Requiem for a noun: the ‘terms of the claims’ (1953-2007)

Christopher Wadlow, University of East Anglia

Abstract

The expression “the terms of the claims” is traced to its origins in the negotiations leading up to the 1963 Strasbourg Convention, which paved the way for the European Patent Convention of 1973. In its original formulation, the purpose of the expression was indeed to denote the “English” approach to claim construction and distinguish it from that prevailing in Germany, but the draft article in which the “terms of the claims” occurred specifically intended to rule out the literal English approach, in favour of using the claims as a signpost towards the general inventive concept, which was to be definitive.