Definition
An obsolete term from medieval military and fortification law referring to the act of constructing a warlike defensive device — typically a grated or perforated structure — over a gate or passageway, through which scalding water, heavy objects, or other offensive materials could be directed at attackers or intruders. The term describes both the physical construction of such a device and, by extension, the legal authorization or obligation to install and maintain it as part of fortified structures.
Common Language
No meaningful common-language counterpart exists. "Coulare" is pure historical legal jargon with no surviving ordinary English usage. It should not be confused with "couloir" (a narrow mountain passage or gully), which derives from related French roots but carries an entirely different meaning.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers will encounter this term almost exclusively in medieval English and Norman legal texts dealing with castle-guard obligations, feudal tenure conditions, and the rights and duties of lords with respect to fortified holdings. Several research traps apply:
First, the term appears in contexts where a lord's tenure or grant carried affirmative obligations of fortification — understanding what "coulare" specifically required matters for reading the scope of such duties accurately.
Second, historical sources transliterate the term inconsistently. Variant spellings in manuscript sources and early printed legal compilations may obscure the connection between instances of the same term.
Third, the concept belongs to a cluster of obsolete military-tenure vocabulary — alongside terms governing drawbridges, portcullises, and castle-ward — that largely disappears from practical legal usage after the abolition of military tenures in England (Tenures Abolition Act 1660). Any research touching feudal obligations, manorial records, or early property law in jurisdictions shaped by Norman-derived common law should treat this term as a marker pointing toward the broader body of castle-guard and fortification law.
Fourth, the Rapalje & Lawrence definition is truncated — the entry ends mid-sentence. Researchers should treat it as a partial gloss only, and should cross-reference primary sources in Norman French and Law Latin for a complete account of the term's legal scope.
Historical Dictionary Support
Rapalje & Lawrence is the only identified shelf source to include this term, and their entry is incomplete, breaking off after "offensive" without completing the catalogue of materials that could be deployed through the device. This truncation is itself informative: it signals that the compilers were drawing on a narrower base of primary sources and did not have a full account to render.
No other major historical legal dictionaries in the Law Mind corpus — including Bouvier, Black, or Burrill — appear to carry this term, which reflects how completely it fell out of active legal use following the dismantling of the feudal military-tenure system. Its survival in Rapalje & Lawrence likely reflects their broader coverage of Norman and early English legal vocabulary compared to American-focused competitors.
Jurisdictional Note
Relevant only to English and Norman-derived legal history. The term has no practical application in any modern jurisdiction and would appear in research only through historical documents predating the seventeenth-century abolition of military tenures in England.