# Latin scholars - a little help, please
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [March 5, 2008, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169 "2008-03-05T12:38:26Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [March 5, 2008, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169/1 "2008-03-05T12:38:26Z")
There’s an old writ from the English courts called “procedendo ad judicium”.
How would you translate that into English?
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### Author:  [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)
#### Post date: [March 5, 2008, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169/2 "2008-03-05T13:53:42Z")
I googled around a bit, because translating isolated bits of Latin without the context usually gives you ambigous results. Is the writ you’re referring to the same as the one called “de non procedendo rege inconsulto” mentioned [here](http://history.wisc.edu/sommerville/367/367-044.htm)?
If yes, I guess that the translation of “de non procedendo ad iudicium rege inconsulto” as “not to proceed to judgement if the King has not been consulted” seems both grammatically correct and appropriate, regarding the meaning explained on the site I quoted.
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### Author:  [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)
#### Post date: [March 5, 2008, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169/3 "2008-03-05T13:56:16Z")
Of course you can also put it the other way round, as in a writ _de procedendo ad iudicium_. In this case, it can be translated literally as a writ “to proceed to judgement,” if the court to which the writ is addressed is instructed to go on in its proceedings.
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### Author:  [@Outpits](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Outpits)
#### Post date: [March 5, 2008, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169/4 "2008-03-05T15:16:18Z")
[QUOTE=Schnitte]
Of course you can also put it the other way round, as in a writ _de procedendo ad iudicium_. In this case, it can be translated literally as a writ “to proceed to judgement,” if the court to which the writ is addressed is instructed to go on in its proceedings.
[/QUOTE]
Black’s Law Dictionary describes it as an order from a superior court to an inferior court to give a judgment to one party or the other, but does not tell the lower court how to decide the case.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [March 5, 2008, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-scholars-a-little-help-please/440169/5 "2008-03-05T16:30:03Z")
The wikipedia article says:
> [@](#):
>
> In common law jurisprudence, procedendo is one of the prerogative writs. It is a writ that sends a case from an appellate court to a lower court with an order to proceed to judgment.
>
> “The writ of procedendo is merely an order from a court of superior jurisdiction to one of inferior jurisdiction to proceed to judgment. It does not in any case attempt to control the inferior court as to what that judgment should be.”
>
> State ex rel. Davey v. Owen, 133 Ohio St. 96, 106 (Ohio 1937).
>
> The writ of procedendo ad judicium was the earliest remedy for the refusal or neglect of justice on the part of the courts.It was an original writ, issuing out of chancery to the judges of any subordinate court, commanding them in the king’s name to proceed to judgment, but without specifying any particular judgment. In case of disobedience or of neglect on the part of the judges to whom it was addressed, or refusal by them to act, they were liable to punishment for contempt.