Legal Definitions - dalus

The term dalus is a historical legal term that referred to two distinct but related concepts concerning land.

• Historically, it could denote a natural depression in the land, such as a small valley or a ditch.
• More specifically in an agricultural context, it referred to a narrow strip of unplowed pasture land situated between two cultivated furrows or fields.

Examples:

• Example 1 (Land Strip): In a 13th-century English village, two farmers, Thomas and John, had adjoining fields where wheat was cultivated. The boundary between their plots was not a fence but a narrow, unplowed strip of grass, perhaps wide enough for a single person to walk or for a single animal to graze. This strip was historically known as a dalus, serving as a clear demarcation between their respective cultivated lands.

  Explanation: This scenario illustrates the agricultural meaning of dalus as a thin strip of pasture land located specifically between two plowed areas, functioning as a boundary or a small communal resource within a farming landscape.

• Example 2 (Dale or Ditch as a Boundary): A medieval land deed from the 15th century described the boundaries of a newly granted estate. One boundary marker was stated as "running eastward from the ancient oak to the great dalus." In this context, the dalus referred to a significant natural ditch or a small, shallow valley that formed a clear and recognizable demarcation line for the property, rather than a cultivated strip.

  Explanation: Here, dalus is used in its broader sense to describe a natural geographical feature—a ditch or a small dale—that historically served as a prominent and legally recognized boundary marker for land ownership, distinguishing it from the more specific agricultural strip.