Definition
To personate is to fraudulently assume the identity or character of another real person, without that person's knowledge or consent, and — while acting in that false character — to do some act, gain some advantage, or cause some harm or prejudice. The core of the offense is deception coupled with an act: assuming a false identity alone is insufficient; the impersonation must be deployed to accomplish something detrimental to another or advantageous to the impersonator.
At common law, personation was treated as a cheat or misdemeanor. Statutory developments in England and the United States expanded the offense and increased penalties, particularly for personating officials, bail bondsmen, voters, or parties to legal proceedings.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To fraudulently portray another person; to impersonate. Also: to portray a character in a play; to personify; to disguise or mask.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): To celebrate loudly; to extol; to praise. (Marked as obsolete.) Also used in the literary sense of representing or portraying a character in dramatic or poetic composition.
The gap between common and legal meaning is real but narrowing. The literary and theatrical senses of "personate" — portraying a character in a play or poem — have largely dropped from everyday usage, leaving the fraudulent-impersonation sense dominant in both common and legal contexts. However, the legal definition adds an element the common usage does not: mere impersonation is not enough. The legal term requires that the false assumption of identity be paired with an act done in that character, to another's prejudice or the impersonator's gain. A theatrical performance or good-faith impression carries no legal weight under this definition.
Common Confusion
Personate vs. Impersonate: In modern common usage these terms are interchangeable. In historical legal sources, "personate" is the term of art used in criminal statutes and treatises; "impersonate" rarely appears in early legal texts and may not carry the same technical weight in older statutory contexts. Researchers working with pre-20th-century English or American statutes should look for "personate" rather than "impersonate" as the operative term.
Personate vs. False Pretenses: Both involve fraud, but they are distinct. False pretenses turns on a false representation of fact to induce transfer of property. Personation turns on assuming a false identity. The two can overlap — personating a bank officer to obtain a loan also involves false pretenses — but they are charged and analyzed separately.
Core Elements
The offense of personation at common law and under early statutes requires:
1. Assumption of identity — The defendant must hold themselves out as a specific, real other person. Assuming a wholly fictitious name is generally not personation; it may be fraud or false pretenses, but it lacks the element of counterfeiting an actual individual.
2. Without consent or authority — The person being impersonated must not have authorized the assumption of their identity.
3. In the feigned character, an act — The impersonator must do something while in the assumed identity: sign a document, receive property, vote, appear in a legal proceeding, claim a benefit, or similar.
4. Resulting harm or advantage — The act must prejudice the person personated or another, or result in a benefit to the impersonator.
Why It Matters in Research
The term "personate" is functionally obsolete in modern American statutory drafting, where "impersonate" dominates. Researchers consulting 18th- and 19th-century English or American statutes, indictments, or treatises must search for "personate" and "personation" rather than modern equivalents. The older sources will not index under "impersonate."
The two-East reference (2 East, P. C. 1010) appears in both Black's and Bouvier's and anchors the common law treatment; it is a real citation to Edward East's Pleas of the Crown (1803), and remains a useful confirmatory source when tracing the historical baseline of the offense.
A critical research trap: some historical statutory schemes treated personation of different classes of persons as separate offenses carrying different penalties — personating a voter, personating a party to a deed, personating an heir, personating a bail. These were not merged into a single impersonation statute. Researchers investigating a specific historical personation charge must identify which statutory category applied, as elements and penalties varied considerably.
In the Law Mind corpus, personation most naturally surfaces in criminal law materials and in equity contexts involving fraudulent conveyances or fraudulent appearances in legal proceedings. It has less presence in tort materials, though civil liability for personation (invasion of privacy, fraud) may appear in modern tort discussions.
The offense is closely connected to forgery in early legal analysis: where the impersonator signs a document in the victim's name, personation and forgery may be charged together or analyzed in the same treatise sections.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's (1st and 2nd Ed.) and Bouvier's are in close agreement on the core definition, and all three historical entries share the same East citation, confirming it as the foundational common law authority. The definitions are essentially identical in substance: assume another's character, without consent, and do something in that character to another's harm or the impersonator's gain.
Bouvier adds the important practical note that bare personation — assuming another's identity without more — was only a misdemeanor at common law, no greater than a common cheat. This is a meaningful historical limitation that researchers should flag: the offense required the act in the assumed character, not just the assumption. Bouvier also signals that statutory punishment filled the gap where common law penalties were perceived as insufficient, a pattern common to fraud offenses in the 19th century.
What the historical dictionaries do not address: civil liability for personation, the question of personating fictitious as opposed to real persons, and the significant modern extensions to digital and online contexts. None of these developments appear in the shelf sources, and researchers should not infer from the historical definitions that the offense was confined to in-person, physical impersonation.
Jurisdictional Note
American jurisdictions have largely replaced "personation" with "impersonation" in statutory language, and the specific conduct criminalized varies — some states focus on impersonating officers or officials, others on voter impersonation, others on impersonation for financial gain. English law retained "personation" as statutory terminology longer than American practice. Researchers working across jurisdictions should treat the historical definitions as a baseline and verify current statutory language independently.