Definition
An obsolete spelling variant of DOCKET. In historical legal usage, a dogget referred to the same instrument or record as a docket: a brief memorandum, register, or abstract of proceedings, judgments, or other matters pending before or disposed of by a court. The term appears in older English legal writing but carries no independent substantive meaning distinct from docket. See DOCKET for the full operative definition.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Obsolete form of docket.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): See Docket. [Obs.]
The common and legal meanings here are effectively identical — the term is simply an archaic orthographic variant, not a word that migrated from general vocabulary into specialized legal use. No meaningful gap exists between common and legal meaning; both sources treat dogget as a spent form of docket with no independent content.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in early English legal manuscripts, court records, or abridgments may encounter this spelling and should treat it as a direct equivalent of docket without inferring any specialized or distinct meaning. The variant spelling is most likely to surface in sources predating the standardization of English legal orthography — broadly, materials from before the eighteenth century. When transcribing, indexing, or searching historical court records, recognizing dogget as a synonym for docket prevents misclassification of the term as an unknown or specialized instrument.
The primary practical trap is treating the spelling difference as a meaningful substantive distinction. It is not. Any procedural or documentary significance attaches to the docket concept itself, not to this variant form.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary disposes of the term in a single cross-reference: "See Docket." This is the appropriate treatment — Burrill recognized the term as a variant worth acknowledging for identification purposes but carrying no independent legal content. No divergence among historical sources is evident because no historical source treats dogget as anything other than an alternate spelling. The entry in Webster's 1913 mirrors this approach exactly. Neither source offers any doctrinal elaboration, which is itself informative: compilers working across different traditions agreed that the term warranted recognition but not analysis.