COMMON PLEAS, COURT OF, was the first of the three common law courts to emerge as a distinct judicial body from the Curia Regis. Owing to the increase of pleas between subject and subject (communia placita) before the Curia Regis, Henry II. appointed five justices to sit permanently in that court —in banco residentes—to hear such causes, and if any could not be determined by them it should be reserved for the hearing of the king himself and his wise men, i.e., coram rege in his council. But as yet there was no clear division. The justices sat now in one division of the Curia Regis, now in another. Both before and after John's reign the court of common pleas, although gen erally stationary at Westminster, followed the king from place to place as part of the Curia Regis. This constituted one of the grievances of the barons, and accordingly by Art. 17 of Magna Carta it was provided that it should not do so but should be held in some certain place. This eventually became a particular spot in Westminster Hall. During Henry III.'s minority there could not be a court held coram rege, and so one court tried all causes; but upon his majority in 1224 the division again appeared, and from that date the court of common pleas and the court held coram rege—which later became the court of King's bench (q.v.) —had separate rolls. In 1272 the court of common pleas had its own chief justice, and the separation might be said to be com plete. By the Judicature Act, 1873, the jurisdiction of the court was transferred to the king's bench division of the high court of justice.
See Holdsworth, Hist. Eng. Law, vol. i. (H. H. L. B.)