ASSIZE (Lat. assidere, to sit by or near, through the Fr. assisa, a session).
In Engliah Law. A writ directed to the sheriff tor the recovery of immovable pro perty, corporeal or incorporeal. Cowel; Lit tleton, 234.
The action or proceedings in court based upon such a writ. Magna Charta, c. 12; Stat. 13 Edw. 1. (Westm. 2) c. 25; 3 Blackstone, Comm. 57, 252; Sellon, Pract. Introd. xii.
Such actions were to be tried by special courts, of which the judicial officers were justices of amine. See COURTS OF ASSIZE AND Nisi PAWS. This form of remedy is said to have been introduced by the parliament of Northampton (or • Nottingham, a.m. 1176), for the purpose of trying titles to land in a more certain and expeditious manner before com missioners appointed by the crown than before the suitors in the county court or the king's justiciary in tho Aula Regis. The action is properly a mixed action, whereby the plaintiff recovers his land and damages for the injury sustained by the disseisin. The value of the action os a means for the recovery of land led to its general adoption for that purr), se, those who had suffered injury not really amounting to a dieseisin alleging a dieseisin to entitle them selves to the remedy. The scope of the remedy was also extended so as to allow the recovery of incorporeal hereditaments, as franchises, estovers, etc. It gave place to the action of ejectment, and is now abolished, having been previously almost, if not quite, entirely disused. Stat. 3 & 4 Will. IV. o. 27, 0 36. Stearns, Real Act. 187.
A jury summoned by virtue of a writ of assize.
Such juries were said to be either Inagua (grand), consisting of sixteen members and serving to de termine the right of property, or purva (petite), consisting of twelve and serving to determine the right to possession. Mirror of Just. lib. 2.
This sense is said by Littleton and Blackstone to be the original meaning of the word. Littleton, 0 234; 3 Blackstone, Comm. 185. Coke explains it as denoting originally a session of justices ; and this explanation is sanctioned by the etymology of the word. Coke, Litt. 153 b. It seems, however, to have been early used in oll the senses here given. The reoognitors of assize (the jurors) bad the power of deciding, upon their own knowledge, without the examination of witnesses, where the issue was joined on the very point of the assize; but oollateral mat ters were tried either by a jury or by the recognitors acting as a jury, in which latter case it was said to be turned into a jury (assisa vertitur in juratum). Booth, Real Act. 213 ; Stearns, Real Act. 187; 3 Blackstone, Comm. 402. The term is no longer used, in England, to denote a jury.
The verdict or judgment of the jurors or recognitors of assize. 3 Blackstone, Comm. 57, 69.
A court composed of an assembly of knights and other substantial men, with the baron or justice, in a certain place, at an appointed time. Grand Coutum. cc. 24, 25.
An ordinance or statute. Littleton, 234; Reg. Orig. 239. Any thing reduced to a cer tainty in respect to number, quantity, quality, weight, measure, etc. 2 Sharswood, Blackst. Comm. 42; Cowel ; Spelman, Gloss. Assisa. See the articles immediately following.
In Scotch Law. The jury, consisting of fifteen men, in criminal cases tried in the court of justiciary. Paterson, Comp.; Bell, Diet.