Definition
A Latin verb from Roman civil law and early English law meaning "to decree" or "to decide." Used to describe the act of a sovereign, court, or official authority issuing a binding determination or judgment. In its most direct sense, decernere denotes the exercise of adjudicative or sovereign power to settle a matter with authoritative finality. The phrase *rex decernit* — the king decrees — illustrates its use to express royal command or determination in early English legal contexts.
Common Confusion
Decernere should not be confused with *declarare* (to declare) or *determinare* (to determine), though all three describe authoritative pronouncements. The distinction is one of finality and form: decernere carries the sense of a decree issued by a superior power — sovereign or judicial — whereas declarare tends toward the pronouncement of existing rights or law, and determinare toward the resolution of a dispute through deliberation. Researchers encountering these terms in medieval or early modern Latin legal texts should treat them as functionally distinct rather than interchangeable synonyms.
Why It Matters in Research
This term appears almost exclusively in Latin-language primary sources: Roman law texts, medieval English legal records, and ecclesiastical materials. Researchers are unlikely to encounter decernere in common law case reporters after the gradual displacement of Law Latin in English courts, a process largely complete by the eighteenth century. Its principal research value is as a key to reading and translating primary source documents — particularly the Digest, early English royal writs, and ecclesiastical court records where Latin remained in formal use longer than in common law courts.
The reference to *Articuli Cleri*, chapter 7, situates the term in the context of disputes over ecclesiastical jurisdiction in early fourteenth-century England. That document — issued in 1316 under Edward II — addressed conflicts between royal and church courts. Encountering decernere in that context signals a decree-issuing act with jurisdictional significance, not merely a ministerial determination. Researchers working on the boundary between ecclesiastical and royal authority in medieval England should note this association.
In the Digest citation (Dig. 1.4.1.1), decernere appears in the title *De constitutionibus principum*, concerning imperial constitutions and the force of imperial pronouncements. This situates the term squarely within the Roman law theory of sovereign legislative and adjudicative power — a context relevant to scholars tracing the civilian influence on English and continental jurisprudence.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary provides the foundational entry: "To decree; to decide," with supporting citations to the Digest and Articuli Cleri. The entry is brief and functional, as expected for a term whose meaning is stable and whose primary use is translational. Burrill correctly identifies both Roman civil law and old English law as the operative contexts, which together cover the term's practical range.
No meaningful divergence exists across historical legal dictionaries on this term. Its meaning has never been contested — the challenge for the researcher is not definitional ambiguity but source identification: recognizing when and where the term appears, and understanding the legal significance of the document in which it is embedded. Historical dictionaries offer little beyond the translation; the interpretive work falls to the researcher.
Jurisdictional Note
Decernere is not a term of art in any modern common law jurisdiction. Its use is confined to historical sources rooted in Roman civil law and early English legal practice. Researchers working in civilian or mixed jurisdictions (Scotland, Louisiana, Quebec, South Africa) may encounter the term in older jurisprudential writing, where the influence of Roman law texts was more direct and prolonged.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See: DECREE