In response to the deputies’ petitions, the encroachments of the Royal Council in this respect were forbidden; while a scheme was discussed by which the Court of Chancery, which had followed the sovereigns from place to place to the great inconvenience of litigants, was in 1485 permanently established in Valladolid for the benefit of Northern Castile. Another similar court was also placed in Ciudad Real to supply the needs of the country south of the Tagus, being removed however at the end of the Moorish war to the more important town of Granada. At first sight it would seem from these measures as if the judicial functions of the Royal Council had been destroyed, whereas on the contrary they were to develop an authority, that not only threatened but dominated the “Audiences” of Valladolid and the South. Of the five departments of government defined by the Cortes of Toledo, it was in the Council of Justice that the true nucleus of the Royal Council, their common ancestor, remained. Here sat the King and Queen in person, the recognized source of all Castilian law; here, in their absence, ruled a President, whose authority was reckoned in the kingdom as second only to that of Sovereignty itself; here was a body of highly trained lawyers, whose official acts demanded the unqualified obedience of every subject, and whose decisions on legal matters were final. It is little wonder if the Council of Justice became the dominating element of the Castilian Government. The Council of State, the second of the new departments for public affairs, was also presided over by the King and Queen, but it dealt mainly with foreign negotiations, hearing embassies and transacting business with the Court of Rome. In addition there was the Supreme Court of the Santa Hermandad, a Council of Finance, and a Council for settling purely Aragonese matters. A link between these central councils and the local government of the country was found in “pesquisidores,” or inspectors, sent out from headquarters to enquire how the law was being administered and obeyed. Were the repressive measures against the Jews sternly enforced? Were the “corregidores,” now in 1480 imposed by royal authority on all cities and towns, doing their duty both by the Crown and also by the municipalities in which they were placed? Had any governor of a fortress or other official oppressed the people in his neighbourhood, or for his own ends shown favouritism to certain families? These were some of the questions to which the inspector must require an answer, and where those answers were unsatisfactory it rested with him to see justice performed.