contemporanea expositio

Noun

contemporanea expositio (uncountable)

1. Legal opinions set forth at the time a document was written.
   • We have the contemporanea expositio of Edward the Sixth, but what is the contemporanea expositio of Charles the Second ?1856, Sir Robert Phillimore, Argument of Robert Phillimore in the Court of Arches: in the matter of the ornaments in the churches of St. Paul and St. Barnabas, Knightsbridge, page 141
   • This is the contemporanea expositio which is to prove that the doctrine of the sacraments is not delivered fully in the Articles ; being in fact about a totally different question !1848, Clericus M.A., Cantab, pseud, The Church of England pronounced heretical, by the promoters of a petition against the consecration of dr. Hampden to the see of Hereford, page 44
2. The doctrine that the legal opinions of the time a document was written should be used to interpret laws in preference to more modern formulations.
   • The contemporanea expositio is a safe key to the meaning of deeds, and in Evelyn's Memoirs, written fourteen years after the complete establishment of the Charter House, we have a striking illustration of the original rule as he understood it […]1832, The Law Magazine: Or, Quarterly Review of Jurisprudence, page 110
   • Not only do I think that they must be read in conjunction, but the usage which has followed the Union has, in my judgment, both interpreted them when so read, and has by contemporanea expositio confirmed the view that they ought to be so read.1910, The Scottish Law Reporter: Continuing Reports ... of Cases Decided in the Court of Session, Court of Justiciary, Court of Teinds, and House of Lords