Definition
De pascuo lapidoso is a Latin phrase from medieval English law meaning, literally, "of stony pasture." It appears in the context of real property and land tenure, designating a writ or action concerning rights over ground characterized by rocky or stony terrain. Such land was typically of low agricultural value and was the subject of disputes over pasture rights, common rights, or the scope of a grant or conveyance where the quality and character of the land was legally relevant.
Why It Matters in Research
This term is of narrow historical significance and appears almost exclusively in medieval and early modern English sources dealing with real property actions, writs, and manorial records. Researchers encountering it are most likely working with:
- Writs of right or possessory assizes where the physical character of the land was pleaded to define or limit the scope of a claim.
- Manorial records and terriers where land parcels were described by their physical quality, with stony pasture distinguished from meadow, arable, or waste.
- Disputes over common of pasture, where the productivity of the land affected the stint (the number of animals a commoner could graze).
The chief trap for researchers is treating this as a formal writ name when it may instead function as a descriptive phrase embedded within a broader legal instrument. It should be searched as both a standalone term and as a qualifying clause within longer passages. Latin descriptors of land quality were not always standardized, and variant spellings or equivalent phrases (pascuum lapidosum, pastura lapidosa) may appear across different regional or period sources without cross-referencing.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary entry for this term is unhelpful as presented: the source material supplied attributes to the headword an entry that reads "Stanley. DE PAVILIDRO, Pauliaco. Paveley." This appears to be a garbled or misattributed entry — likely a fragment from a place-name list or a corrupted cross-reference — and bears no evident connection to the phrase de pascuo lapidoso as a legal term. It offers no substantive definition and cannot be relied upon for interpretive guidance.
Burrill's is otherwise a strong source for Latin real property terms of English origin, but the absence of a coherent entry here is itself significant: it suggests the phrase was not in common enough circulation by the mid-nineteenth century to warrant a full treatment, and that Burrill may have encountered it only incidentally, in a list or index. Researchers should not expect other standard historical dictionaries — Jacob's Law Dictionary, Tomlin's Law Dictionary, or Bouvier's — to supply more. For authoritative treatment, the better path is through Spelman's Glossarium Archaiologicum or Du Cange's Glossarium Mediae et Infimae Latinitatis, both of which address medieval Latin land-quality descriptors in greater depth than common-law dictionaries.
Jurisdictional Note
This term is specific to English common law and the medieval and early modern land law of England and Wales. It has no recognized counterpart in American, Scottish, or civil law systems. Researchers working in colonial American property records will not encounter it as a term of art.