avourie

Middle English

Alternative forms

• avouerie, avowerie, avoerie, advourie

Etymology

Borrowed from Old French avoerie, avouerie, from avoer (“avow”), from Latin advocō (“call, console”).

Noun

avourie (plural avouries)

1. (law) acknowledgment (as of a child, of property)
2. (law) avowry (act of justifying distraint)
3. protection, patronage
   • c. 1302, “Song on the Flemish Insurrection”, in Thomas Wright, editor, The Political Songs of England, from the Reign of John to that of Edward II., published 1839, page 189:

     Y telle ou for sothe, for al huere bobaunce, / Ne for the avowerie of the Kyng of France / Tuenti score ant fyve haden their meschaunce by day ant eke by nyht.

     I tell you for truth, for all their boasting, / and despite the patronage of the King of France, / twenty score and five had their mischance, by day and also by night.

4. protector, patron saint
5. authorization
6. (ecclesiastical) advowson

Descendants

• English: avowry, advowry

References

• “avǒu(e)rīe, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.