TRU

4 definitions found across Law Mind sources

TRUAuthored
The Law Mind • 708 words
Definition
TRU is an abbreviated or archaic form of TRUCE, appearing in historical legal manuscripts, pleadings, and ecclesiastical records as a contracted spelling. The term carries no independent legal meaning distinct from truce; it is a scribal or typographic variant encountered in older primary sources, particularly in documents of English and continental European origin. As used in historical legal contexts, TRU refers to the same concept as truce: a temporary suspension of hostilities, whether by agreement between private parties, between sovereigns, or — most distinctively in the medieval period — by ecclesiastical decree. See TRUCE for full treatment.
Common Confusion
TRU as an abbreviation should not be confused with its modern commercial use (the retail chain Toys "R" Us employed the abbreviation "TRU" in industry contexts). That usage is entirely unrelated to legal history. In legal research, any encounter with "TRU" in a historical document should be read as a probable contraction of truce, treuga, or a related variant — not as a reference to any modern entity or acronym.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in medieval legal records, ecclesiastical court documents, or early English and Norman French manuscripts may encounter TRU as a contracted form rather than the full spelling TRUCE or TREUGA. This is a indexing and search trap: full-text searches for "truce" will miss instances rendered as "tru," "trew," or "trewe" in manuscript sources. When using digitized historical corpora, researchers should expand search strings to include variant spellings. The Burrill extract associated with this entry introduces the concept mid-definition, suggesting the entry in the original source transitions from a historical example — the 1027 Synod of Roussillon establishing a Peace of God restriction on violence between Saturday nones and Monday prime — into a doctrinal definition of truce rooted in confidence and mutual obligation. This passage is important for researchers tracing the ecclesiastical origins of the truce concept in Western legal history, as the Peace of God and Truce of God movements directly influenced the development of secular protections against private warfare in feudal law. Burrill's fragment also signals the connection between truce and trust: Lord Coke's definition of a use, cited in the excerpt, employs the language of confidence, which Burrill draws on to characterize the "radical idea" of a trust or truce as grounded in reliance and good faith between parties. Researchers exploring the conceptual overlap between truce, trust, and use in early English equity may find this passage a useful doctrinal bridge.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary treats TRU as an entry leading directly into the doctrine of TRUCE, using the 1027 Roussillon synod as a historical anchor. The entry is notable for two reasons. First, it situates the legal concept of truce in ecclesiastical history rather than purely secular or common law sources, reflecting the medieval reality that the Church was the primary institutional enforcer of truces during the Peace of God and Truce of God periods. Second, Burrill explicitly links the "radical idea" of truce to confidence — the same conceptual foundation he and contemporaries (citing Butler and Lewin) identified in the law of uses and trusts. This is an unusual doctrinal move. Most modern dictionaries treat truce and trust as entirely separate lineages. Burrill's framing suggests that nineteenth-century legal historians recognized a shared conceptual ancestry in the idea of reliance-based obligation, worth noting for researchers working on the intellectual history of equity. No other source dictionaries in the Law Mind corpus include a standalone entry for TRU. The term does not appear as a recognized legal term of art in modern usage.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: TRUCE — for full treatment of the doctrine, its ecclesiastical origins, its development in the law of nations, and its treatment in English common law.
Related Terms
TRUCE — full form of this entry; the primary term for research purposes TREUGA — Latin form used in ecclesiastical and continental European sources PEACE OF GOD — ecclesiastical predecessor doctrine TRUCE OF GOD — specific medieval Church decree suspending private warfare on holy days TRUST — shares conceptual foundation in confidence and reliance per Burrill USE — connected by Coke's definition as cited in Burrill's entry ARMISTICE — modern international law analogue
TRUmain
Burrill's Law Dictionary • 1870
