ABSTRACT
The term Ecclesia Anglicana was frequently used in the late Middle Ages to describe the English Church. The Church authorities claimed assistance from the lay power in enforcing their jurisdictional rights, notably by means of writs of signification. The enforcement of morality, particularly sexual, was one of the major ways in which Church law impinged on the laity, but as the teachings of the Church were the foundations of social morality generally, there was little reason to expect anything but cooperation in this field between it and the lay power. Canon law, of course, was concerned not only with spiritual offences but also, more generally, with offences committed by churchmen, and the claims of the lay power to punish criminous clerks had been a major issue of controversy in the twelfth century. Under Henry IV, when Parliament was particularly resistant to royal fiscal demands, there were further disputes over clerical taxation.
