Definition
An adverb used in criminal pleading and indictments to signify that an act was committed by force, forcibly, or with violence. In legal usage, the term is not merely descriptive of manner but serves a specific charging function: it signals that the degree of force applied was sufficient to constitute a legally cognizable element of the offense alleged — particularly offenses involving forcible taking, assault, or crimes requiring proof of physical compulsion.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): "In a violent manner. To an intense degree; extremely; strongly; intensely."
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): "In a violent manner."
The legal gap here is narrow but real. In ordinary usage, "violently" can be hyperbolic or intensifying — a door slammed violently, a storm struck violently — without implying legally cognizable force. In criminal pleading, the word carries a technical weight: its inclusion (or omission) in an indictment was historically treated as a question of sufficiency, not mere style.
Common Confusion
"Violently" is sometimes conflated with "forcibly" in historical pleading practice, as though the two were interchangeable. They are functionally similar but not identical. "Forcibly" speaks to the application of physical force; "violently" implies both force and a degree of intensity or compulsion. In robbery indictments specifically, courts historically debated whether "violently" was a necessary term of art or whether other language — such as "feloniously and against the will" — could substitute. Bouvier notes that the word was "formerly supposed to be necessary" for robbery charges but was ultimately held unnecessary. Researchers should not assume that the presence or absence of the word in historical indictments is determinative of the offense charged.
Why It Matters in Research
This is primarily a pleading term, and its significance is historical rather than substantive. Researchers working in early American or English criminal records — particularly robbery, rape, and assault indictments — will encounter "violently" as boilerplate language whose legal necessity was actively debated in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The trajectory moves from required to merely conventional to optional, and that shift is not uniform across jurisdictions or time periods.
Two research traps: First, the presence of "violently" in a historical indictment does not reliably indicate that actual violence occurred — it may simply reflect pleading convention. Second, the absence of "violently" in a historical indictment should not be read as evidence that the act was non-violent. By the mid-19th century, courts in multiple states had already held the word unnecessary if the indictment otherwise alleged the essential elements of the offense.
Researchers examining sufficiency-of-indictment cases from the antebellum period should note that "violently" was part of a cluster of adverbial pleading terms — including "forcibly," "feloniously," and "unlawfully" — each of which had its own contested necessity. These terms appear together frequently in primary sources but were analyzed separately by courts, which can complicate searches indexed by offense type rather than pleading language.
Historical Dictionary Support
All three source dictionaries agree on the core definition: "violently" means by the use of force, forcibly, or with violence, and its primary legal relevance is as a term used in indictments for certain offenses. The dictionaries diverge on emphasis.
Black's (both editions) is brief and functional, treating "violently" as a pleading adverb without extended analysis. The 2nd edition adds case citations — State v. Blake (Maine), State v. Williams (Louisiana), Craig v. State (Indiana) — suggesting that by the time of that edition, the term's sufficiency had become a matter of active appellate litigation rather than settled drafting convention.
Bouvier is more instructive and more candid about the term's contested status. He frames it explicitly as a term "formerly supposed to be necessary" but since "holden unnecessary," and points to the substitutability of "feloniously and against the will" for robbery indictments. Bouvier's entry also notes the separate question of averring "putting in fear" — a distinct element in robbery that is often pleaded alongside "violently" but serves a different legal function.
What the historical dictionaries collectively miss is any discussion of how courts analyzed "violently" as a substantive element rather than a pleading convention — that is, when the degree of force actually matters to the offense definition, not just to the indictment's formal sufficiency.
Jurisdictional Note
The necessity of "violently" in criminal indictments was resolved differently across American jurisdictions and was largely a settled question by the late 19th century, with most courts treating it as surplusage when other adequate language appeared. Louisiana and Indiana cases cited in Black's 2nd edition suggest active litigation on the issue in those states specifically. Researchers should not assume uniform treatment in early state practice.