We have about the same thing in Norway, called "skifte". It's usually translated with probate, but there was normally no will involved. The skifte was a public affair, with enumerations of inheritors, estate inventories, and divisions of inheritance. To a genealogist, they are solid gold.
In the area where I come from, the protocols start about 1665, decades before the parish registers, and are frequently the only available source for genealogy.
At the moment, I'm working with a massive one for Hans Tygesen, a guy who died childless in 1712, as the last surviving of 11 siblings. About 90 descendants of their father are listed, in up to three generations. Most of the relations of his big family would have been unknown but for this "skifte" or probate. I have counted eight documented lines back to Tyge Andersen, both through my mother and my father.
All in all, I've made extracts of more than 2,000 probates through the years, from 1665 to the 1820s, although none as big as this one.