Definition
An archaic Anglo-Norman legal term for a bushel — a unit of dry measure used in medieval English law to quantify grain, produce, and other commodities in commercial transactions, market regulations, and manorial obligations. The term appears in early legal texts governing weights and measures, trade, and the assessment of dues or rents payable in kind.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working with medieval English legal records, manorial rolls, or early statutes regulating markets and trade will encounter bussel as the standard Anglo-Norman rendering of "bushel." Its importance is narrow but specific: when transcribing or interpreting pre-modern documents, failure to recognize bussel as a unit of measure — rather than a personal name or unrelated term — can produce significant errors in understanding obligations, penalties, or transaction quantities recorded in the source. The phrase bussels et demy bussels (bushels and half-bushels) indicates that fractional measures were legally recognized and commonly specified, which matters when calculating rents in kind, tithes, or market tolls. Researchers should also be aware that the actual volumetric content of a "bushel" varied by commodity and by locality across medieval England; bussel in a legal document does not point to a single fixed quantity without reference to the relevant commodity and jurisdiction.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary provides the sole historical dictionary entry, defining bussel simply as the Law French equivalent of "bushel" and citing Britton (c. 30) as authority. Britton, the late thirteenth-century legal treatise written in Law French, is the natural home for this term, and Burrill's citation is consistent with the treatise's treatment of market regulations and measures. No elaboration on legal context, enforcement, or variation appears in Burrill beyond the bare gloss. Other major historical legal dictionaries — including Jacob's Law Dictionary, Tomlin's Law Dictionary, and Black's Law Dictionary in its early editions — do not appear to carry a distinct entry for bussel, treating the concept instead under "bushel" or within broader discussions of weights and measures. Researchers should not expect to find substantive doctrinal discussion of bussel in any historical dictionary; its significance is terminological and paleographic rather than conceptual.
Jurisdictional Note
The term is specific to medieval English law and its Anglo-Norman legal vocabulary. It has no recognized use in Scottish, Irish, or later common law jurisdictions, and no modern legal significance in any jurisdiction.