Definition
An obsolete Latin term from medieval English legal usage. HOSTAGIUM most likely denoted a tax or tribute levied toward the maintenance or support of an army. The term appears in early English ecclesiastical and monastic records and belongs to the family of feudal fiscal impositions that characterized medieval land tenure and public obligation. Its precise meaning was uncertain even to early legal lexicographers.
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Why It Matters in Research
Researchers encountering HOSTAGIUM in medieval English documents — particularly monastic charters, cartularies, or records touching ecclesiastical landholding — should treat the term with caution. Even Burrill, drawing on Blount, acknowledges that the word was transmitted without a confirmed signification. The derivation from *hostis* (army, or enemy) or *hostium* points toward a military service commutation or army-support levy, placing the term alongside cognate feudal burdens such as SCUTAGE, AUXILIUM, and related impositions on land. However, because no authoritative definition was fixed in the primary sources that Blount and Burrill relied upon, any interpretation in a specific document must be grounded in that document's context, surrounding terms, and the nature of the grantor's or grantee's obligations.
The term is unlikely to appear outside of highly specialized medieval Latin sources. Researchers working in post-Conquest English land law, monastic finance, or the history of military tenure will be the primary audience likely to encounter it. Cross-referencing the specific passage in the *Monasticon Anglicanum* — the source Blount cites — is advisable before drawing firm conclusions about meaning in any particular instrument.
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Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary is the sole shelf source to address HOSTAGIUM, and its entry is notably sparse. Burrill transmits the term from Thomas Blount's *Nomo-Lexicon* (1670), who in turn drew it from the *Monasticon Anglicanum* without attaching a meaning. Burrill's conjecture — that the word signified a tax or tribute toward army support — is etymological inference rather than documented definition. No other major historical legal dictionaries in the standard corpus (Jacob, Tomlin, Black) appear to have carried independent entries for this term.
The absence of a settled definition in any primary authority is itself instructive. It suggests that HOSTAGIUM was either highly localized in usage, extremely rare, or that its meaning was considered self-evident to contemporaries in a way that rendered formal definition unnecessary. Researchers should weight Burrill's entry accordingly: it is a reasoned guess, not a confirmed gloss.
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