latitancy

English

Etymology

From latitant +‎ -cy.

Noun

latitancy (uncountable)

1. The act or state of lying hidden, or lurking.
   • 1786, Joseph Wise, “An Exposition of the Apocalypse”, in The Town and Country Magazine:

     Her latitiancy must commence at some time, when the serpent poured such a flood out of his mouth, such vehemence of false doctrines, as to cause the true doctrines in much to submit thereto, and abscond; which is the woman's fleeing into the wilderness.

   • 1885, Robert Barnes, Fancourt Barnes, A System of Obstetric Medicine and Surgery:, page 237:

     Latitancy, or the lying in wait of the ovum and spermatozoa for each other , has an important bearing on the question .

2. Dormancy.
   • 1650, Thomas Browne, “Of the Cameleon”, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC, 3rd book, page 133:

     It cannot be denied it [the chameleon] is (if not the moſt of any) a very abſtemious animall, and ſuch as by reaſon of its frigidity, paucity of bloud, and latitancy in the winter (about which time the obſervations are often made) will long ſubſist without a viſible ſuſtentation.

   • 1813 June, Thomas Abraham Salmon, “Letter”, in The Gentleman's Magazine, volume 83, page 537:

     but being still unwilling to withhold their contents any longer from others also, either whose interest or curiosity be conceives might chance to be anyways excited by their disclosure, from their present dormant state of latitancy, to public view.

3. (law) The act of withholding information in order to avoid justiciability.
   • 1843, Jeremy Bentham, The Works - Volume 7, page 53:

     Supposing the fact of latency established, and the fact of latitancy justly inferred from it; still, under existing institutions, there exists a counter-probability by which its probative force in the character of a criminative circumstance is weakened.

   • 1873, John Cole Lowber, Thomas Sergeant, Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the English Courts, page 451:

     The allegation of a cuase for a writ of pone is a mere matter of form; as much so as the allegation of latitancy upon mesne process, or the affection of John Doe for the tenant in possession.