estreat means A true copy, duplicate, or extract of an original writing or record, especially of amercements or penalties set down in the rolls of court to be levied by the bailiff, or other officer. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 88 out of 100.
Why this word is great
ESTREAT — [Noun, Verb] A true copy or extract of an original court record, particularly of penalties to be levied, or the act of enforcing such penalties by extracting the record. From Old French estrete ("an extract"), from Latin extractum ("drawn out"), past participle of extrahere ("to draw out"). Unlike a "transcript" (a mere reproduction, neutral and unburdened by consequence) or a "forfeit" (the abstract loss itself), an estreat is the cold machinery of justice made manifest—the clerk’s quill scratching names into a ledger, the bailiff’s heavy tread on a debtor’s threshold, the wax seal pressed upon a summons like a verdict already decided. It is the moment when the law, so often theoretical, becomes inescapably real.
noun
- A true copy, duplicate, or extract of an original writing or record, especially of amercements or penalties set down in the rolls of court to be levied by the bailiff, or other officer.“If the crime reached onely to ſhamefull penance, […] then might that penance be reduced to a ranſome, according to the graine of the offence aſſeſſed in the preſence of a Judge by the free men, and entered upon the roll, and the eſtreat of each ranſome ſeverally and apart ſent to the Sheriffe.”
verb
- To extract or take out from the records of a court, and send up to the court of exchequer to be enforced; said of a forfeited recognizance.
- To bring in to the exchequer, as a fine.