Definition
A Latin writ of medieval English law that lay on behalf of citizens or burgesses of a town entitled to exemption from toll, available when toll was unlawfully demanded of them. The phrase translates roughly as "of being quit of toll." The writ functioned as an enforcement mechanism for pre-existing toll exemptions — it did not create the exemption but provided judicial relief when an exempt party was wrongfully subjected to a toll charge.
Toll, in this context, meant a customary payment or levy exacted at markets, fairs, bridges, or roads as a condition of passage or trade. Towns that had secured exemption by royal charter or long-established custom could invoke this writ when local toll collectors disregarded that exemption.
Why It Matters in Research
This term falls into a narrow category of obsolete English process writs that do not survive in any modern legal system. Researchers encountering it will typically do so in one of three contexts: (1) transcription or analysis of medieval plea rolls and year books; (2) commentary on the Natura Brevium and related registers of writs; or (3) secondary scholarship on medieval municipal privileges and borough law.
The primary research trap is terminological fragmentation. The Bouvier entry for this writ is embedded mid-entry alongside ESSOIN/ESSOIGN, a completely unrelated procedural concept. Researchers scanning Bouvier alphabetically may miss the writ entirely or conflate it with the surrounding entry. The placement appears to reflect a typographical or editorial irregularity in the source rather than any meaningful doctrinal connection between the two terms.
The Fitzherbert citation in Bouvier (Fitzh. N. B. 226) refers to Anthony Fitzherbert's La Nouvelle Natura Brevium, the standard early modern guide to the register of writs. Researchers seeking the fullest treatment of this writ should go directly to Fitzherbert rather than relying on Bouvier's compressed summary.
Jurisdictionally, this writ has no American legal life. It is a creature of English common law in its pre-modern, writ-based form, and its disappearance tracks the general dissolution of the forms of action in England and the absence of any equivalent transplantation to American colonial or early republican practice. American researchers will encounter it only as historical background for understanding toll exemption disputes or borough privileges.
For corpus researchers, the writ connects to the broader cluster of franchise and exemption writs — terms like QUIETUS, DE THEOLONIO, and toll-related entries in the register of writs — rather than to any procedural law strand.
Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's is the sole historical dictionary source available here, and its treatment is minimal. The entry is effectively a single sentence cross-referencing Fitzherbert and identifying the writ's basic purpose and beneficiary class. It does not discuss the pleading form, the required proof of exemption, or the procedural posture of the action.
Fitzherbert's Natura Brevium, the source Bouvier cites, remains the authoritative historical reference for this writ. Spelman's Glossarium (referenced in the adjacent Bouvier entry on ESSOIN) provides useful background on toll terminology and franchise exemptions in medieval English law, though it does not address this writ specifically.
No American legal dictionary tradition engaged substantively with this writ, which is consistent with its status as a piece of English franchise law with no New World application.
Jurisdictional Note
This writ is exclusive to pre-modern English common law. It has no recognized equivalent in any American jurisdiction and no modern English successor. Research involving it is inherently historical.