Definition
A Latin term of pleading appearing in early common law records, forming part of the conclusion of a plea in bar by way of traverse. The full phrase, *et de hoc ponit se super patriam*, translates as "and of this he puts himself upon the country" — meaning the pleading party submits the disputed issue to determination by a jury of the country (the community). *Triam* is the accusative form completing this formula, referring to the jury or the country upon which the party places himself for judgment.
In practice, the term does not stand alone as a substantive legal concept but functions as a technical fragment of the formal closing language used to conclude a traverse in common law pleading. It signals that the pleader, having denied or traversed the opposing party's allegation, elects trial by jury rather than some other form of determination.
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Common Confusion
*Triam* is easily mistaken for an independent legal term when encountered in early plea rolls or year books. It is not. It is the grammatical object within a formulaic phrase. Researchers who encounter it stripped of context may fail to recognize it as part of the standard traverse conclusion rather than a standalone doctrine or procedural device. It should not be confused with the broader concept of "going to the country" or with the jury itself — *triam* is the word that grammatically receives the action of *ponit se*, not a name for the proceeding.
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Why It Matters in Research
This term surfaces almost exclusively in medieval and early modern English plea records, year books, and exchequer memoranda. Burrill traces it to a Memorandum in Scaccario (Exchequer Memorandum) from 22 Edward I and to a Year Book entry from 1 Edward II — placing its documented use firmly in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. Researchers working with plea rolls, common bench records, or exchequer proceedings from this period will encounter the phrase as a routine closing formula, not as a signal of anything exceptional about the plea.
The practical research trap is this: later common law pleading retained the substance of the traverse conclusion in translated or modernized form ("and of this he puts himself upon the country"), while the Latin original fell away. If you are working across a corpus that spans both the Latin plea roll period and later English or American practice, you will not find *triam* in post-medieval sources even when the same pleading structure is present. The concept migrated; the word did not.
Additionally, because *triam* appears as a fragment in Burrill's entry — the text transitions abruptly to a separate entry — researchers should be alert to the possibility that it is underrepresented in historical dictionaries relative to its frequency in primary sources. Its absence from later law dictionaries (Bouvier, Black) reflects the disappearance of Latin pleading forms, not the disappearance of the underlying procedure.
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Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary is the principal historical dictionary source for this term, and its treatment is brief. The entry defines the phrase *et de hoc ponit se super patriam* directly, provides the literal English translation, cross-references the entry for "Conclusion to the Country," and locates the usage in primary sources from the reigns of Edward I and Edward II. No substantive analytical commentary is offered beyond the translation and cross-reference.
What historical dictionaries collectively miss is any sustained treatment of *triam* as a grammatical element within a living pleading system. By the time Bouvier and later Black's were compiled, Latin pleading forms had been abolished by procedural reform in both England and the United States, making the term an antiquarian entry rather than a working one. Researchers should not expect alignment across historical dictionaries on this term; it simply does not appear in those compiled after Latin pleading ceased.
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Jurisdictional Note
*Triam* in this formulaic sense is specific to English common law pleading prior to procedural modernization. American colonial courts that followed English common law pleading would have encountered the translated form rather than the Latin, and the Latin phrase itself was not carried into American practice in any meaningful way. The procedural concept — traversing and submitting to jury trial — is universal across common law jurisdictions; the specific term is not.
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