One of the peculiarities of scholarship on the medieval English parliament is that the appointment of the committees of receivers and triers have received so little attention. This is surprising, not least because the long lists of receivers' and triers' names constitute one of the most visually striking sections of the contemporary record of parliament, the parliament roll. The receivers and triers formed the administrative and judicial framework which enabled parliament to handle complaints and requests of a private nature – that is to say, private petitions. Their appointment in parliament took place immediately after the chancellor's opening speech in which the reasons for summoning parliament were explained to the assembled Lords and Commons. The speech normally ended with a statement to the effect that the king wished to provide justice to all his subjects and that those who wished to submit complaints should hand them to the receivers within a certain specified time. The receivers (who were normally chancery clerks) would then pass the petitions on to the triers (royal judges and members of the lay and spiritual peerage) who would expedite as many as they could, sending any particularly difficult cases which required the application of the king's grace onto the king and council.

One of the reasons why these committees of receivers and triers have been neglected by scholars is because of an ambivalence about their true signifi- cance in the medieval parliament.