writ

A written order, issued by a court, ordering someone to do (or stop doing) something.

Noun

  1. A written order, issued by a court, ordering someone to do (or stop doing) something.
  2. A document ordering that an election be conducted.
  3. An order issued by the House of Lords summoning peers to the Chamber.
  4. Authority, power to enforce compliance.
    • We can't let them take advantage of the fact that there are so many areas of the world where no one's writ runs. - 2009, Stephen Gale et al., The War on Terrorism: 21st-Century Perspectives, Transaction Publishers,...
    • Within Lololand, of course, no Chinese writ runs, no Chinese magistrate holds sway, and the people, more or less divided among themselves, are under the government of their tribal chiefs. - 1913, Elizabeth Kimball...
  5. That which is written; writing.
    • Then to his hands that writ he did betake, / Which he disclosing, red thus, as the paper spake. - 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie,...
    • Babylon, so much spoken of in Holy Writ - 1603, Richard Knolles, The Generall Historie of the Turkes, […], London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC:

Origin

From Middle English writ, from Old English writ and ġewrit (“writing”), from Proto-Germanic *writą (“fissure, writing”), from Proto-Indo-European *wrey-, *wrī- (“to scratch, carve, ingrave”). Cognate with Scots writ (“writ, writing, handwriting”), Icelandic rit (“writing, writ, literary work, publication”).

Forms

writs

Synonyms

claim form

Derived

drop the writ handwrit Holy Writ prerogative writ proverbs should be writ in pairs writ of assistance writ of attachment writ of execution writ of habeas corpus writ of inquiry writ of mandamus writ of privilege writ of prohibition writ of right writ of summons writ-room

Verb

  1. simple past of write
    • I know the hand, in faith tis a faire hand, And whiter then the paper it writ on, Is the faire hand that writ. - c. 1596–1598 (date written), W[illiam] Shakespeare, The Excellent History of the Merchant of Venice. […]...
    • Lou's not Times foole, though roſie lips and cheeks VVithin his bending ſickles compaſſe come, Loue alters not with his breefe houres and vveekes, But beares it out euen to the edge of doome: If this be error and vpon...
  2. past participle of write up
    • I know the hand, in faith tis a faire hand, And whiter then the paper it writ on, Is the faire hand that writ. - c. 1596–1598 (date written), W[illiam] Shakespeare, The Excellent History of the Merchant of Venice. […]...
    • Let Virtuoſo’s in five years be Writ; / Yet not one Thought accuſe thy toil of Wit. - c. 1678 (date written; published 1682), J[ohn] Dryden, “Mac Flecknoe”, in Mac Flecknoe: A Poem. […] With Spencer’s Ghost: Being a...
    • For as this is the Liquor of modern Hiſtorians, nay, perhaps their Muſe, if we may believe the Opinion of Butler, who attributes Inſpiration to Ale, it ought likewiſe to be the Potation of their Readers; ſince every...

Origin

From Middle English writ, write, from Old English write.

Derived

underwrit writ large writ small