Mozley and Whiteley’s Law Dictionary

Mozley and Whiteley’s Law Dictionary

Mozley and Whiteley’s Law Dictionary is basically a Legal dictionary for students of law. In fact, the 13th edition has the only title of “The Law Student’s Dictionary”. Therefore, the last edition with the name “Mozley and Whiteley’s Law Dictionary” was the 12th edition (of 2001). It is a handy piece of reference which covers essentially English legal terminology.

The purpose of this Legal dictionary remains across the time the same as that was stated in the Preface to the First Edition, which says:

“The primary object of this Work is to give an exposition of legal terms and phrases of past and present use. But, as the mere exposition of a word or phrase would often be barren and unsatis-
factory, we have in many cases, especially when dealing with the legal terms of the present day, added an exposition of the law bearing upon the subject-matter of the Title.

To many of the Titles which have reference to the historical portions of the law, we have appended the law-Latin or Norman-French words which were used as their equivalents by the mediaeval
lawyers when writing (as they often did) in one or other of those languages respectively.”

Through the different editions a large number of entries have been revised. This was due to various consolidating statutes, and the fact that some statutes had enacted completely new law.

Preface to First Edition (1876)

“There is a difference in the practice of lexicographers as to the order of Titles consisting of more than one word. Some place the order according to the letters of the Title considered as a whole;
others regulate the order by the letters of the first word. This being so, it may be as well to state that we have adopted the latter principle. Thus, “Writ of Bight” has precedence over “Writer to
the Signet,” because “Writ”would precede “Writer”if the words stood alone, notwithstanding that “e”(the fifth letter in “writer”) precedes in the alphabet “o”(the first letter of “of “).

We append to this Preface a list of the abbreviations used in the course of the Book. We do not in this list include authorities which are referred to in full, nor any series of Legal Reports. A catalogue
of all the Reports, with the abbreviations generally used to denote them, will be found under the Title “Reports”(Note: this list is shorter than the reports provide by some other english legal dictionaries, like Osborne’s Concise Law Dictionary). Moreover, the names of the principal current series are included in the Titles of the Dictionary.”

Preface to Second Edition (1904)

“This Edition has been thoroughly revised and the work in part re-written. Since the publication of the First Edition a large number of Statutes of first-rate importance have been enacted. The
provisions of these Statutes and the effect of numerous important judicial decisions have necessitated many alterations in the text.

It has been the object of the Editors to produce a Law Dictionary suitable for students and practitioners. Many Titles relating to obsolete subjects have been omitted; the matter relating to others has been compressed; Scotch and Indian words, for the most part, have been omitted. On the other hand, many new Titles have been introduced, and translations of Latin maxims and phrases have been added.

It is hoped that these alterations will render the book more practically useful.”

Tenth Edition (1988)

This edition was (slightly) bought up to date under the editorship of E.R. Hardy Ivamy, which was barrister and Professor of Law in the University of London. It was not hugue (511 pages) but it included all essential legal useful information.

See Also

Conclusion

Notes

References and Further Reading

About the Author/s and Reviewer/s

Author: international

Mentioned in these Entries

A Selection of Legal Maxims, Bouvier’s Law Dictionary and Institutes of American Law, Bouvier’s Law Dictionary and Concise Encyclopedia, 1914, Dictionary of International and Comparative Law, International Law: A Dictionary, Law Dictionaries, Legal dictionary, List of Legal Dictionaries, Parry and Grant Encyclopaedic Dictionary of International Law.

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