Definition
"Of and concerning the matters afore" is an archaic pleading formula used in common law declarations, particularly in actions for libel and slander (defamation). The phrase appeared as part of an extended averment designed to connect defamatory words to the plaintiff and to the specific subject matter alleged in the declaration. In practice, the full formula typically ran something like: the defendant spoke the words "of and concerning the plaintiff, and of and concerning the matters aforesaid," tying the injurious statement both to the person harmed and to the context previously set out in the pleading.
The phrase functioned as a term of pleading art rather than a substantive legal standard. Its purpose was formal: to satisfy the requirement that the declaration allege, with sufficient particularity, that the words complained of were directed at the plaintiff and related to the matter described in the body of the pleading. Failure to include or adequately support such an averment could expose a declaration to demurrer or render it fatally defective on the face of the record.
Common Confusion
This phrase should not be confused with the substantive defamation requirement — carried into modern law — that a defamatory statement be "of and concerning" the plaintiff. The modern "of and concerning" element is a substantive legal test going to whether the plaintiff can be identified from the statement. The archaic formula "of and concerning the matters afore" is a pleading device linking the statement to subject matter previously alleged in the declaration. The two share vocabulary and ancestry but operate at different levels: one is a rule of evidence and liability; the other is a rule of pleading form.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in pre-code common law pleading records — particularly English reports and early American case law through roughly the mid-nineteenth century — will encounter this formula and its variants in defamation and related actions. The phrase is unlikely to appear in modern legal materials except in historical quotation or scholarly commentary on pleading history.
The key research trap is treating the formula as a substantive legal element rather than a pleading convention. Courts of the era could and did draw fine distinctions between the averment as pleaded and what the evidence could support at trial. A declaration that alleged the words were spoken "of and concerning" the plaintiff but failed to connect them to the specific matter "aforesaid" could be attacked on technical grounds entirely separate from the merits of the underlying defamation claim.
Researchers should also note that the phrase "said" in old-form pleading — flagged by Rapalje & Lawrence — performs a parallel function: it refers back to matter already introduced in the declaration. The two devices (said, of and concerning the matters afore) work together in the architecture of a common law declaration to maintain internal consistency and provide the defendant fair notice of the precise claim. Both are holdovers from a system of pleading in which precision of reference was itself a legal requirement, not merely a stylistic preference.
When reading nineteenth-century defamation reports, the presence or absence of this averment — and challenges to it — will often explain procedural outcomes that appear otherwise mysterious. The issue was not whether the words were defamatory in fact, but whether the declaration properly framed the claim.
Historical Dictionary Support
Rapalje & Lawrence give no direct entry for the full phrase "of and concerning the matters afore" but treat the operative word "said" as a pleading term, citing Barn. & C. 113. That citation points to Barnewall and Cresswell's English King's Bench Reports, a standard source for early nineteenth-century common law procedure. The entry is minimal — confirming that "said" in a declaration has technical legal significance as a backward-referencing device — and must be read in the broader context of pleading treatises to be fully useful.
Historical legal dictionaries of this period generally underserved pleading formulas, treating them as the province of practice manuals (Chitty's Pleading, Gould's Pleading) rather than general dictionaries. Rapalje & Lawrence's brief treatment reflects this gap. Researchers should not expect comprehensive coverage of formula-based pleading language in general legal dictionaries of the era; the technical detail lives in the pleading treatise literature.