Definition
A French adjective meaning small, minor, or lesser, used in Anglo-American law as a qualifying prefix to distinguish a lower-ranked or less serious form of something from its grander or greater counterpart. "Petit" has no independent legal force on its own; it operates exclusively as a modifier. Its primary surviving legal uses are:
1. PETIT JURY: The trial jury of twelve persons (now sometimes fewer under modern rules) impaneled to hear and decide the facts in civil or criminal proceedings. Contrasted with the grand jury, which does not try cases but determines whether charges should be brought. The petit jury is the jury of popular understanding — the body that delivers a verdict.
2. PETIT LARCENY (also PETTY LARCENY): Theft of property whose value falls below a threshold set by statute, as distinguished from grand larceny. The dollar threshold varies by jurisdiction and has shifted dramatically over time as legislatures have updated it.
3. PETIT TREASON (historical): The killing of a person to whom the killer owed special allegiance — a husband by his wife, a master by his servant, a prelate by a cleric — as distinguished from high treason against the sovereign. Abolished in England by statute in 1828; not adopted as a distinct offense in most American jurisdictions.
4. PETIT CAPE (historical): A judicial writ in old real property actions directing the sheriff to take possession of land where a tenant had appeared but subsequently defaulted in later proceedings. Obsolete.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): "Petit" in common modern English appears primarily as the feminine form "petite," meaning small or slight in physical stature. The masculine form "petit" survives in English mainly in legal usage and borrowed French phrases.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): The 1913 Webster's treats "petit" as essentially obsolete in ordinary English except in legal compounds, noting it is the same as "petty" and citing "petit jury" and "petit constable" as the surviving examples.
The gap matters for researchers: in legal contexts, "petit" is not merely a synonym for "small" or "unimportant." It is a term of art that marks a formal institutional distinction — most critically, the distinction between the petit jury (which decides cases) and the grand jury (which initiates prosecution). A reader encountering "petit" in a historical legal document should treat it as a technical marker, not a generic diminutive.
Common Confusion
PETIT vs. PETTY: These are the same word in different spellings. "Petty" is the anglicized form; "petit" is the French-derived form. In modern American statutes and practice, "petty" is more common (petty theft, petty offense, petty larceny). In older common law texts and in formal legal terminology, "petit" appears. The two spellings are interchangeable in meaning, but researchers searching historical materials must account for both. A corpus search for only one spelling will miss significant material.
PETIT JURY vs. GRAND JURY: These are not simply big and small versions of the same thing. They serve entirely different functions. The grand jury determines whether evidence supports bringing charges; the petit jury determines guilt or liability at trial. Confusing the two distorts both constitutional analysis and historical research.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
The term appears historically in the following compounds, with varying degrees of survival in modern practice:
- Petit jury (active; constitutionally significant)
- Petit larceny / petty larceny (active; statutory)
- Petit treason (obsolete; English law only)
- Petit cape (obsolete; old real property practice)
- Petit constable (obsolete; subordinate officer of the peace)
- Petit sergeanty (historical; a tenure by which land was held in exchange for rendering some small service to the king)
Why It Matters in Research
The most important research function of "petit" is as a navigation signal in historical materials. When you encounter it in old case reports, pleadings, or treatises, it is almost always marking one half of a formal legal distinction — and the other half of that distinction is the more important anchor concept (grand jury, grand larceny, high treason).
For corpus researchers, three traps deserve attention:
First, spelling variation is significant. Pre-twentieth-century sources freely alternate between "petit" and "petty," and even "petite" appears in some older English texts. Searches limited to one spelling will produce incomplete results, particularly for larceny and jury materials.
Second, the petit jury has deep constitutional significance in American law that the simple French diminutive does not signal. The Sixth Amendment right to trial by jury and the Seventh Amendment's civil jury right both refer to the petit jury as understood at common law. Constitutional scholarship on jury rights is indexed to "petit jury" in older sources but to "trial jury" or simply "jury" in modern ones.
Third, the dollar thresholds distinguishing petit larceny from grand larceny have been revised repeatedly by legislatures across jurisdictions. A statutory definition from 1850 is not reliable authority for what constitutes petit larceny today, and historical cases on the distinction may turn on threshold values that bear no resemblance to current law.
The Burrill entry is a useful reminder that "petit" in Latin-influenced law practice also appeared as a verb form ("petit" = "he/she demands" or "prays"), derived from the Latin petere. This is a distinct usage entirely, appearing in old pleading formulae such as "A. petit versus B." Researchers in medieval or early modern records may encounter this verbal form and should not read it as the French adjectival "petit."
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary (both editions) treats "petit" briefly and functionally — a signpost word directing readers to the compound entries (petit jury, petit larceny, petit sergeanty). The first edition entry is minimal; the second edition adds the petit cape definition and explicitly notes the cross-references to jury, larceny, and sergeanty. Neither edition dwells on the word itself, which reflects its true status: it is structural vocabulary, not a substantive concept.
Burrill's entry diverges usefully from Black's by surfacing the Latin petere root and the old pleading usage, citing Bracton and Raymond. This is the most distinctive contribution of the historical dictionaries: Burrill's reminds researchers that "petit" in early legal records might be the Latin verb of demand rather than the French adjective of size. Black's does not flag this distinction at all.
Webster's 1913 corroborates that "petit" had already fallen out of ordinary English usage by the early twentieth century, surviving only in legal compounds — which means corpus materials using "petit" outside of those compounds are likely either very old or quoting law.
Jurisdictional Note
"Petit larceny" thresholds are entirely statutory and vary significantly across American jurisdictions. Some states have eliminated the grand/petit larceny distinction entirely in favor of tiered theft statutes. In England, petit treason was abolished by the Offences Against the Person Act 1828; it was never a separate offense in most American common law jurisdictions.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
No Law Mind Encyclopedia entry directly addresses the petit jury or petit larceny as primary subjects. The petition-related encyclopedia entries (constitutional_107, constitutional_190, tax_181) address a different legal concept — the right of petition — and are not relevant to this term despite the surface similarity in spelling.