Amerce

Amerce - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

AMERCE, v.t. amers'. [A verb formed from a for on or at, from L. merces, reward.]

1. To inflict a penalty at mercy; to punish by a pecuniary penalty, the amount of which is not fixed by law, but left to the discretion or mercy of the court; as, the court amerced the criminal in the sum of one hundred dollars.

2. To inflict a pecuniary penalty; to punish in general. Milton uses of after amerce; ""Millions of spirits amerced of heaven;"" but this use seems to be a poetic license.

a-murs': Found in the King James Version only in De 22:19, "And they shall amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver." Amerce is a legal term derived from the French (a = "at"; merci = "mercy," i.e. literally, "at the mercy" (of the court)). Here it is used of the imposing of a fine, according to the Law of Moses, upon the man who has been proven by the Elders to have brought a false charge against the virginity of the maid he has married by saying to the father, "I found not thy daughter a maid."