Definition
An archaic Law French term meaning "all," understood to be a corruption of *touts*. Appears in the compound phrase *tus jours*, meaning "forever" or "always." The term has no independent legal significance in modern usage but surfaces in historical legal texts and instruments, particularly in property conveyances and formulaic expressions of perpetual grant or right.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers encountering *tus* in historical documents should recognize it immediately as a phonetic or scribal variant of the Law French *touts*, not a distinct legal concept. Its primary research relevance is terminological: misreading *tus* as an unfamiliar technical term can send a researcher down a false trail. The phrase *tus jours*—equivalent to the more familiar Law French *toujours*—appears in older English common law instruments and Year Book materials as a shorthand expression of perpetual entitlement or continuous obligation. When transcribing or indexing manuscript sources, scribal variation between *tus*, *touts*, and *toujours* is common, and the terms should be treated as interchangeable in context. The word is unlikely to appear in any post-seventeenth-century printed legal material except as a historical quotation.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary provides the entry's entire evidentiary base, citing Kelham's *Dictionary of the Norman or Old French Language* (1779) as authority for the *touts* derivation. Burrill offers no case authority and no extended analysis—correctly so, as the term is a glossary entry rather than a substantive legal concept. No other standard historical law dictionaries (Jacob, Tomlin, Bouvier, Black) carry a separate entry for *tus*, which itself confirms that the term was recognized even by historical lexicographers as a minor scribal variant rather than a term of art. Kelham's work remains the appropriate primary source for researchers needing to trace the Norman French root.