peck
a Scots measure of dry capacity. A quarter of the firlot was a peck (possibly from the word ‘pack’ or else from the French picotin, meaning a ‘peck’, or the Latin picotus, a liquid measure). See Dry Capacity for details.
Your Scottish Archives Glossary
The Your Scottish Archives Glossary defines archaic words and phrases, mostly Scots law terminology, commonly found in documents and records in Scotland’s archives. If you think a word or phrase should be added to the glossary, or an existing entry could be defined better, please contact us at your@scottisharchives.org.uk.
You can also use the Dictionary of the Scots Language as a further resource at https://dsl.ac.uk/ for Scots words and phrases (including legal terminology).
To find a term within the glossary, click on the initial letter of the word you are looking for, then select the relevant syllable segment displayed below.
Example: to find the term “roup” select section “R” then sub-section “Ro”
pendicle
a small piece of ground, usually attached to a building or separated from the rest of a property in some way.
Pentecost
more often used than the alternative name, Whitsun or Whitsunday – the seventh Sunday after Easter, but fixed in 1693 for term purposes as 15 May; it was one of the two terms of the year on which rents fell due and when contracts, leases and tacks began and ended. The other term was Martinmas.
permutation
the equivalent of excambion in heritable property; this is the exchange of one piece of moveable property for another (therefore a posh word for barter)
personal papers (or family papers)
records created or generated by an individual or family in the course of their private lives, such as correspondence, certificates, diaries or other personal material.
petitioner
someone who brings an action before a court, i.e. petitions the court.