At its foundation, the Imperial Chamber Court was seated in
Frankfurt. It was later moved to
Worms,
Augsburg,
Nürnberg,
Regensburg,
Speyer,
Esslingen, Speyer again (from 1527 to 1689), and finally to
Wetzlar until it was dissolved in 1806. From the early Middle Ages, there had been a
supreme court for the Empire, the
Hofgericht, in which the
Emperor himself presided. Since technically anyone could appeal to the
Reichskammergericht, in the 18th century, Peasant appeals were extremely common. A member of the court in 1767 said that "these kinds of lawsuits [that is, complaints against rulers] have unfortunately become so frequent of late that every day whole flocks of peasants may be seen [on their way to court]". The court received 220-250 cases every year, and in the 1790s it produced more than 100 decisions each year. Though the court did not function much slower than a modern court may today, the
Reichskammergericht was often overloaded. Thus, the court encouraged parties to settle cases on their own. Many times, this worked, and parties sought a compromise. Thus, the
Reichskammergericht often deferred non-urgent cases until plaintiffs decided to proceed. The court did take payments from parties hoping to make their case a priority, but these were not expected and it didn't seem they affected the objectivity of the judges. ==Composition==