Definition
In old European law, to pledge property — that is, to deliver or transfer property as security for an obligation, typically a debt. The term appears in medieval Latin legal texts and denotes the act of placing property into a pledged or trust-like condition as collateral, with the expectation that the pledgor retains some reversionary interest upon satisfaction of the underlying obligation.
The concept overlaps with the broader Roman and Germanic traditions of real security over property, functioning analogously to what modern systems would recognize as a pledge, hypothec, or mortgage in its primitive form.
---
Common Confusion
Black's Law Dictionary (2nd ed.) lists this term under the variant spelling EINFIDUOCIARE, which appears to be either a scribal or typographic corruption of INFIDUCIARE. Researchers working across multiple editions of Black's should be aware that these are the same term. Neither spelling should be confused with INFEUDARE (to enfeoff, or to invest with a feudal holding), a related but distinct concept involving feudal tenure rather than pledge or security.
---
Why It Matters in Research
This term is almost exclusively a historical artifact. Researchers will encounter it only in medieval Latin legal texts, glossaries of Lombard law, or comparative legal histories dealing with early European security interests in property. Its practical research value lies in three areas:
First, it serves as an access point into the Lombard law sources — specifically the Leges Langobardorum — where pledge and security arrangements over property were codified. Burrill's citation to Leges Langobardorum lib. 2, tit. 29, l. 2 provides a direct thread into that corpus, which is essential for researchers tracing the development of real security interests in early medieval Germanic legal systems.
Second, the term illustrates the conceptual lineage between ancient pledge arrangements and later common law and civilian security devices. Legal historians examining the evolution of mortgage, lien, or hypothec doctrine may find INFIDUCIARE useful as a terminological marker for the moment when pledge-as-delivery began to be distinguished from pledge-as-encumbrance.
Third, researchers should exercise care with the prefix. The "in-" construction with "fiducia" points toward the Roman fiducia cum creditore — an early Roman security device in which property was actually transferred to the creditor by mancipation, subject to a duty of retransfer upon payment. INFIDUCIARE appears to invoke or echo this fiduciary pledge tradition, but in its Lombard law context it operates under Germanic rather than classical Roman rules. Do not assume that classical Roman fiducia doctrine maps cleanly onto the Lombard usage.
---
Historical Dictionary Support
All three source dictionaries agree on the core definition — to pledge property — and all three trace the term to old European law. Burrill adds the most useful detail, citing the Leges Langobardorum directly and referencing Spelman, the standard point of reference for medieval Latin legal terms in the common law dictionary tradition. Black's first edition reproduces essentially the same entry. Black's second edition's decision to list the term under EINFIDUOCIARE rather than INFIDUCIARE is unexplained and is almost certainly a typographic variant rather than a deliberate alternate form.
What the historical dictionaries do not do is situate INFIDUCIARE within the broader taxonomy of early medieval security devices — fiducia, pignus, hypotheca — or explain how the Lombard usage related to or diverged from Roman antecedents. For that context, researchers must go beyond the dictionary shelf to works on Lombard law and comparative legal history. Spelman's Glossarium Archaiologicum, cited by both Black's and Burrill, remains the primary historical glossary reference for terms of this type.
---
Jurisdictional Note
INFIDUCIARE has no operative significance in any modern common law or civil law jurisdiction. It belongs to the historical stratum of medieval Germanic and Lombard law. Its relevance is confined to legal history, comparative law, and the interpretation of medieval Latin instruments or texts.
---