Definition
Landimers is an archaic legal term with two related but distinct senses:
1. Measures of land. In early English usage, landimers referred to units or standards used to measure parcels of land, particularly in the context of conveyancing and land description.
2. In Scots law, landimers referred to persons — specifically, measurers of land — appointed or recognized to perform the physical survey and measurement of landholdings. The term describes both the function (measurement) and, in Scottish legal practice, the individuals who performed it.
The term is encountered almost exclusively in historical legal materials and has no operative meaning in modern practice.
Why It Matters in Research
This is a term where the two historical sources point in slightly different directions, and a researcher must read carefully to determine which sense is intended in the document under examination.
The English common law usage (measures of land) treats landimers as a noun of thing — a unit or standard of measurement. The Scots law usage (measurers of land) treats it as a noun of person — an official or designated individual. Context, jurisdiction, and document type will signal which meaning applies: a conveyance or charter describing a parcel's extent likely invokes the first sense; a court record, arbitration, or boundary dispute proceeding in a Scottish context likely invokes the second.
Researchers working in Scottish legal history should note that landimers in the sense of official measurers connects to broader Scots law practices around land division, boundary settlement, and the formal resolution of marches (boundary disputes). Skene's de Verborum Significatione, cited in Bouvier, is the primary historical authority for the Scottish usage and the natural starting point for deeper investigation into that context.
Researchers in English or colonial American land records who encounter this term should treat it as a descriptor of measurement units or conventions, though they should be aware that the term is rare enough in English practice that its appearance may itself signal a document of Scottish origin or influence.
Because landimers appears in very few sources and has no modern continuation, it presents a verification challenge: if the term appears in a document without clear jurisdictional markers, the researcher cannot assume either meaning with confidence and should look to surrounding language, the document's origin, and analogous period sources.
Historical Dictionary Support
Rapalje & Lawrence and Bouvier's are in agreement that the term means, at its core, measures of land — both cite Cowell's Interpreter as the underlying authority for this definition. The agreement on the English sense is therefore solid, resting on a single common source (Cowell).
The divergence is in Bouvier's additional layer: the Scots law gloss drawn from Skene, identifying landimers as persons rather than units. Bouvier's is the more complete entry precisely because it distinguishes the two usages. Rapalje & Lawrence offer only the bare English definition and pivot quickly to adjacent terms (Landing, Landing Place, Landirecta), suggesting the editors treated landimers as too marginal to warrant extended treatment.
Neither source provides case law or statutory authority for landimers itself, which confirms the term's status as historical terminology unlikely to appear in reported decisions. The Rapalje & Lawrence entry's adjacent references to Pennsylvania, Maine, Massachusetts, and New York cases concern landing and landing place — distinct terms — and should not be read as authority for landimers.
What the historical dictionaries do not address: neither source explains how landimers as a unit of measurement related to other contemporary land measures (acres, roods, perches), nor do they address whether the Scottish measurer-function was a formal office or an informal customary role. Researchers needing that depth must go beyond the dictionary shelf to Cowell and Skene directly.
Jurisdictional Note
The persons-sense of landimers is specific to Scots law and should not be imported into English or American legal analysis. The measures-sense, while originating in English usage via Cowell, is archaic in all common law jurisdictions and carries no operative weight in any modern proceeding.