Definition
De copia libelli deliberan (Latin: "for delivering the copy of the libel") is an ancient common law writ directed to the judge of an ecclesiastical court, commanding that judge to furnish the defendant with a copy of the libel — that is, the formal written complaint or pleading — filed against him in that court. The writ was a mechanism by which the common law courts exercised supervisory control over the ecclesiastical jurisdiction, ensuring that a party haled before a church court could obtain the written charges against him.
The term "libel" here carries its procedural Latin meaning: the initial pleading or declaration in a civil law proceeding, equivalent in function to a declaration or complaint in a common law action. It does not refer to defamatory publication.
Common Language
The word "libel" in modern English refers to written defamation. In Webster's 1913, libel carries both the defamation sense and a surviving legal sense: "the formal declaration or document that contains the grounds of a complaint." In ordinary contemporary usage, only the defamation meaning is current.
The gap matters acutely here. Researchers encountering this writ for the first time may misread its purpose entirely, assuming a connection to defamation. The libel referenced in this writ is purely procedural — the initiating pleading of a civil law action in an ecclesiastical forum — and has nothing to do with reputational injury.
Common Confusion
Do not confuse de copia libelli deliberan with writs of prohibition, which also ran from common law courts to ecclesiastical courts but served a different function: prohibition halted ecclesiastical proceedings that exceeded that court's jurisdiction, whereas de copia libelli deliberan did not challenge jurisdiction but instead regulated fair procedure within an acknowledged ecclesiastical proceeding by securing the defendant's access to the charges against him.
Why It Matters in Research
This writ is a fossil term — it appears almost exclusively in pre-modern sources treating the relationship between the common law courts and the ecclesiastical courts of England, a jurisdiction that was substantially reshaped by nineteenth-century reform and does not exist in American law at all. Researchers will encounter it primarily when working in:
— Sources treating the Register of Writs (Registrum Omnium Brevium), the great medieval compilation of standard writ forms, where this writ appears at folio 58 in the relevant editions.
— Historical treatments of the Court of Arches, the principal appellate ecclesiastical court of the Province of Canterbury, and its commissaries, to whom the writ was specifically directed according to Burrill.
— Studies of the common law's supervisory relationship over concurrent civil law jurisdictions operating within England, a topic of recurring importance in English legal history through the seventeenth century.
The writ has no American counterpart and no modern English application following the absorption of ecclesiastical court jurisdiction into the civil court structure during the nineteenth century. Researchers should treat it as purely historical. If the research question involves modern rights to notice of charges or access to pleadings, the relevant modern framework is procedural due process and civil procedure rules governing service and pleading disclosure — entirely separate bodies of law.
The writ also illustrates the broader jurisdictional dynamic between common law and ecclesiastical courts. Writs of this kind — directing ecclesiastical judges to comply with procedural requirements recognized by the common law — were part of a sustained common law effort to define the boundaries and internal conduct of the church courts. Researchers tracing that dynamic should map this writ alongside prohibition, consultation, and the various writs addressed to ordinary and delegate judges of ecclesiastical tribunals.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary provides the only entry among the Law Mind shelf sources. Burrill identifies it as "an ancient writ" and correctly describes its function and addressee, citing the Registrum Originale (Register of Original Writs) at folio 58 as authority. He notes that the Register's form of the writ was directed specifically to the Dean of Arches and his commissary, which situates the writ within the Canterbury ecclesiastical hierarchy.
No other Law Mind shelf sources — including Black's, Bouvier's, or Tomlin's — carry this entry, which reflects both the writ's antiquity and its jurisdictional specificity. The absence from American-oriented dictionaries like Bouvier's is expected: the writ had no natural transplantation into American legal practice, which never developed a parallel ecclesiastical court structure integrated with civil courts in the English manner. Researchers relying solely on American legal dictionaries will find no guidance here and should turn directly to English sources treating the Register of Writs or the history of the Court of Arches.
Jurisdictional Note
This writ is exclusively English in origin and application. It presupposes the concurrent operation of ecclesiastical courts administering civil law procedure alongside common law courts — a structural feature of English legal history with no American equivalent. No American jurisdiction received or adapted this writ.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia — Ecclesiastical Courts (for the jurisdiction and procedure of church courts in England, including the Court of Arches); Writs (for the general framework of original writs and their use as supervisory instruments between courts).