I have compiled a draft of a Glossary of useful terms for students of early modern crime and law and order, with my upcoming students in mind. No pretty styling has as yet been applied. It also applies primarily to the criminal justice system in England and Wales, since my knowledge of Scottish law is still abysmal. (If you know of good online or other sources for Scottish law…)
I’d very much appreciate it if you would take a look and post any comments. To those who know something of the topic, have I left anything important out? Are the definitions accurate? (I am no expert in legal history…) And to the non-experts, do the definitions make any sense? I’ve tried to make them as clear and straightforward as possible. Also, I’ve tried to avoid including a lot of (to me) obvious general terms that are still in use, but am I making unfounded assumptions about what modern readers (especially second-year undergraduates…) can be expected to know?
All help and suggestions gratefully received…
20 comments on “A Glossary of Crime”
Excellent stuff. A few nitpicks, though:
I might include “pleading one’s belly” as a synonym for “benefit of belly.”
I’m also not sure I’d call the common law a “code of law,” given that it was largely judge-made and never officially compiled; in legalese, “code” and “codify” usually refer to a standard, officially recognized compilation.
Double jeopardy didn’t apply only to acquittals; it encompassed the three pleas of autrefois acquit, autrefois convict and autrefois pardon. Once there was any final disposition of a case, the accused couldn’t be indicted again.
You may want to list some of the other minor law enforcement titles, e.g., headboroughs and tithingmen, and note the role of corrupted Norman French as well as Latin in legal documents.
“Petty jury” is also spelled “petit jury.”
I know there’s more to say about habeas corpus during this period - e.g., what courts could issue and overrule the writ - but I don’t have the information close at hand; I’ll look it up sometime in the next few days.
Thanks, Jonathan. I didn’t realise that about double jeopardy; I don’t know much about habeas corpus either, so that could be helpful. I’ll think about the ‘common law’ definition (that one is lifted largely from the OBP, so I’m blaming them). Thanks for the other variants, and I think you’re right about adding more terms for officials. (Has anyone got a good definition of ’sheriff’ in early modern England and Wales, BTW? No Robin Hood jokes…) I’m considering whether to add a few more courts, too: Chancery and Common Pleas spring to mind.
I’m also wondering whether to add a few more concrete dates for some of the entries - eg the dates of the capital statutes for burglary, murder, etc. There are some significant dates re habeas corpus as well, if I remember rightly. And I need to check the date of the Transportation Act (1718?) and the Penitentiary Act (1777?).
Trouble is, the more I think about it, the longer I could spend on it!
PS: Thinking it over, do you think ‘body of law’ might be better than ‘code of law’?
Transportation Act was 1717. I have just remembered that about 5 years ago I even transcribed some of it here:
http://www.le.ac.uk/esh/ca26/eh400/sources/2b1.html
while I was working for Clare Anderson. Actually, there’s loads of stuff there for your EM crime online sources page.
The irony of yr glossary, Sharon, is that today I put a CD in the mail to you, featuring, among other things, a glossary. Although ours is scanter and refers to 1750-1950 only, so misses out on most of the more idiosyncratically EM stuff.
It’s someone else’s turn for the computer now [must install wireless network] - I’ll check out yr glossary later.
That link is great! I’ve added the index to the list of sources to peruse later. Thanks for the CD too, I’ll pick it up next time I’m in the office. If the glossary has anything useful, will it be ok to pinch it?
You’ll easily see our failings. Copyright’s onerous; use requires some enterprise.
Other things to add to the glossary:
Acting Constable
Assistant Constable
Beadle
(Waltham) Black Act
Borough
Deodand
Wapentake (Yorkshire version of a Hundred)
[Townships - not always in sparsely populated areas. Sheffield, forex, which was one parish, had six.]
Umm . . I was going to write definitions, then I remembered that you are on a postdoc fellowship and hence have time for this sort of thing, while I have a stack of papers (oddly enough, mainly covering the first world war) to mark, and thus don’t.
I have just got hold of a copy of Andrew Harris’s book on police in the City of London 1780-1830. Yay!
And (note to self as much as anything) did I remember to put Bow Street Runners in?
Or the 1792 Middlesex Justices police offices?
City Marshall
Trained Bands
Watch
Yeomanry
Militia
warrant
bench / county bench
clerk to the justices
Sorry.
I left out ‘Bench’!! (I may not include all of the rest, but I can’t believe I forgot that one!)
No need to apologise… I did ask, after all.
recorder
I’m not talking to you any more.
In that case, I’m a bit worried about how you’ll react to:
Compter
ward
watch and ward
inquestmen
vagabond
rogue
principal (in sense of person who is nominally constable)
deputy / substitute (as constable - should go with ‘acting constable’)
wardmote
Tyburn ticket
Thinking of words to put in - ie looking for stuff that’s missing - is in fact a really hard thing to do, as I proved when I looked at the glossary for the first time and couldn’t think of anything. It’s a lot easier to read something, look for technical terms, and check if they are there or not. As I have just proved. Given a copy of Harris’s ‘Policing the city’, a casual observer could deduce that I’d got to page 20.
Thanks again. I’ve been adding notes as I’m reading too, and going through indexes as well. I do still like you really. However, before we both reach exhaustion, I think I might just pass on every single variety of law officer to be found in London…
“Body of law” sounds about right. In the interests of providing post-doc fellows with something to occupy their time, you might also want to add:
Act for Further Preventing the Growth of Popery
bankruptcy fraud
jury de medietate linguae
oaths (possibly with reference to the 18th-century cases allowing Jews to swear on the Torah and Muslims on the “Alcoran”)
outlawry
Penitentiary Act 1779
rewards for apprehension of criminals (possibly with associated slang terms, e.g., “weigh forty pounds”)
rotation office
Treasons Act 1696
I’m sure I’ll think of more five minutes after posting this comment.
Is it just me or is there some suppressed hostility towards post-doc fellows? btw, what about some examples from the Company in India? thuggees?
Now there’s an interesting idea… but for a rather different listing, I think. The idea here is to focus on the legal (etc) terms that the students will need when looking at the domestic context and criminal justice system. Although it makes me think that there might well be space for some words like thuggee that got imported into the English language. I’ll think about that.
The Indian stuff will all be in Radhika Singha’s _A Despotism of Law_ if you want to take a look.
I’m not hostile towards postdoc fellows, particularly not anyone who’s doing lots of marvellous hight quality open-source research like Sharon is. Just jealous.
I’m not hostile towards postdoc fellows, particularly not anyone who’s doing lots of marvellous hight quality open-source research like Sharon is. Just jealous.
Likewise.
y’all doth protest too much. Cuz my hostility is very open to those getting paid lots of money (hey, the pound is up!) without having to deal with students.