ABSTRACT
The common law is a distinctive legal system that originated in medieval England, grew and developed in the courts of the king, and during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries came to be applied throughout the English realm. Hogue (1985) distinguishes it from other legal systems of that period (e.g., local customary law, canon law administered by church courts, rules of feudal custom applied by courts of baronial overlords) ‘by calling it simply the body of rules prescribing social conduct and justiciable in the royal courts of England’ (Hogue 1985, p. 5). In time, three royal courts (three superior courts of common law) emerged: the Court of Exchequer (with jurisdiction over controversies pertaining to the king’s property and revenue); the Court of King’s Bench (with jurisdiction over criminal cases and civil cases involving a breach of the peace); and the Court of Common Pleas (with jurisdiction over all other civil disputes between the king’s subjects).
