INDORSAT - The Law Mind Legal Dictionary

INDORSATAuthored

The Law Mind • 498 words

Definition

An archaic Scotch law term meaning "indorsed." It appears in historical Scottish criminal legal records as the past participial form indicating that a document — typically a writ, instrument, or record — had been indorsed, that is, written upon or signed on its back.

Why It Matters in Research

INDORSAT is a term a researcher will encounter only in historical Scottish criminal records and early legal proceedings, not in any living legal usage. Its sole documented appearance in the major historical dictionaries traces to a single source: Pitcairn's Ancient Criminal Trials of Scotland (vol. 2, p. 41), which all four source dictionaries cite uniformly. Researchers working with Scottish criminal trial records from the early modern period should treat INDORSAT as a document status marker — an indication that the instrument in question bore a writing or signature on its reverse. The term itself carries no independent legal weight beyond signaling that act.

Because INDORSAT is simply the adjectival or participial form of INDORSE as used in old Scotch procedure, researchers encountering it should cross-reference the fuller treatment of indorsement doctrine to understand what legal consequences the underlying act of indorsing carried. The word itself is a linguistic artifact of Scots Latin legal drafting, not a distinct legal concept with its own doctrine.

Researchers should be alert to variant spellings in manuscript records: forms such as "endorsat" or "indorsatt" may appear in the same corpus. Do not assume an unfamiliar spelling in a Scottish record represents a different term.

Historical Dictionary Support

All four source dictionaries — Black's (1st and 2nd editions), Burrill's, and Bouvier's — are in complete agreement: INDORSAT means "indorsed" in old Scotch law, and all cite the same passage in Pitcairn's Criminal Trials. This unanimity reflects the term's extreme narrowness; there was nothing to dispute. None of the dictionaries develop the term beyond this single-sentence gloss.

Burrill's entry is the most useful for research context, because it embeds INDORSAT within its broader treatment of INDORSE, tracing the Latin root indorsare and the Law French endorser, and noting that to indorse in the mercantile sense means to write one's name on the back of a bill of exchange, promissory note, or check, with or without additional words, thereby effecting a transfer. This contextual placement confirms that INDORSAT in Scottish records should be read against the same background understanding of what indorsement accomplished — authentication, transfer, or acknowledgment depending on the instrument and the words used.

What the historical dictionaries do not provide: any discussion of whether INDORSAT in Scottish practice carried the same legal effects as indorsement in English mercantile or common law usage, or whether its use was confined to criminal procedure records as opposed to commercial instruments. Researchers cannot assume equivalence without consulting the Scottish primary sources directly.

INDORSATmain

Burrill's Law Dictionary • 1870

In old Scotch law. Indorsed. 2 Pitc. Cr. Trials, 41. INDORSE, Endorse. [L. Lat. indorsare; L. Fr. endorser, qq. v.] To put on the back; to write on the back, (in dorso.) In mercantile law. To write one's name on [and properly, across] the back of a bill of exchange, promissory note or check, with or without other words; to transfer by such writing. See Indorsement. To write one's name on the face of a bill or note, or on another paper annexed to it. See Indorsement. This is an improper sense of the term. INDORSEE, Endorsee. [L. Lat. indossatarius.] In mercantile law. The party in whose favor a bill of exchange, promissory note or check is indorsed; the party to whom it is transferred by the indorsement of the payee, or any previous holder.* Chitty on Bills, 2. INDORSEMENT, Endorsement. [Fr. endossement; L. Lat. indorsamentum, indossamentum, qq. v.] Any writing on the back, (in dorso,) of any instrument or paper. 1 Salk. 375. A writing on the back of a paper or parchment containing another writing. 7 Mod. 86. Called "aterm known in law." Id. ibid. See Indorse. In mercantile law. The writing one's name on [that is, across] the back of a bill of exchange, promissory note or check; the writing the name of the payee, or holder of a bill, note or check on the back of it, by which the property in it is assigned and transferred.* 2 Bl. Com. 468, 469. Story on Bills, § 204. Story on Notes, § 121. The writing the name of the payee or holder of a bill or note on the face of it, or on another paper annexed to it, (and called in French law, allonge, q. v.) It is well settled that writing on the back of a bill or