Definition
A fine or monetary penalty formerly imposed for the commission of theft. The term derives from medieval Latin legal usage and appears in feudal and Anglo-Norman legal contexts as a designation for a compulsory payment exacted from a person found guilty of stealing. It belongs to the broader category of penal monetary exactions — mulcts — by which early legal systems converted certain criminal offenses into financial obligations, either in lieu of or in addition to corporal punishment.
Why It Matters in Research
FURIGELDUM is a term researchers will encounter almost exclusively in medieval English legal records, glossaries, and early treatises. It has no operative significance in modern law and is not embedded in any living statutory scheme. Its research value is almost entirely historical and terminological.
The primary trap for corpus researchers is the appended maxim. Both editions of Black's follow the entry with "Furiosi nulla voluntas est" — a separate Latin maxim meaning "A madman has no will" — without a clear typographical break. Researchers reading quickly may conflate the two, treating the maxim as a gloss on FURIGELDUM rather than as an independent entry. The second edition of Black's compounds this confusion by truncating the definition of FURIGELDUM itself, leaving the entry incomplete before the maxim appears. Any researcher citing the second edition entry should verify against the first edition and Burrill's for the full definition.
The term fits within a family of feudal fiscal terminology — mulcts, amercements, wites, and gelds — that researchers must distinguish carefully. FURIGELDUM is specifically a theft-related fine; it should not be read as a general synonym for any monetary penalty. The "geldum" component connects it to the broader family of Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman geld payments (as in Danegeld), and recognizing that root helps locate the term correctly within the corpus of early English fiscal and criminal law.
Researchers working in ecclesiastical records, manorial court rolls, or early common law treatises may encounter FURIGELDUM alongside other offense-specific fines. Bouvier's citation to "Jac. L. Dict." — Jacob's Law Dictionary — indicates the term circulated through the learned legal dictionary tradition from at least the early eighteenth century, though it was already an archaism by that point.
Historical Dictionary Support
The four source dictionaries are in substantial agreement: FURIGELDUM denotes a fine paid for theft, and nothing more. Burrill's is the most informative, explicitly parsing the Latin components (fur, thief + geldum, payment) and thereby confirming the compositional logic of the term. Black's first edition matches Burrill's in substance. Bouvier's is characteristically brief, adding only the Jacob's Law Dictionary attribution, which is useful for tracing the term's transmission through the English legal dictionary tradition. The second edition of Black's is defective as printed — the definition is truncated and the entry bleeds into the Furiosi maxim — making it the least reliable source for this term.
None of the historical dictionaries situate FURIGELDUM within a broader discussion of Anglo-Saxon or Norman penalty structures, nor do they distinguish it from related terms such as wite (a general penalty) or bloodwite (a fine for bloodshed). Researchers should not rely on these entries alone for contextual understanding and should consult specialist works on early English legal history for fuller treatment.
Jurisdictional Note
FURIGELDUM is a term of historical English law with no recognized counterpart in American, Scottish, or other common law jurisdictions. It does not appear in modern statutory or case law and carries no operative legal force in any current jurisdiction.