in law, a writ which issues out of the chancery, directed to an inferior court, to call up the records of a cause there depending, in order that justice may be done. And this writ is obtained upon complaint, that the party who seeks it has received hard usage, or is not likely to have an impartial trial in the inferior court. A certiorari is made returnable either in the king's bench, common pleas, or in chancery.

It is not only issued out of the court of chancery, but likewise out of the king's bench, in which last mentioned court it lies where the king would be certified of a record. Indictments from inferior courts, and proceedings of the quarter-sessions of the peace, may also be removed into the king's bench by a certiorari; and here the very record must be returned, and not a transcript of it; though usually in chancery, if a certiorari be returnable there, it removes only the tenor of the record.