Legal Term: AIDS

Definition: Engl. law. Formerly they were certain sums of money granted by the tenant to his lord in times of difficulty and distress, but, as usual in such cases, what was received as a gratuity by the rich and powerful from the weak and poor, was soon claimed as a matter of right, and aids became a species of tax to be paid by the tenant to his lord, in these cases: 1. To ransom the lord"s person, when taken priisoner, 2. To make the lord"s eldest son a knight, - 3. To marry the lord"s eldest daughter, by giving her a suitable portion. The first of these remained uncertain, the other two were fixed by act of parliament at twenty shillings each being the supposed twentieth part of a knight"s fee, 2 Bl. Com. 64.

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