Portrait of Diego del Corral y Arellano, oidor of the Council of Castile, by the painter Diego Velázquez
An oidor (Spanish pronunciation:
Royal Audiencias and Chancillerías, originally courts of Kingdom of Castile, which became the highest organs of justice within the Spanish Empire
. The term comes from the verb oír, "to hear," referring to the judge's obligation to listen to the parts of a judicial process, particularly during the phase of pleas.
Origins
The
audiencia. This early audiencia was still closely tied to the king's personal right to judge.[2] In reviewing the cases before them, oidores relied on summaries prepared by court lawyers known as relatores.[3]
Spanish America and the Philippines
As the
mortgages and ground rents (juez de censos), probate issues (juez de bienes de difuntos), and legal separation (oidor juez de casados). In the audiencias in which the criminal judges (alcaldes del crimen) met as a separate chamber, such as those of Mexico City and Lima, it was not uncommon for one person to serve as both oidor (civil judge) and an alcalde del crimen. Moreover, upon the death or incapacity of a governor or viceroy, either the senior oidor (oidor decano) or the audiencia as a whole would serve as the interim governor or viceroy, depending on the specific law of the territory
.
Marriage disputes
The oidor de casados was a special type of judge that arose to deal with the de facto separation of many married couples during the colonization of the New World and the fact that, after leaving Spain, many married men abandoned their lawful wives and entered into informal relationships with either
Marina Ortíz de Gaete to Chile. Over time, the powers of the oidor de casados evolved to cover all types of lawsuits
between a married couple.
Ecclesiastical judges
Due to the general use of the word oidor, the term was also applied to the clerics who served as judges in ecclesiastical courts, although they had nothing to do with the audiencias.
