Definition
An archaic Law French term meaning deficiency or failure. In its historical legal usage, *defaille* denoted the condition of falling short, being wanting, or failing to meet an obligation or standard — broadly, a state of insufficiency or default. The related form *defaire* carried the distinct but connected meaning of undoing, reversing, or setting aside a legal act or instrument; to defeat or render void what had previously been done.
These terms appear primarily in medieval and early common law materials as part of the Law French vocabulary that dominated English legal writing from the Norman Conquest through the early modern period.
Common Confusion
*Defaille* and *defaire* are adjacent entries in Burrill and share a common root, but they are not interchangeable. *Defaille* is a noun describing a condition of deficiency or falling short. *Defaire* is a verb describing the act of undoing or defeating a legal instrument or proceeding. A court or party could *defaire* an instrument because a *defaille* existed — but the terms occupy different grammatical and legal roles. Reading one for the other in translation risks converting a descriptive observation about a party's condition into an operative legal act, or vice versa.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers encountering *defaille* in historical legal texts should treat it as a signal term pointing toward concepts of default, deficiency, or failure of condition — not as a term of art with a precise modern equivalent. Its significance lies almost entirely in period sources: Year Books, early plea rolls, and treatises composed in or citing Law French.
The proximity of *defaille* and *defaire* in Law French dictionaries creates a research hazard. The two words are related in etymology but functionally distinct: *defaille* describes a state (deficiency, insufficiency), while *defaire* describes an act (undoing, defeating, reversing). Conflating them in translation could materially misread the legal effect intended by a source — the difference between describing a party as deficient and describing a judgment or instrument as set aside.
Researchers working in Burrill or Kelham should note that these Law French dictionaries often cluster related forms together without drawing sharp definitional lines between them. Independent verification against the original Latin equivalents — here, *infectum reddere* for *defaire* — is advisable when the distinction matters to interpretation.
The corpus of Law Mind materials most likely to surface *defaille* includes early common law treatises, Norman-era land records, and commentaries on feudal obligation. Modern case law will not use this term.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary is the primary shelf source for this entry. Burrill defines *defaille* as "deficiency" and attributes the definition to Kelham's Law French Dictionary, without elaboration. The entry for the related *defaire* is more developed: Burrill gives "to undo; to reverse or set aside; to defeat," with the Latin gloss *infectum reddere* (to render undone), again citing Kelham.
No other Law Mind shelf dictionary contains a substantive entry for this term. The reliance on Kelham as the foundational authority reflects the standard practice of nineteenth-century legal lexicographers, who largely deferred to Kelham's 1779 *Norman French Dictionary* for Law French terms. Researchers who need to go deeper should consult Kelham directly rather than rely on Burrill's compressed paraphrase.
What historical dictionaries miss: there is no discussion in Burrill of how *defaille* functioned procedurally in historical pleading, nor any illustration by example from Year Book usage. The entry is definitional rather than contextual.
Jurisdictional Note
As a Law French term, *defaille* has no current jurisdictional application. Its use is confined to historical English common law sources predating the formal displacement of Law French from legal proceedings, which occurred progressively from the seventeenth century onward and was largely complete by the early eighteenth century.