such courts, by a law of 1180, the Sheriff of the shire, or an agent of his, ought to be present; so that royal and central justice was extending itself over the minor local courts.