Reader (Inns of Court)

A Reader in one of the Inns of Court in London was originally a senior barrister of the Inn who was elected to deliver a lecture or series of lectures on a particular legal topic. Two Readers (known as Lent and Autumn Readers) would be elected annually to serve a one-year term.

Lincoln's Inn became formally organised as a place of legal education thanks to a decree in 1464, which required a Reader to give lectures to the law students there.

By 1569 at Gray's Inn there had been Readers for more than a century, and before the rise of the Benchers they formed the governing body of the Inn.