Here are the results for the letter a
- ABACTOR
- Cattle thief
- ABEYANCE
- A condition of undetermined ownership, as of an estate that has not yet been assigned
- ABSTRACT
- abbreviated transcription of a document or record that includes the date of the record, every name appearing therein, the relationship (if stated) of each person named and their description (ie., witness, executor, bondsman, son, widow, etc.), and if they signed with their signature or mark.
- ABSTRACT BOOK
- Record books containing abstracts of the information contained on deeds or land entries, usually listed in alphabetical order by surname of the purchasers
- ACCOUCHEUR
- Assisted women in childbirth (midwife)
- ACRE
- Three types of acre were in use in late seventeenth century in Ireland - the English or Statute acre, the Scottish or Cunningham acre, and the Irish or Plantation acre.
1 Irish acre = 1.62 Statute acres.
1 Cunningham acre = 1.29 Statute acres.
- ACREABLE
- Of an acre; per acre; as, the acreable produce
- ACT BOOK
- Records the actions of court, essentially a summary of what went on. Outline details of the grant of probate, including name of testator, date of probate, executor name(s), value of estate.
- ACTS
- Primary legislation of Ireland. Part of the work of the Oireachtas is to make laws, called Acts of the Oireachtas
- ACTUARY
- Accountant - public business account keeper
- AD COLLIGENDUM BONA
- If there is no executor or administrator for a person s estate - perhaps because of a dispute over the validity of the will - the court may appoint a person to collect the goods of the deceased and keep them in safe custody until an administrator can be appointed.
- AD LITEM
- Legal term meaning in this case only. For example, "Michael Kelly, duly appointed by the court, may administer ad litem the settlement of the estate of Thomas Brennan, deceased."
- ADMINISTRATOR
- An appointee of the court who settles the estate of a deceased who died without leaving a will
- ADMINISTRATOR'S BOND
- A bond posted by an administrator to guarantee the proper performance of his duties
- ADVENTURER
- A person who subscribed (adventured) a sum of money for the equipment of an army to suppress the Rising of 1641 on the security of lands to be confiscated from Irish proprietors.
- ADVOWSON
- The right of patronage or presentation to a church benefice.
- AFFIDAVIT
- A written or oral statement made under oath.
- AGRARIAN
- Relating to land, land tenure, or the division of landed property: agrarian laws. A person or group who favours the equal division of landed property and the advancement of agricultural groups.
- AGUE
- Recurring fever and chills of malaria
- AHNENTAFEL
- Ancestor table, tabulates the ancestry of one individual by generation in text rather than pedigree chart format. A comprehensive ahnentafel gives more than the individual's name, date and place of birth, christening,marriage, death and burial. It should give biographical and historical commentary for each person listed, as well as footnotes citing the source documents used to prove what is stated.
- AHNENTAFEL NUMBER
- The unique number assigned to each position in an ancestor table is called an ahnentafel number. Number one designates the person in the first generation. Numbers two and three designate the parents of number one and the second generation. Numbers four through seven designate the grandparents of person number one and the third generation. As the ahnentafel extends by generation, the number of persons doubles.
- ALEWIFE
- Woman who kept an Alehouse or Tavern
- ALIENATION
- The power of a tenant to dispose, either by sale or inheritance, of his interest in his property. A special form of alienation is subletting, known as devising.
- ALIENATION OF LANDS
- Lands that had been
aliened (i .e., transferred to a new tenant of the crown)
without the payment of the required fine for entry into
these lands.
- ALL SAINTS
- 1st November. Together with May Day (1st May) was a major traditional Irish rural festival, and Lord Brownlow required his native Irish tenants to pay rent on these days rather than on the traditional English days for rent payment - Lady Day and Michaelmas.
- ALL SPICE
- A Grocer
- ALMONER
- An almoner is a chaplain or church officer who originally was in charge of distributing money to the deserving poor.
- ALTERAGE
- A form of affinity proscribed in late medieval Ireland between the Irish and the English, whereby a man stood sponsor for a child at baptism; (also) gossipred.
- AMERCEMENTS
-
Fines or penalties that were not fixed by statute.
- AMERICAN WAKE
- Fellow villagers, and even people from miles around, gathered for this event, knowing how unlikely it was that the emigrants would ever return. Pipes of tobacco were shared and glasses of poiton were drunk. There was music, dancing and farewell speeches.
- ANILEPMAN
- Smallholder - tenant of the Manor
- ANNOTATION
- Interpretation, explaination, clarification, definition, or supplement. Many types of genealogical presentations contain statements, record sources, documents, conclusions, or other historical information that require an annotation. Generally, annotations appear in footnotes, end-notes, or in the text itself. Genealogical software provides a field for documentation, comments, notes, and analysis. Genealogists use annotations to explain discrepancies between two or more documents, to add information from another source to support a statement or conclusion made in a different record, and other difficult to interpret situations.
- ANNUS
- Year.
- ARCHIL MAKER
- Made a purple dye from lichens - used in the textile industry
- ARD as in ARDACH
- A Hill
- Ascendancy
- Originally a reference to the Protestant ruling class in 18th century Ireland. It came to refer particularly the ruling gentry and later as a vague term for a putative Protestant elite in Ireland.
- ASHMAN
- Shipman or sailor
- ASSIGNMENT
- Grant of property or a legal right, benefit, or privilege to another person.
- ASSIGNMENTS
-
Bills or Tallies given to crown creditors of
anticipated revenues prior to the payment of such revenues
into the exchequer. Such assignments were recorded ln
the rolls of the exchequer.
- ASSIZES
- The Courts of Assize, or assizes, were periodic criminal courts held around England, Ireland and Wales until 1972, when together with the Quarter Sessions they were abolished by the Courts Act 1971 and replaced by a single permanent Crown Court. The assizes heard the most serious cases, which were committed to it by the Quarter Sessions local county courts held four times a year, while the more minor offences were dealt with summarily by Justices of the Peace in petty sessions also known as Magistrates Courts.
The word assize refers to the sittings or sessions (Old French assises) of the judges, known as "justices of assize", who were judges of the King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice who travelled across the seven circuits of England and Wales on commissions of "oyer and terminer", setting up court and summoning juries at the various Assize Towns.
- ATTAINT
- To convict of a crime punishable by foreiture of estate and extinction of civil rights.
- AVOIRDUPOIS
- Miscellaneous merchandise sold by weight.
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