Obs. [a. OF. conestablerie, f. conestable (cf. med.L. constabulāria): see -ERY.]
1. The office of a constable; constableship.
c. 1400. Rom. Rose, 4218. Thanne Drede hadde in hir baillie The kepyng of the conestablere [F. connestablie] Toward the north.
c. 1450. Merlin, xxi. 373. Gawein … ye will take the Constabilrie of myn housolde.
1494. Fabyan, Chron., VII. 647. The constablery of Fraunce.
1540. Act 32 Hen. VIII., c. 48. Holden … of the constablery of the same castel..
2. The district under a constable; a constablewick.
1610. N. Riding Rec. Soc., I. 201. John Harland, living within the constablery of Spaunton.
1690. Royal Proclam., in Lond. Gaz., No. 2568/2. In Their several Parishes, Hamlets, Constableries, and Divisions respectively.
1762. trans. Busching’s Syst. Geog., III. 417. East Lothian, or the constablery of Haddington.
