V

An epithet used to cast contempt and contumely on the person to whom it is applied. 2. To call a man a villain in a letter written to a third person, will entitle him to an action without proof of special damages. An opprobrious epithet, implying great moral delinquency, and equivalent to knave, rascal, or scoundrel. The word is libelous. … [Read more...] about VILLAIN

Persons who are appointed by a court to make an investigation of certain matters, or to examine a particular locality, (as, the proposed site of a new road,) and to report to the court the result of their inspection, with their opinion on the same. In old practice. Persons appointed under writs of view to testify the view. Rose Real Act. 253. … [Read more...] about VIEWERS

A person attached to a manor, who was substantially in the condition of a slave, who performed the base and servile work upon the manor for the lord, and was, in most respects, a subject of property and belonging to him. Villein in gross. A villein who was annexed to the person of the lord, and transferable by deed from one owner to another. Villein regardant. A villein annexed … [Read more...] about VILLEIN

L. Fr. In old English law. A vivum vadium or living pledge, as distin-guished from a mortgage or dead pledge. Properly, an estate given as security for a debt, the debt to be satisfied out of the rents, issues, and profits. … [Read more...] about VIF-GAGE

A servile kind of tenure belonging to lands or tenements, whereby the tenant was bound to do all such services as the lord commanded, or were fit for a vil-lein to do. Cowell. See VILLEIN. Pure villenage A base tenure, where a man holds upon terms of doing whatsoever is commanded of him, nor knows in the evening what is to be done in the morning, and is always bound to an … [Read more...] about VILLENAGE