(548) (549) gaged. Thus, in the county of Roussillon, *** The radical idea of a trust is confiA. D. 1027, it was determined in a synod dence, and this is the word employed by of the clergy, that no man should attack his Lord Coke in his definition of a use, which enemy from the hour of nones on Saturhas been adopted by Mr. Butler and Mr. day, to the hour of prime on Monday. In Lewin, as the best and most exact definition 1041, a general truce of God was accepted of a trust. Butler's Co. Litt. Note 249, by the barons, first of Aquitaine, and then lib. 3. Lewin on Trustees, 15. See infra. of all France, to last from the Wednesday The same idea is still more aptly expressed evening of every week to the Monday by the Roman term fidei-commissum, which morning following. This regulation was literally means a thing committed to one's admitted by Edward the Confessor in Engfaith; and Justinian explains that it was land, in 1042, with some additions of great so called, because it rested upon no obligafestivals and other days. It was confirmed by many councils, especially the Lateran council of 1179. The observance of it was sworn by knights, burgesses, and peasants of the age of fourteen and upwards, and the penalty of its infringement was extion of law, (nullo vinculo juris,) but only on the honor of those to whom it was committed, (sed tantum pudore eorum qui rogabantur, continebantur.) Inst. 2. 23. 1. A trust, then, in its simplest elements, is a confidence reposed in one person, who communication. Brande. Dr. Robertson is termed the trustee, for the benefit of supposes the clause in the form of an Enganother, who is called the cestui que trust; lish indictment, which, as an aggravation of and it is a confidence respecting property, the criminal's guilt, mentions his having which is thus held by the former for the assaulted a person who was "in the peace benefit of the latter. Out of this confiof God and of the king," to be borrowed from the Truce or Peace of God and of the king, (Treuga and Pax Dei, and Pax Regis.) 1 Rob. Charles V. Appendix, Note xxi. (550) title to the land." In the mean time, the ther to the person in whom the confidence cestui que trust, when in possession, is considered, in a court of law, as tenant at will to the trustee. Cruise's Dig. tit. xii. ch. 1, sec. 3. Chancellor Kent expresses the same idea, in more comprehensive terms: "A trust, in the general and enlarged sense, is a right on the part of the cestui que trust to receive the profits, and to dispose of the lands in equity." 4 Kent's Com. 304. Lord Coke's definition of a use, which has been already alluded to, may now be given. "A use is a trust or confidence reposed in some other, which is not issuing out of the land, but as a thing collateral, annexed in privity to the estate of the land, and to the person touching the land; scilicet, that cestui que use shall take the profit, and that the terre-tenant shall make an estate, according to his direction." Co. Litt. 272 b. Mr. Butler calls this "the best definition of a trust in equity." Butler's Co. Litt. Note 249, lib. 3. Mr. Lewin expressly adopts it as the definition of a trust, (though he modifies the latter part of it,) and comments on its different clauses in detail. Lewin on Trustees, 15. The language of the definition savours of the technical and antiquated learning of the times, and requires some such commentary as that of Mr. Lewin to understand it fully; but it is valuable as prominently presenting the radical idea of a confidence, which is either omitted, or indirectly alluded to, in most of the standard definitions. As to the learning of trusts in general, see 2 Story's Eq. Jur. 960-982. 4 Kent's Com. 301-313. 1 Greenleaf's Cruise's Digest, tit. xii. 1 Hilliard's Real Prop. 297-348. United States Digest, Uses and Trusts. was reposed; "use" to the person for whose benefit it was reposed. Thus, it is said by Lord Chief Baron Gilbert, " If the use be not a thing annexed to the land, it will be asked of me, what it is; to which I answer, that a use is an equitable right to have the profit of lands, the legal estate whereof is in the feoffee, according to the trust and confidence reposed in him." Gilb. Us. (by Sugden,) 374. And again, Lord Bacon remarks: "For a trust which is the way to a use, it is exceedingly well defined by a civilian of great understanding, Fides est obligatio conscientiæ unius ad intentionem alterius." Bac. Read. Uses. 1 Steph. Com. 329, note (d.) Mr. Stephen observes, that uses and trusts were in their origin closely united, but not identical. A trust was the confidence reposed by one man in another, when he invested him with the nominal ownership of property, to be dealt with in some particular manner, or held for some particular person or purpose pointed out. If the trust was of a certain description, viz. to hold land for the benefit of another person, generally, and to let him receive the profits, the sort of interest or right which consequently attached to the latter person was called a use, to distinguish it from the nominal ownership or estate of the trustee. 1 Steph. Com. 328, 329. The idea of a trust in the law of England was no doubt originally taken from the fidei-commissum (q. v.) of the Roman law; the word itself is of Teutonic origin, and may be traced back to the usages of the ancient Germans. See Trustis.
TRUnoun
Wiktionary (English) • 2026
Wiktionary contributorsCC BY-SA 4.0 • via Kaikki
Extracted and formatted for display by Law Mind. Source link opens the current Wiktionary page and its contributor history; it is not a frozen copy of this extract.
Initialism of Toys "R" Us, a now defunct American store chain.
truadj
Wiktionary (English) • 2026
Wiktionary contributorsCC BY-SA 4.0 • via Kaikki
Extracted and formatted for display by Law Mind. Source link opens the current Wiktionary page and its contributor history; it is not a frozen copy of this extract.
Abbreviation of true.

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