Testatum

Witnesseth."

In conveyancing, the witnessing part of a deed, — beginning, in the English form, " Now this indenture witnesseth," — is termed, from the characteristic Latin word, the testatum clause. The testatum clause in a writ was a recital that defendant was reputed to have absconded, rendering necesfact on which the writ was supposed to be based being purely fictitious.

3 Bl. Com. 283.

The practice was indirectly abolished by the common-law procedure act, 1852, which allowed execution to issue at once into any county, without reference to the county in which the venue is laid, and without any suggestion of the issuing of a prior writ into such county. In former English practice, when a writ of execution had been directed to a sheriff of a county, and that sheriff returned that there were no goods of the defendant in his bai Uwick, then a second writ, reciting this former writ and the sherifi's answer to the same, might be directed to the sheriff of some other county wherein the defendant was supposed to have goods, commanding him to make execution of the same; and this second writ was called a testatum writ, from the words in which the writ was concluded; viz., " Whereupon, on behalf of the.said plaintiff, it is testified in our said court that the said defendant has goods, &c., within your bai Uwick." Brown, -TESTE.

Witness.

This was the initial word of the concluding clause of common-law writs in Latin, which was added in attestation of the fact that the writ was issued by authority; and to that end such clause usually set forth the attestation of the sovereign, or of the chief justice of the court out of which the writ issued, the place at which and the day on which it was issued or granted. The corresponding clause in the English form is commonly called the teste; and a writ with such clause is said to be tested. Teste is a word commonly used in the last part of every writ, wherein the date is contained, beginning with the words teste meipso, meaning the sovereign, if the writ be an original writ, or be issued in the name of the sovereign; but, if the writ be a judicial writ, then the word teste is followed by the name of the chief judge of the court in which the action is brought, or, in case of a vacancy of such office, in the name of the senior puisne judge. Mozley %■ W.