AMERCEMENT or AMERCIAMENT, in English law, an arbitrary pecuniary penalty, inflicted in old days on an offender by the peers or equals of the party amerced. The word has in modern times become practically a poetical synonym for fine or deprivation. But an amercement differed from a fixed fine, prescribed by statute, by reason of its arbitrary nature; it repre sented a commutation of a sentence of forfeiture of goods, while a fine was originally a composition agreed upon between the judge and the prisoner to avoid imprisonment. The assessment of an amercement was termed an a ff eerment. In the lower courts the amercement was offered by a jury of the offender's neighbours (aff eerors) ; in the superior courts by the coroner, except in the case of officers of the court, when the amount was affeered by the judges themselves. All judgments were entered on the court roll as "in mercy" (sit in misericordia) . Articles 20 to 22 of Magna Charta regulated the assessment of amercements.
See Stephen, Hist. Crim. Law; Pollock and Maitland, Hist. Eng. Law; McKechnie, Magna Carta.