In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the Polish kingdom assumed the form of a monarchy of privileged estates, whose rights stemmed from privileges granted to the nobles and gentry as a body and to the clergy as a whole. However, the towns did not enjoy any such uniform representation since royal privileges were bestowed on them individually. Similarly, villages were granted separate privileges for each village.
The Corona Regni Poloniae was perceived as an institution separate from the person of the king, replacing what previously had been a patrimonial concept of royal or ducal power. Outside those areas under royal government, the crown held some lands in vassalage and was believed to have rights to others which had once belonged to it. In a period of interregnum or when no male heir existed, the crown was represented by the estates, with the nobility and gentry, the privileged classes, occupying first place. The Polish crown exercised a sense of sovereignty which was expressed in theory by the principle that the king is emperor in his own realm (rex imperator in regno suo) and, in practice, by the indivisible and inalienable nature of its territory. From the thirteenth century the emblem of the kingdom had been a white eagle on a red field; from the restoration of the kingdom in 1295 the eagle had worn a crown on its head.
From the death of Louis of Hungary in 1382 royal power in Poland was based on the principle not of heredity but of election which, in the fifteenth century, limited candidacy to members of the Jagiellonian dynasty. At his coronation the king issued a general confirmation of the privileges enjoyed by the estates. Royal power extended widely in the administration of the kingdom which was regulated with the help of central palace officers (the marshal, the chancellor, the treasurer and others). In the provinces, the king had his lieutenants, starosta, often called the ‘royal arm’ (brachium regale) who were responsible for administration, taxation, justice in criminal matters and policing. The king was the highest judge and commander in chief of the army. He conducted foreign policy whilst domestic affairs were run by both the king and the royal council, comprising the highest dignitaries of the crown, certain officials and the bishops. The full council, or senate as it came to be knownin the early sixteenth century, numbered about seventy members, of whom the king often convened only a number.
The ancient duchies incorporated into the kingdom survived as palatinates whose dignitaries were appointed by the king for life. These men retained some of their legal rights, but they lost their former powers as keepers of castles, while retaining the right to a place on the royal council. The holders of other ancient territorial offices preserved certain of their powers as local judges, but their titles were, above all, more an expression of their holders’ rank among the nobility.
Each estate had its own judicature. The nobility had local courts in particular areas which acted on the principles of common law, besides adjudicating also in non-litigious matters such as the registering of property and credit transactions. The castle courts, under the control of the starostas, were important especially in criminal cases. In the course of the fifteenth century the courts of the gentry and the starostas alike ceased hearing cases from the peasantry. Church courts judged cases involving canon law, and acted with the gentry in cases connected with spiritual matters such as heresy, marital problems and wills containing religious bequests. The urban judiciary acted in certain towns; in cases of appeal the king summoned a high court for Little Poland in Cracow castle. The village judicature lost its right of appeal beyond the village lord who could only be indicted before the local court for miscarriage of justice.
The genesis of Polish parliamentarism may be traced from the colloquia or meetings of the nobles and gentry which, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, had been summoned by local lords in various regions of the country to deal with political matters and to fulfil their judicial functions. At the end of the fourteenth century these became more frequent in two forms. For the whole kingdom there was the sejm (general assembly) or conventio magna dominated by the magnates of the royal council, whilst in the provinces, in Great Poland or (separately) in Little Poland, there were conventiones generales (provincial assemblies). The privileges granted by Casimir IV to the gentry in 1454 strengthened the hand of the third rank of the system of representation for the estates, the sejmiki (land diets) or conventiones particulares which numbered eighteen by the end of the fifteenth century. Local dignitaries and regional gentry took part in these. The king summoned them to approve additional royal taxation and to agree to the general mobilisation. The sejmiki pronounced on interpretations of the common law and elected two plenipotentiary deputies to attend assemblies summoned from all over the province or the kingdom. At the accession of Jan Olbracht, the sejm of the whole kingdom became the chief parliamentary form as provincial sessions were summoned less and less frequently. The Piotrkow sejm (1493) was the first two-chamber sejm to consist of the royal council (called the senate shortly afterwards) and the chamber of deputies, formed by local representatives. Urban leaders were also invited to attend in an advisory capacity. The sejm was soon to witness political conflict between and within its chambers.