Definition
A writ of execution historically available in England against a debtor to the Crown. The writ commanded the sheriff to do two things simultaneously: arrest (literally, "take") the body of the debtor, and cause the debtor's lands and goods to be "extended" — that is, seized and appraised for the satisfaction of the debt owed to the Crown. The writ thus combined personal arrest with property seizure in a single instrument, making it a compound form of Crown execution process. It is a species of extent, the broader family of Crown debt enforcement writs. By the nineteenth century the writ had fallen into practical disuse, and it has no operative counterpart in modern law.
Common Confusion
CAPIAS EXTENDI FACIAS vs. EXTENT vs. CAPIAS AD SATISFACIENDUM: These three instruments are easily conflated because they overlap in function and share vocabulary. An extent (or writ of extent) is the genus — the Crown's general mechanism for seizing a debtor's property. Capias extendi facias is a species of extent that adds the power to arrest the debtor's body, giving the sheriff authority over both person and property in one writ. Capias ad satisfaciendum, by contrast, is a purely personal arrest writ used between private parties, with no Crown-debt dimension and no property-seizure command. Researchers encountering any of these terms in historical records should confirm which instrument is actually described before drawing conclusions about the nature of the underlying debt or enforcement mechanism.
Why It Matters in Research
This term appears almost exclusively in English legal records predating the nineteenth century and in treatises on Exchequer practice. Researchers are unlikely to encounter it in American sources: the writ was a product of Crown prerogative and Exchequer jurisdiction, neither of which survived the American founding in a form that would sustain this remedy. Its appearance in a document is therefore a strong jurisdictional signal — the underlying record almost certainly originates in English Crown debt proceedings, not colonial or state court practice.
The compound nature of the writ matters for interpreting historical records correctly. A sheriff's return on a capias extendi facias may report on both a body arrest and a property appraisal; researchers unfamiliar with the writ's dual command may misread such a return as two separate proceedings or conflate it with a simpler capias or a standalone extent.
The phrase "cause to be extended" embedded in the writ's command is the operative link to the extent family of process. Researchers following a chain of Crown debt enforcement through Exchequer records should move from this entry to EXTENT, which remained in use longer and generated a larger body of case law and commentary.
Rapalje & Lawrence flags the writ as "practically obsolete" as of 1883. Black's entry is similarly truncated, suggesting neither dictionary's editors regarded it as a live research problem by the time of publication. This means the historical dictionaries provide only skeletal coverage; researchers needing procedural detail should consult primary Exchequer practice manuals, particularly those addressing Crown debt enforcement in the eighteenth century and earlier.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary and Rapalje & Lawrence agree on the core definition: a Crown-debt execution writ commanding arrest of the debtor's body and seizure of lands and goods. The definitions are substantively identical, though Black's entry as reproduced here is truncated and does not reach the obsolescence note that Rapalje & Lawrence includes explicitly. Rapalje & Lawrence cites Manning's Exchequer Practice as authority, which points researchers toward the appropriate primary literature for procedural detail.
Neither dictionary provides meaningful historical development of the writ — when it arose, how Exchequer practice shaped its use, or the specific statutory or common law framework governing its issuance. Both treat it as a historical artifact rather than a living instrument, which is accurate but leaves gaps for researchers working with pre-nineteenth-century records where the writ was still operative. The historical dictionaries are adequate for identification purposes but should not be treated as sufficient guides to how the writ actually functioned in Exchequer proceedings.
Jurisdictional Note
This writ was an instrument of English Crown prerogative and Exchequer jurisdiction. It did not transplant to American law in any recognized form. Researchers working in American jurisdictions will not encounter this writ as operative process; its appearance in any American-origin source warrants scrutiny as to whether the document is genuinely American or is instead an English precedent, form book, or treatise being cited for comparative purposes.