Definition of Entry on the roll
In old English practice, the parties to an action, personally or by their counsel, used to appear in open court and make their mutual statements viva voce, instead of as at the present day delivering their mutual pleadings, until they arrived at the issue or precise point in dispute between them. During the progress of this oral statement, a minute of the various proceedings was made on parchment by an officer of the court appointed for that purpose. The parchment then became the record; in other words, the official history of the suit. Long after the practice of oral pleading had fallen into disuse, it continued necessary to enter the proceedings in like manner upon the parchment roll, and this was called “entry on the roll,” or making up the “issue roll.” But by a rule of H.T. 4 Wm. IV, the practice of making up the issue roll was abolished; and it was only necessary to make up the issue in the form prescribed for the purpose by a rule of H.T. 1853, and to deliver the same to the court and to the opposite party. The issue which was delivered to the court was called the "nisi prius record;" and that was regarded as the official history of the suit, in like manner as the issue roll formerly was. Under later practice, the issue roll or nisi prius record consisted of the papers delivered to the court, to facilitate the trial of the action, these papers consisting of the pleadings simply, with the notice of trial. A future interest created in a transferor who conveys an estate on condition subsequent.
That's the definition of Entry on the roll in Black's Law Dictionary 6th Edition. Courtesy of Cekhukum.com.
