The language of the law. Part Latin, part Anglo-Saxon, all confusing.
Today’s term is Saturday’s stop.
Yes, it’s that time of year again when The Legal Genealogist is frantically trying to stay ahead of the demands of teaching at a week-long institute — and never quite managing to stay ahead.
But we can’t have a blank space here in the blog pages, now can we? So here’s a tidbit to tide you over.
The term for today is Saturday’s stop.
And you may very well have had an ancestor prosecuted for violating the law of Saturday’s stop.
It was, Black’s Law Dictionary tells us, a “space of time from even-song on Saturday till sun-rising on Monday, in which it was not lawful to take salmon in Scotland and the northern parts of England.”1
Even-song, of course, was the time for evening prayers and would vary with the season.2
Now you couldn’t have gotten through the day without knowing that, now, could you?
SOURCES
Image: OpenClipArt, user AJ
- Henry Campbell Black, A Dictionary of Law (St. Paul, Minn. : West, 1891), 1063, “Saturday’s stop.” ↩
- See generally W.K. Lowther Clarke, “Evensong Explained, with Notes on Matins and the Litany,” Project Canterbury (http://anglicanhistory.org/ : accessed 11 Jan 2015). ↩
I was just wondering about this last night, actually. Thank you! You’ve made my day. 😉
That’s very funny that it should have come up so soon!!
WHEW !!! I am now informed,no excuses for me.:>)