Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun In Anglo-Saxon law, the morsel of choosing or selection, being a piece of bread consecrated by exorcism and caused to be swallowed by a suspected person as a trial of his innocence.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (AS. Laws) The morsel of execration; a species of ordeal consisting in the eating of a piece of bread consecrated by imprecation. If the suspected person ate it freely, he was pronounced innocent; but if it stuck in his throat, it was considered as a proof of his guilt.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun law, obsolete The
morsel ofexecration ; anordeal consisting of theeating of a piece ofbread consecrated byimprecation . If the suspected person ate it freely, he was pronouncedinnocent ; but if it stuck in his throat, it was considered as a proof of hisguilt .
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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A consecrated cake, called a corsned, was produced, which if the person could swallow and digest, he was pronounced innocent. [
The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part A. From the Britons of Early Times to King John David Hume 1743
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So it was once thought that a perjurer could not swallow a piece of sacramental bread; but, the fear that made the swallowing difficult having passed away, the appeal to the corsned was abolished.
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. Interviews Robert Green Ingersoll 1866
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These were, the oath upon the evangelists; the ordeal of the cross and the fire ordeal, for persons in the higher ranks; the water ordeal, for the humbler classes; and, lastly, the _corsned_, or bread and cheese ordeal, for members of their own body.
Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Charles Mackay 1851
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History records no instance of the choking of any priest in this ordeal, but there is a story that the Saxon Earl Godwin of Kent took the _corsned_ to clear himself of a charge of murder, and (being a layman) was choked.
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The priest who took the ordeal by _corsned_ received a bit of bread or a bit of cheese which was loaded heavily, by way of sauce, with curses upon whomsoever should eat it falsely.
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But I have not the least idea that _corsned_ killed him.
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Hindostan, theft is often enquired into by causing the suspected party to chew some dry rice or rice flour, which has some very strong curses stirred into it, _corsned_ fashion.
sionnach commented on the word corsned
In old English law, this was the name for "ordeal by swallowing a piece of bread or cheese." If it stuck in the throat, that proved guilt. The morsel was "consecrated by exorcism" and was known as panis coniuratus (sworn bread).
"Corsned or morsel of execration: being a piece of cheese or bread, of about an ounce in weight, which was consecrated with a form of exorcism; desiring of the Almighty that it might cause convulsions and paleness, and find no passage, if the man was really guilty; but might turn to health and nourishment, if he was innocent." (Sir William Blackstone: Commentaries, 1769)
July 28, 2008
bilby commented on the word corsned
Now this really is a curio. Fascinating ... and fun to envision a kind of red Leicester depth charge sanctified as polygraph.
July 28, 2008