amerce
Americanverb (used with object)
-
to punish by imposing a fine not fixed by statute.
-
to punish by inflicting any discretionary or arbitrary penalty.
verb
-
law to punish by a fine
-
to punish with any arbitrary penalty
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of amerce
1250–1300; Middle English amercy < Anglo-French amerci ( er ) to fine, representing ( estre ) a merci (to be) at (someone's) mercy. See a- 5, mercy
Explanation
To amerce is to impose a fine on someone as punishment. During the Middle Ages, the King might amerce you if you trespassed on his land to retrieve a lost ball. The word amerce was more common in medieval times, although it's still used in a legal context, along with amercement. Today when a court amerces someone, it legally orders them to pay a fine after finding them guilty of wrongdoing. The word comes from the French a merci, or "at the mercy," referring to the fact that a person facing amercement is at the mercy of the court.
Vocabulary lists containing amerce
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Searching those edges of the universe, We leave the central fields a fallow part; To feed the eye more precious things amerce, And starve the darkened heart.
From Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I. by Jean Ingelow
One came whose art men’s dread of are repressed: Mangled and writhing limb he lulled to rest, And stingless left the old Semitic curse; Him, too, for these blest gifts did Zeus amerce?
From Sir James Young Simpson and Chloroform (1811-1870) Masters of Medicine by Henry Laing Gordon
"Nay, but they will hold thee to ransom, and detain thee till it is brought: I heard them amerce thee at a thousand marks."
From The House of Walderne A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars by A. D. (Augustine David) Crake
I amerce myself, then, to you in that sum; and they will be sufficient sureties for the money.
From Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Socrates by Henry Cary
But Plato here, O Athenians! and Crito Critobulus, and Apollodorus bid me amerce myself in thirty minæ, and they offer to be sureties.
From Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Socrates by Henry Cary
Shall by him be amerced with penance due.
From Webster's Unabridged Dictionary by Noah Webster
A clerk shall not be amerced in respect of his lay holding except after the manner of the others aforesaid; further, he shall not be amerced in accordance with the extent of his ecclesiastical benefice.
From The Magna Carta by Anonymous
At the Kirk Session of St. Cuthbert’s, held on June 18, 1640, it was decided that every snuff-taker in church be amerced in “twenty shillings for everie falt.”
From England in the Days of Old by William Andrews
A peer can be amerced only by his peers, and never to any greater amount than five pounds, excepting in the case of a duke, who can be amerced ten.
From The Man Who Laughs by Victor Hugo
That knowledge thine,Thou hadst not left thy son amerced of prayer,And given him tears, not succour.”
From The Legends of Saint Patrick by Aubrey De Vere
One of their measures has been questioned as unwise and impolitic—that, namely, for amercing and confiscating the estates of certain of the loyalists, and for banishing the most obnoxious among them.
From The Life of Francis Marion by William Gilmore Simms
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
