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Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

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First published 1968 (SND Vol. VII).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

PRESCRIBE, v. Sc. Law usages:

1. intr. Of an action or the like: to become invalid through the passage of time, to lapse, lose validity; of a debt, etc.: to be immune from prosecution through lapse of time. Also transf. as in 1847 quot.Sc. 1722 W. Forbes Institutes I. II. 64:
Some things prescribe in 40, some in 20, some in 13, some in 10, some in 5, some in 4, and others in 3 Years.Sc. 1751 D. Hume Of Justice in Essays and Treatises on Several Subjects (1758) 415:
Bills of exchange and promissory notes, by the laws of most countries, prescribe sooner than bonds, and mortgages.Sc. 1754 Erskine Principles iii. vii. § 19:
Interruptions, by citation upon libelled summonses, where they are not used by a minor, prescribe, if not renewed every seven years.Sc. 1838 W. Bell Dict. Law Scot. 773:
By the act 1579, c. 82, actions of removing prescribe within three years from the term at which the tenant has been warned to remove.Sc. 1847 T. De Quincey Selections (1853) III. 37:
The grasp of the church never relaxed, never “prescribed”, unless freely and by choice.Sc. 1874 Act 37 & 38 Vict. c. 94 § 42:
All inhibitions . . . shall prescribe on the lapse of five years from the date.Sc. 1904 A. M. Anderson Criminal Law 248:
There is nothing in the common law of Scotland to support the view that crimes ever prescribe.

Derivs.: (1) prescriptibility, n., liability to prescribe or lapse, the state of being subject to prescription, see (2) below; (2) prescription, n., the limitation to a certain number of years of the period of time in which a right may be established or a debt or obligation annulled if unchallenged or unclaimed. Hence negative prescription, positive — (see 1838 quot.), triennial —, quinquennial —, sexennial —, septennial —, decennial —, vicennial — (Sc. 1946 A. D. Gibb Legal Terms 67); (3) prescriptive, adj., arising from prescription or lapse of time, freq. in combs. prescriptive right, prescriptive title, etc.(1) Sc. 1732 Kames Decisions (1766) 7:
Whatever argument can be moved against the prescriptibility of such a right by an incorporation.(2) Sc. 1703 Morison Decisions 10657:
An obvious defence of prescription arising from the bond dated in 1661, and no pursuit for it till 1702, being 40 years thereafter.Sc. 1754 Erskine Principles iii. vii. § 6:
Servants' fees, house-rents, men's ordinaries, (i.e. money due for board), and merchants' accounts, fall under the triennial prescription.Sc. 1757 New Letters D. Hume (Klibansky & Mossner 1954) 41:
I believe it is a Rule in Law, that any Summons prevents Prescription.Sc. 1823 Scott St. Ronan's W. viii.:
It is a great shame, St. Ronan's, that the game laws . . . rin sae short a course of prescription — a poacher may just jink ye back and forward like a flea in a blanket.Sc. 1838 W. Bell Dict. Law Scot. 766:
Prescription has been said by lawyers to be a method both of acquiring and losing a right. Hence it has been divided into positive and negative; the former being the mode of acquiring property, or rather of protecting the right from farther challenge, by reason of the possessor's having continued his possession for the legal period: the latter, which is the converse of the former, is the loss of a right by neglecting to follow it forth, or use it during the whole time limited by law.Sc. 1896 W. K. Morton Manual 375:
Sexennial Prescription — By an Act of 1772, Bills and Promissory Notes are declared to prescribe in six years from the term of payment, so that they are ineffectual as grounds of action. The result is, that after six years the creditor cannot use a bill as evidence of his claim.Sc. 1927 Gloag & Henderson Intro. Law Scot. 131:
Under the term prescription are included various rules of law, having in common the element of the effect of lapse of time, but differing widely as to their scope and effect. They may be considered under six heads — (1) and (2) The effect of continued possession in (a) fortifying a title to land, and (b) determining the extent of an estate the title to which is not questioned. These heads fall under positive prescription; (3) Negative prescription, the extinction of obligations: (4) The septennial limitation of cautionary obligations; (5) Prescriptions limiting the methods of proof; (6) Prescriptions referring to obligatory documents.Sc. 1939 Session Cases 40:
The defender pleaded that the obligation contained in that bond had been extinguished by prescription.Sc. 1958 Intro. Sc. Legal History (Stair Soc.) 444:
[In 1934] a majority held that the vicennial prescription of Roman Law was not and never had been part of Scots law.(3) Sc. 1838 W. Bell Dict. Law Scot. 774–5:
A remote heir-substitute is not entitled to have his minority deducted during the part of the prescription period during which he has no immediate right to the estate . . . Where possession has been abandoned by the person claiming on a prescriptive title, or where possession has been taken from him, although he has a second time acquired possession, he cannot connect the two periods.Sc. 1876 J. Grant Burgh Schools 182:
The ancient holiday, to which the scholars believed they had aquired a prescriptive title from immemorial usage.Sc. 1927 Gloag & Henderson Intro. Law Scot. 132:
A title may be fortified by prescriptive possession although the adverse right was a grant by the possessor himself or his predecessor in title.Sc. 1947 Scotsman (8 July):
The decree of general service formed a valid link of title in a prescriptive progress of titles.

2. tr. To make or declare invalid through lapse of time.Sc. 1711 Morison Decisions 10722:
Jean Gordon's liferent right is prescribed, no action having been raised, nor document taken thereon for 40 years after Duncan Cuming her husband's decease.Sc. 1823 Scott St. Ronan's W. viii.:
“Could you not take up the action again?” said Mr Mowbray. “Whew, it's been prescribed sax or seeven year syne.”