bailiff-errant

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English[edit]

Noun[edit]

bailiff-errant (plural bailiffs-errant)

  1. (now historical) An official employed by the sheriff to carry out summonses, writs etc. within the county.
    • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book VI, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
      The warrant straight was made, and therewithall / A Baylieffe-errant forth in post did passe […].
    • 1727, The Compleat Sheriff, page 311:
      This Return is not good, because this Arrest is the proper Arrest of the Sheriff, and no Credit is to be given to the Bailiff errant.
    • 2007, David Roffe, Decoding Domesday, page 122:
      In 1219, Gilbert le Gluton held land and an oven in Nottingham by sergeancy as a royal bailiff errant.
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