Definition
In old legal records, YEME means winter. It appears in medieval Latin-influenced documents as a corruption of the Latin "hieme" (ablative of hiems, meaning winter), used to designate a seasonal point in time — most commonly in connection with a feast day or term of obligation. The formula "in yeme" functions as a temporal marker, equivalent to "in winter," and appears in documents fixing dates for rent payments, service obligations, or other seasonal legal duties.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To keep, to observe, to pay attention.
Historical common usage: Not recorded in Webster's 1913 under this spelling.
The gap here is complete rather than partial. The common English verb "yeme" — meaning to attend to or observe — shares no functional relationship with the legal record usage. A researcher encountering "yeme" in an old document should not import any sense of attention or obligation from the verb form. The legal use is purely calendrical.
Common Confusion
YEME should not be confused with related archaic terms appearing in proximity in old records. Burrill's entry places YEME alongside YL (a Law French contraction meaning "he" or "it," used in phrases such as "yl semble," meaning "it seems") and YO or JOE (Law French for "water"). These terms appear in similar manuscript contexts and similar abbreviation patterns, creating potential for misreading. A copyist or transcriber working with degraded or abbreviated medieval records could conflate these forms. YEME is also distinct from YEMIS, the genitive form (hiemis), which appears in Fleta and functions as a modifier rather than as an ablative phrase.
Why It Matters in Research
YEME is a narrow but real paleographic hazard in research involving medieval English land records, manorial rolls, and ecclesiastical tenure documents. Its primary research significance is identification: a researcher who does not recognize the word risks misreading a temporal obligation as something else entirely, or failing to parse the document's operative date structure.
The feast of St. Martin (Martinmas, November 11) was one of the standard English quarter days and a common anchor point for rent and service obligations. "Ad festum S. Martini, in yeme" — at the feast of St. Martin, in winter — is thus a conventional dating formula, not an unusual usage. Researchers working in manorial records, cartularies, or plea rolls from the twelfth through fifteenth centuries may encounter it as a stock phrase.
Because YEME is a phonetic corruption of a Latin ablative, it may appear with variant spellings across different scriptoria and time periods. Researchers should not expect consistent orthography. The underlying Latin hiems provides the interpretive anchor when spelling varies.
This term has essentially no modern legal relevance. Its research value is limited to historical document work, paleography, and the interpretation of archaic tenure instruments.
Historical Dictionary Support
The three source dictionaries are in full agreement on the core definition: YEME means winter in old records and derives from the Latin hieme or hiems. Black's first and second editions offer spare definitions. Burrill is the more useful source, providing the exemplary formula ("ad festum S. Martini, in yeme") and a cross-reference to Fleta (lib. 2, c. 73) for the Latinized form yemis. Burrill also notes Cowell and Kelham as authorities, situating the word within the broader tradition of Law French and medieval Latin glossography.
None of the dictionaries address spelling variation, which is a practical gap for researchers working directly with manuscript sources. The connection to Martinmas is supplied only by Burrill and is genuinely useful context that the Black's entries omit.