Law or Hist. Also 5 vignee, 6 vysne. [a. AF. and OF. visné (earlier visnet: see next), f. vesin, visin, veisin (F. voisin):—L. vicīn-us neighbor: see VICINE a.]
1. A neighborhood or vicinage, esp. as the area from which a jury is summoned.
1449. Rolls of Parlt., V. 150/1. Triable by Enquest, in the same Shire and Visne where the said action shall be taken. Ibid. (1464), 565/2. Or the visnee where the seid seyser shall be had.
1531. Dial. on Laws Eng., I. vii. 15. All yssues … muste be tryed by .xii. fre & lawful men of the vysne.
1620. J. Wilkinson, Coroners & Sherifes, 3. A Coroner hath a fee belonging to his office viz. of every visne 1 d.
1625. Sir H. Finch, Law (1636), 411. In euery suit betweene an Alien and a Demesne … the one halfe of the Iurie shall be the Aliens, if so many be in that visne.
1651. trans. Kitchin’s Jurisdictions (1657), 574. The sherif returns a Jury of the Visne of D., and the new sherif returns no such visne.
1769. Blackstone, Comm., IV. xxvii. 344. The sheriff of the county must return a panel of jurors…, without just exception, and of the visne or neighbourhood.
1832. Index of Rolls of Parlt., 952/1. The Inquest taken by Men of the Visne of the County where the plaintiffs were born.
1867. Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., 714. Visne, a neighbouring place; a term often used in law in actions of marine replevin.
2. A jury summoned from the neighborhood in which the cause of action lies.
1633. Sir J. Borough, Sov. Brit. Seas (1651), 103. Replevin was brought of a Ship taken upon the wast of Scarborough … to which Mutford tooke two exceptions, one because no certaine Towne, or place was named from whence the visne should come.
1832. Sir F. Palgrave, Eng. Commw., II. 156. It did not occur to the Vehmic Judges to put the offender upon his second trial by the visne, which now forms the distinguishing characteristic of the English law.
1863. H. Cox, Instit., II. iii. 347, note. If the visne appeared on the record to be from a wrong place, it was a good ground for arresting or reversing the judgment.
† 3. = VENUE 5. Obs. rare.
1641. [see VENUE 5].
1665. Ever, Tryals per Pais, viii. 85. Where the Visne is laid to be in a City, in an Action brought in a superior Court [etc.].
1768. [see VENUE 5 b].
