corvée

American  

[kawr-vey] / kɔrˈveɪ /

noun

1. unpaid labor for one day, as on the repair of roads, exacted by a feudal lord.

2. an obligation imposed on inhabitants of a district to perform services, as repair of roads, bridges, etc., for little or no remuneration.

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corvée British  

/ ˈkɔːveɪ /

noun

1. European history a day's unpaid labour owed by a feudal vassal to his lord

2. the practice or an instance of forced labour

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Etymology

Origin of corvée

1300–50; Middle English < Middle French < Late Latin corrogāta contribution, collection, noun use of feminine of Latin corrogātus (past participle of corrogāre to collect by asking), equivalent to cor- cor- + rogā ( re ) to ask + -tus past participle suffix

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

corvée

To do so, they resurrected corvée, a 19th-century Haitian law for indentured labor.

From New York Times ● May 20, 2022

Their arrangement in horizontal courses or grouping at stated intervals, into those lines of battlements with which every wall was crowned, was done by the men of the corvée.

From A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria, v. 1 by Sir Walter Armstrong

“It narrates dramatically the outstanding episodes; the perilous corvée of bringing up fresh supplies of cartridges, the digging of an advance trench under fire, the pinioning of a comrade suddenly seized with dementia.”

From The Jervaise Comedy by J. D. (John Davys) Beresford

Whether the penalty of imprisonment with hard labor was ever inflicted is questionable; in a country where slavery existed and the corvée was in force there would have been but little need for it.

From Babylonians and Assyrians, Life and Customs by A. H. (Archibald Henry) Sayce

Mr. Burbidge secured one, a Grammatophyllum, ‘as big as a Pickford’s van,’ which a corvée of Dyaks could not lift.

From The Woodlands Orchids by Frederick Boyle