Definition
An archaic Law French term meaning "to do." Occasionally encountered in early legal manuscripts and digests as a corrupt or variant form of *faire*, the standard Law French verb meaning "to do" or "to make." The related forms *foit* and *foite* carry the meaning "done" or "a deed," functioning as past-tense or participial variants. In practical terms, *foier* belongs to the cluster of Law French expressions built around the concept of an act performed — a deed done — which underlies the broader legal vocabulary of *fait* (a deed or act in the legal sense).
The term has no independent operative legal meaning in modern law. Its significance is entirely philological and historical: it serves as a linguistic pointer toward *fait* and its cognates, which carried substantial legal weight in common law pleading and property.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in early English legal manuscripts, year books, or abridgments may encounter *foier*, *foit*, or *foite* where context demands a reading of "done" or "an act performed." Misreading these forms — or failing to recognize them as variants — can produce confusion about whether a passage concerns a procedural act, a conveyance, or a completed transaction.
The key navigational point: *foier* is a dead end on its own. It leads directly to *faire* and *fait*, and researchers who encounter it should immediately pivot to those entries. The Law French corpus is riddled with orthographic instability — the same word appearing in multiple spellings across manuscripts copied at different times or in different regions — and *foier* is a textbook example of this instability. Kelham's *Norman-French Dictionary*, which Burrill cites as authority here, is the primary scholarly anchor for these variant forms.
If a document uses *foit* or *foite* in a property or pleading context, the operative concept is almost certainly the one developed under *fait*: a formal act, deed, or thing done, carrying the legal weight of a completed transaction rather than a mere promise or intention.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary provides the only entry of substance among the historical shelf sources. Burrill identifies *foier* as a corrupt form of *faire*, cites Kelham as authority, and cross-references *fait* — a compact but complete treatment for a term of purely lexical rather than doctrinal significance. No independent doctrine attaches to *foier* itself; Burrill makes clear it is a spelling variant, not a term of art with its own legal content.
What the historical dictionaries collectively miss, or decline to address, is the broader problem of Law French orthographic variation and the manuscript traditions that produced these forms. A researcher relying solely on dictionary coverage would know that *foier* means "to do" but would lack context for why such variants proliferate and how to handle them when cataloging or transcribing early sources.