Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In English law, an old writ by which a person was summoned to the King's Bench to answer, as on the supposition that he lay concealed.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (O. Eng. Law) A writ based upon the presumption that the person summoned was hiding.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun UK, law, historical A writ based upon the presumption that the person summoned was hiding.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Latin, he lies hidden.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word latitat.

Examples

  • [3603] Seldom, saith Plutarch, honesty and beauty dwell together, and oftentimes under a threadbare coat lies an excellent understanding, saepe sub attrita latitat sapientia veste.

    Anatomy of Melancholy 2007

  • If he is your Christian neighbour, he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat -- the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden. previous | next

    senorcoconut Diary Entry senorcoconut 2003

  • But he was hardly gone three steps from without the gates of their cloister when the good ladies throngingly, and as in a huddled crowd, pressing hard on the backs of one another, ran thrusting and shoving who should be first at the setting open of the forbidden box and descrying of the quod latitat within.

    Five books of the lives, heroic deeds and sayings of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel 2002

  • But he was hardly gone three steps from without the gates of their cloister when the good ladies throngingly, and as in a huddled crowd, pressing hard on the backs of one another, ran thrusting and shoving who should be first at the setting open of the forbidden box and descrying of the quod latitat within.

    Five books of the lives, heroic deeds and sayings of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel 2002

  • Musicians are but too apt to give to music's detail and music's difficulties the homage that should be paid to music's self: in this resembling the habitual man of law, who occasionally forgetteth the great principles of jurisprudence, and invests with mysterious agency such words as latitat and certiorari.

    A Love Story A Bushman

  • [17] Of these renderings the subjoined may be taken as favorable specimens: -- "Breve originale, original sinne; capias, a catch to a sad tune; alias capias, another to the same (sad tune); habeas corpus, a trooper; capias ad satisfaciend., a hangman: latitat, bo-peep; nisi prius, first come first served; demurrer, hum and haw; scandal. magnat., down with the Lords."

    A Book About Lawyers John Cordy Jeaffreson 1866

  • As for St. Dennis and OULD Nick, an attorney had his foot upon em, with an habere a latitat, and three executions hanging over 'em; and there's the end of rogues! and a great example in the country.

    The Absentee Maria Edgeworth 1808

  • St. Dennis and _Ould_ Nick, an attorney had his foot upon 'em with an habere, a latitat, and three executions hanging over 'em: and there's the end of rogues! and a great example in the country.

    Tales and Novels — Volume 06 Maria Edgeworth 1808

  • I would file my _bill of Middlesex_; or my _latitat_ with an _ac etiam_.

    The Adventures of Hugh Trevor Thomas Holcroft 1777

  • And then the latitat _supposes_ that a bill had issued, and further _supposes_ that it has been returned _non est inventus_, and moreover _supposes_ it to have been filed.

    The Adventures of Hugh Trevor Thomas Holcroft 1777

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.