The Cost of Litigation

The complaint that litigation was unreasonably complex and costly was commonly voiced across early modern Europe, and has often been espoused by historians. However, scholars also emphasise that litigants were not necessarily the passive victims of impenetrable layers of litigation simply concocted at the whim of legal professionals. Therefore, this article assesses the cost of litigation in the way it was really used, notably in the Franc of Bruges (Brugse Vrije, in today Belgium) during the eighteenth century. Many cases did not go beyond the early phases, leading us to conclude that initial costs provide an accurate impression of the price actually paid by many litigants, amounting to roughly one month’s income from skilled labour. Also, most cases that ended in the early phases of proceeding, took progressively less time to reach a conclusion.