Definition
Brevia de cursu (Latin: "writs of course") are standardized writs that issued automatically from the English common law courts as a matter of routine, without requiring special application to or discretionary action by a judge or the chancellor. Because their form was fixed and their issuance was essentially mechanical, a party entitled to such a writ could obtain it by applying to the clerk of the court and paying the requisite fee, rather than petitioning for judicial authorization. They stood in contrast to writs that required the exercise of judicial or equitable discretion before they would issue.
Common Confusion
BREVIA DE CURSU vs. BREVIA MAGISTRALIA: The critical distinction in the medieval writ system was between writs of course and "writs of grace" or magisterial writs (brevia magistralia). Brevia de cursu were preformulated, available off the shelf from the Chancery's register of writs, and issued as a matter of right. Brevia magistralia were drafted specially by the masters in Chancery to address novel situations not covered by existing forms. Researchers encountering references to either category in early common law sources should identify which type of writ is at issue, as the distinction bears directly on whether a remedy was available as of right or required equitable intervention.
Why It Matters in Research
This term is almost exclusively a term of historical English common law and will appear primarily in sources treating the medieval and early modern writ system — commentaries on Bracton, Glanvill, Fitzherbert's Natura Brevium, and institutional treatments of common law procedure. Researchers should be aware of several navigational points.
First, the writ system as a whole collapsed in England with the Common Law Procedure Acts of the nineteenth century and was effectively abolished as a formal mechanism. American jurisdictions largely abandoned formal writ pleading through procedural reforms culminating in the adoption of rules-based civil procedure modeled on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (1938). References to brevia de cursu in American sources will therefore be confined to historical or comparative discussion.
Second, the category matters because it reflects the early distinction between law and equity. The existence of fixed, course-issued writs meant that cases fitting established patterns had a right-based remedy at common law. Cases that did not fit the register drove parties toward the Chancellor, fueling the development of equity jurisdiction. Understanding which writs were "of course" thus illuminates why equity developed as a separate system.
Third, the term appears in civil law and comparative law commentaries — particularly works drawing on Mackeldey's Roman and civil law synthesis — where the concept is invoked to explain the difference between remedies available as of right and those requiring discretionary grant. Researchers working in mixed jurisdictions or comparative law contexts should be alert to this cross-tradition usage.
Fourth, researchers should not treat "writ of course" as synonymous with "writ of right." A writ of right (breve de recto) was a specific writ for recovering freehold land — it was a writ of course in the sense that it issued from the register, but "writ of right" describes a particular remedy, not the procedural category of course issuance.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary defines the term concisely as "Writs of course. Formal writs issuing as of course," citing Mackeldey (Heinrich Mackeldey's Compendium of Modern Civil Law). The entry is spare but accurate. Black's citation to Mackeldey rather than to a purely common law source is notable: it suggests the editors understood this as a concept useful for comparative exposition as much as for English common law history.
The historical dictionaries collectively offer little beyond this compressed definition. The concept was well understood by practicing lawyers during the period when the writ system was operational, and so the dictionaries of that era treated it as requiring minimal explanation. For modern researchers, that sparseness is itself informative: the term was technical shorthand within a system whose practitioners already understood the underlying framework. Substantive treatment requires consulting the institutional writers — Bracton, Glanvill, Coke's Institutes, and Blackstone's Commentaries (Book III) — rather than the dictionaries alone. Blackstone's treatment of original writs in Book III provides the fullest accessible account of how course writs functioned within the common law system.
Jurisdictional Note
The concept is native to English common law and its historical derivatives. It has no operative significance in modern American, English, or Commonwealth procedure, all of which have replaced the writ system with rules-based pleading. It retains meaning only in historical, comparative, and jurisprudential contexts.