Common law in England can be traced back to the Norman conquest. The laws, such as they were then, did not address every concern. At first, a subject (of the king) had to petition the king to ask to be heard in his court. One of the first instances of this was in 1070 when Lanfranc, the Archbishop of Canterbury had a case against Odo, Earl of Kent, the king's brother. The archbishop petitioned that lands taken by Odo be restored. Rules of equity began when it became apparent that the common law courts could not solve all legal problems. The king set up courts of chancery (equity). By the 1800s the equity courts were becoming obsolete. In 1875 Parliament did away with the chancery courts altogether.