One versed in, or practising, the common law.
Opposed sometimes to civilian or other foreign lawyer, sometimes to equity or ecclesiastical lawyers in England.
1588. Fraunce, Lawiers Log., Ded. Twenty … common lawyers.
a. 1661. Fuller, Worthies (1840), I. 90. Denied indeed by our commons-lawyers, but stickled for by some canonists.
1668. Hale, Pref. Rolle’s Abridgm., 7. A Man, though otherwise of pregnant Reason, must not be offended if he be not born a Common-Lawyer.
1885. Law Times, 169/1. There is a large preponderance of creations of common lawyers [as Q. C.s].
