Law and the courts

This list explains no law and gives no advice; it gives the words a court report is written with. One of them is l’huissier, and it is the same word as English « usher ». Huis is an old French noun for a door, from Latin ostium, and the ostiarius was the man who kept it. Anglo-Norman carried him into English as usser, where he still shows people to their seats in a theatre or a church. French sent him into the law instead: un huissier de justice serves documents and enforces judgments, so English needs « bailiff » or « enforcement officer » for him. The door itself survives in one more French phrase, à huis clos — behind a closed door, a hearing English calls « in camera », which is the same picture built on a Latin room instead of a Latin door.