Forms: 6 bayly-, 6–7 bali-, 7 balli-, bayli-, baily-, 8– baill-, bail-, bailliage. [a. F. bailliage (= Pr. bailiatge, Sp. bailiage), f. bailli: see BAILIFF and -AGE. Made in med.L. baill(i)agium, baliaticum, but answering to a L. type *bājulīvāticum.]
1. The jurisdiction or district of a bailiff; formerly sometimes applied to an English bailiwick, but now only to that of a French or Swiss bailli, or other foreign prefecture.
1513. Earl Worc., in Strype, Eccl. Mem., I. i. 5. This town … and all the bayliage should have no resort … but to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
1525. Ld. Berners, Froiss., II. cci. [cxcvii.] 615. The hole duchy of Acquytayne … baylyages, sygnories, and wasselages.
1599. Hakluyt, Voy., II. 80. The first baliage or priorie that should be vacant.
1680. Relig. Dutch, iv. 38. Divonne, in the Balliage of Gex.
1777. Howard, Prisons Eng. (1780), 81. The other prison for the bailliage, contains nineteen chambers.
1791. Burke, App. Whigs, Wks. VI. 231. The several orders, in their several baillages … were the ‘people’ of France.
1882. Athenæum, 30 Dec., 896/2. The twelve peers of the castle had … appeal in some cases from the sovereign bailliage.
¶ See also BAILLAGE.
