Definition
An archaic Law French adverb meaning "thus" or "in like manner." The term appears in early legal records and pleadings written in Law French, functioning as a connective word used to indicate that what follows corresponds to, mirrors, or is to be understood in the same way as what preceded it. It carries no independent substantive legal meaning; its significance is purely grammatical and contextual within the documents in which it appears.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers encountering this term will find it almost exclusively in medieval and early modern English legal records — plea rolls, year books, and formal pleadings drafted in Law French before that language was displaced from English legal practice by statute in the mid-seventeenth century. Because *ycement* functions as a function word rather than a term of art, its presence in a document is not itself legally significant, but misreading or overlooking it can distort the meaning of a passage. The word signals parallelism or equivalence between clauses, and failing to recognize it may cause a researcher to miss that two conditions, acts, or parties are being treated identically by the drafter. When transcribing or translating Law French sources, this term is a flag to look backward in the text for the antecedent to which the current clause is being equated.
Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's Law Dictionary provides the entirety of the recorded definitional tradition for this term, citing Kelham's *Dictionary of the Norman or Old French Language* (1779) as the underlying source. Burrill's entry is minimal: "L. Fr. Thus; in like manner." This brevity is appropriate given the word's grammatical rather than doctrinal character. No substantive divergence exists across historical sources because the sources are effectively singular — Kelham observed the term in primary records, Burrill transmitted it. Researchers should note that the historical dictionaries do not place this term in any doctrinal context, which itself confirms that *ycement* was a linguistic vehicle, not a legal concept with independent content.
Jurisdictional Note
The term is specific to the English common law tradition and its Law French documentary heritage. It has no presence in civil law, Scots law, or American legal materials outside of direct quotation from medieval English sources.