botleas

English

Etymology

From Old English bōtlēas (unpardonable), from bōt (compensation for an injury or wrong) + -lēas (-less). Doublet of bootless.

Adjective

botleas (not comparable)

  1. (early English legal historical, of a crime) Too grievous to be atoned for by the payment of a bōt or bōte; irredeemable, unpardonable.
    • 1991, Carla Ann Hage Johnson, “Entitled to Clemency: Mercy in the Criminal Law” in Law and Philosophy X, № 1 (February 1991), page 112:
      Persons guilty of the botleas crimes had no right to any particular punishment. Thus the convicted could not “complain if a foot was taken instead of his eyes, or if he was hanged instead of beheaded”.

Anagrams


Old English

Etymology

From bōt + -lēas.

Adjective

bōtlēas

  1. Bootless, unpardonable, what cannot be redeemed, recompensed or expiated by the payment of boot.

Declension

Descendants

References

  • bótleás in Joseph Bosworth and T. Northcote Toller (1898) An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary
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