Definition
A Latin phrase meaning "in this manner" or "after this manner." Used in legal instruments, pleadings, and formal records to introduce or incorporate the specific form, language, or method that follows — essentially signaling that what comes next is set out verbatim or in the prescribed form. The phrase functions as a bridging locution: it alerts the reader that the drafter is about to reproduce exact language, a standard form, or the operative words of a document rather than paraphrasing.
Why It Matters in Research
In hunc modum appears primarily in medieval and early modern legal sources — pleading books, Year Books, Bracton, Fleta, and the formulary literature descending from them. Its function is structural rather than substantive: it marks a transition into verbatim text or a set form. Researchers reading early pleading records or common law treatises will encounter it most often just before the formal words of a writ, charter, or oath are reproduced. Recognizing it prevents misreading the passage as a paraphrase or summary when it is in fact an exact reproduction.
Because the phrase carries no independent legal doctrine, it rarely appears in case indexes or digest headnotes. It is a feature of legal drafting style, not a term of art with evolving case law. Researchers who encounter it in a historical transcript or formulary need not look for a substantive legal rule behind it — the phrase is purely procedural or presentational.
The phrase also surfaces in ecclesiastical court records and civilian-influenced instruments, where Latin formulary language persisted longer than in common law pleading. Researchers working in probate, admiralty, or canon-law adjacent records should be alert to it in those contexts as well.
One practical trap: in hunc modum is sometimes confused with phrases like ad hunc modum (to or toward this manner) or hoc modo (in this way), which perform similar bridging functions. The meanings are close enough that conflation rarely causes interpretive error, but precision matters when transcribing or quoting historical instruments.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary defines in hunc modum simply as "after this manner," citing Fleta, lib. 2, c. 64, § 1. The entry is brief because the phrase needs little elaboration — it is a formulaic connector, not a doctrine. Burrill's treatment is consistent with the phrase's role in the sources: Fleta, like Bracton before it, frequently used such bridging locutions to introduce the exact words of writs or pleadings. Historical dictionaries across the tradition offer essentially the same gloss; there is no meaningful divergence among sources. What the historical dictionaries collectively omit is any navigational guidance for the researcher — the phrase appears across multiple document types (common law writs, civilian instruments, ecclesiastical forms) and its significance is entirely contextual.