corrective function in recordari facias, although it is apparent from some of 
the cases that the royal courts are proceeding on a theory that a judgment 
iniustum ex ordine, procedurally aberrant, may be reformed. The indications of 
canonical influence are clearer in the handling of the so-called certifications, 
particularly when considered in connection with Bracton's dictum that the 
jurisdiction proper lies with him who took the assise, since otherwise the judgment 
passes into res judicata and then needs the special intervention of the 
King. 107 Indeed, in one mid-thirteenth-century mandate the canonical term is 
explicitly used {retractavit indicium) 108 to describe the reform of the judgment. 
Bracton himself employs this expression in his discussion of the procedure 
in cases where a recovery has been had as a result of falsely procuring 
the essoining of an adversary, in which event, he says, retractabitur indicium 
109 The borrowing here seems evident, since in canon law of his time 
the procured default of an adversary is a ground for retractatio. 110 Close Roll 
evidence from about the time Bracton was writing is corroborative. Not only 
does the King (1253) explicitly declare his prerogative to reform judgments, 111 
but in a number of cases his intervention after judgment is explicitly placed 
upon the familiar canonical grounds of fraud and stealth. 112 
We have dwelt upon the development of appellate devices in England because, 
as we have already remarked, the state of procedural advancement at 
the center of the empire had a direct bearing upon the handling of dominion 
review. The exploitation of the jurisdictional prerogatives of over lordship was 
in considerable degree dependent upon the mechanics of moving a cause to 
hearing, and equally upon some common understanding of the nature and 
scope of the function of review. The law of the Church had something to contribute 
on both these points, and beyond this, because of its universality, to 
the general climate of opinion in all places where the English King might 
undertake to exercise his powers as suzerain. 113 But apt as the feudal law may 
have been in justifying the jurisdiction over appeals by way of false judgment, 
107 De legibus, f. 291. The expression "passes 
into res iudicata" is typically canonical {Deer. 
Greg., lib. 11, tit. XXVII, c. 15). 
108 Close Rolls 1254-56, 2 {"Per quandam 
certijicacionem . . . coram predicto Simone, 
retractavit iudicium"). Cj. ibid., 180. 
109 De legibus, f. 336. 
110 Deer. Greg. Lib. 11, tit. XXVII, cc. 12, 13; 
and cj. Tancred, Ord. iudiciarius, tit. 3, § 3, 
note 14. 
111 Close Rolls 1251-53, 447 {"Cum nostrum 
sit facta omnium justiciar'orum nostrorum 
emendare, meliorare et retractare, si necesse 
juerit"). 
112 Ibid., 183 {ad decepionem eurie nostro et 
per fraudem); ibid., 196 {breve per surrepcionem 
a nobis obtinuerunt) ; ibid., 446 recuperavit 
seisinam . . . impetravit breve nostrum 
per veri suppressionem). 
113 This was also undoubtedly the case with 
the appellate system of the French Kings which, 
as we remarked above, owed something to the 
canon law {cj. Fournier, Essai sur I'histoire de 
droit d'appel 199-201). Here the borrowing 
was facilitated both by the pursuit of civil law 
studies in France and by the fact that the 
jurisdiction was exerted over causes from the 
pays de droit ecrit.