Definition
An archaic Law French adjective meaning "clear," "plain," or "confident." Found in early English legal reports and Year Books, *clere* functions as a modifier indicating that a point of law, a fact, or a proposition is beyond dispute or self-evident — not requiring elaborate argument or further proof. The adverbial form *clerement* carries the same force, meaning "clearly" or "plainly."
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in the Year Books, early English plea rolls, or the Tudor-era reports of Dyer and Keilwey will encounter *clere* as a term of judicial rhetoric rather than a term of art with technical legal consequences. Its significance is evaluative: when a judge or reporter describes a matter as *clere*, the intended signal is that the point admits no serious contrary argument. This rhetorical function is easy to miss when reading Law French in translation, where the word may be rendered as simply "clear" without flagging the weight it was meant to carry in the original legal discourse.
The adverbial *clerement* (Dyer, 32) performs the same rhetorical work and should be read in the same evaluative light. Neither form has survived as a live legal term; both are confined to historical sources.
Researchers should also note the overlap between *clere* and the English legal idiom "clear law" — a phrase that persisted in English and American common-law usage well past the Law French period to describe points considered settled beyond dispute. Understanding *clere* as its Law French antecedent helps trace the continuity of this evaluative convention across centuries of common-law reporting.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill records *clere* as Law French for "clear; confident" (citing Dyer, 31, French edition) and also as "plain" (citing Keilwey, 75b), with the adverbial *clerement* meaning "clearly" (Dyer, 32). This is the principal historical lexicographic treatment available. Burrill's entry is brief because the term carries no technical legal content beyond its rhetorical role — it is a descriptor, not a doctrine.
No significant divergence appears across the historical dictionary sources because coverage is thin; *clere* is noted in specialty Law French glossaries rather than given extended treatment. The Dyer and Keilwey citations Burrill supplies are genuine reference points in the Year Book tradition and lend the entry documentary grounding, but neither source develops the term beyond its ordinary evaluative use in judicial discourse.
Jurisdictional Note
*Clere* is a term of English Law French with no direct counterpart in continental or Scots legal vocabulary. Its use is confined to the English common-law reporting tradition, primarily from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.