An outlaw, in its original and legal meaning, is a person declared as outside the protection of the
law
Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...
. In pre-modern societies, all legal protection was withdrawn from the criminal, so that anyone was legally empowered to
persecute
Persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group by another individual or group. The most common forms are religious persecution, racism, and political persecution, though there is naturally some overlap between these terms ...
or kill them. Outlawry was thus one of the harshest penalties in the legal system. In
early Germanic law
Germanic law is a scholarly term used to described a series of commonalities between the various law codes (the ''Leges Barbarorum'', 'laws of the barbarians', also called Leges) of the early Germanic peoples. These were compared with statements ...
, the
death penalty
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...
is conspicuously absent, and outlawing is the most extreme punishment, presumably amounting to a death sentence in practice. The concept is known from
Roman law
Roman law is the law, legal system of ancient Rome, including the legal developments spanning over a thousand years of jurisprudence, from the Twelve Tables (c. 449 BC), to the ''Corpus Juris Civilis'' (AD 529) ordered by Eastern Roman emperor J ...
, as the status of ''
homo sacer'', and persisted throughout the
Middle Ages
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...
.
A secondary meaning of outlaw is a person who systematically avoids capture by evasion and violence to deter capture. These meanings are related and overlapping but not necessarily identical. A fugitive who is declared outside protection of law in one jurisdiction but who receives asylum and lives openly and obedient to local laws in another jurisdiction is an outlaw in the first meaning but not the second (example - William Bankes, detailed below). A fugitive who remains formally entitled to a form of trial if captured alive but avoids capture because of high risk of conviction and severe punishment if tried is an outlaw in the second sense but not first (example - Rozsa Sandor, tried and sentenced merely to a term of imprisonment when captured.).
In the
common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...
of England, a "writ of outlawry" made the pronouncement ''
Caput lupinum ''Caput lupinum'' or ''caput gerat lupinum'' is a term used in the English law, English legal system and its derivatives. The Latin language, Latin term literally means "wolf's head" or "wolfish head", and refers to a person considered to be an outl ...
'' ("Let his be a wolf's head"), equating that person with a wolf in the eyes of the law. Not only was the subject deprived of all legal rights, being outside the "law", but others could kill him on sight as if he were a wolf or other wild animal. Women were declared "waived" rather than outlawed but it was effectively the same punishment.
Legal history
Ancient Rome
Among other forms of
exile
Exile is primarily penal expulsion from one's native country, and secondarily expatriation or prolonged absence from one's homeland under either the compulsion of circumstance or the rigors of some high purpose. Usually persons and peoples suf ...
,
Roman law
Roman law is the law, legal system of ancient Rome, including the legal developments spanning over a thousand years of jurisprudence, from the Twelve Tables (c. 449 BC), to the ''Corpus Juris Civilis'' (AD 529) ordered by Eastern Roman emperor J ...
included the penalty of ''interdicere aquae et ignis'' ("to forbid water and fire"). Such people penalized were required to leave Roman territory and forfeit their property. If they returned, they were effectively outlaws; providing them the use of fire or water was illegal, and they could be killed at will without legal penalty.
''Interdicere aquae et ignis'' was traditionally imposed by the
tribune of the plebs
Tribune of the plebs, tribune of the people or plebeian tribune ( la, tribunus plebis) was the first office of the Roman Republic, Roman state that was open to the plebs, plebeians, and was, throughout the history of the Republic, the most importan ...
, and is attested to have been in use during the
First Punic War
The First Punic War (264–241 BC) was the first of three wars fought between Rome and Carthage, the two main powers of the western Mediterranean in the early 3rd century BC. For 23 years, in the longest continuous conflict and grea ...
of the third century BC by
Cato the Elder
Marcus Porcius Cato (; 234–149 BC), also known as Cato the Censor ( la, Censorius), the Elder and the Wise, was a Roman soldier, senator, and historian known for his conservatism and opposition to Hellenization. He was the first to write histo ...
. It was later also applied by many other officials, such as the
Senate
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
, magistrates, and
Julius Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...
as a
general
A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of highest military ranks, high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry.
In some usages the term "general officer" refers t ...
and provincial governor during the
Gallic Wars
The Gallic Wars were waged between 58 and 50 BC by the Roman general Julius Caesar against the peoples of Gaul (present-day France, Belgium, Germany and Switzerland). Gallic, Germanic, and British tribes fought to defend their homela ...
. It fell out of use during the
early Empire.
England
![Robin Hood Memorial](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a9/Robin_Hood_Memorial.jpg)
In
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...
, an outlaw was a party who had defied the laws of the realm, by such acts as ignoring a
summons
A summons (also known in England and Wales as a claim form and in the Australian state of New South Wales as a court attendance notice (CAN)) is a legal document issued by a court (a ''judicial summons'') or by an administrative agency of governme ...
to court, or fleeing instead of appearing to plead when charged with a
crime
In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definit ...
.
[ The earliest reference to outlawry in English legal texts appears in the 8th century.
]
Criminal
The term ''outlawry '' refers to the formal procedure of declaring someone an outlaw, i.e. putting him outside the sphere of legal protection.[ In the ]common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...
of England, a judgment of (criminal) outlawry was one of the harshest penalties in the legal system, since the outlaw could not use the legal system for protection, e.g. from mob justice
Mob rule or ochlocracy ( el, ὀχλοκρατία, translit=okhlokratía; la, ochlocratia) is the rule of government by a mob or mass of people and the intimidation of legitimate authorities. Insofar as it represents a pejorative for majorit ...
. To be declared an outlaw was to suffer a form of civil
Civil may refer to:
*Civic virtue, or civility
*Civil action, or lawsuit
* Civil affairs
*Civil and political rights
*Civil disobedience
*Civil engineering
*Civil (journalism), a platform for independent journalism
*Civilian, someone not a membe ...
or social
Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not.
Etymology
The word "social" derives from ...
death. The outlaw was debarred from all civilized society. No one was allowed to give him food, shelter, or any other sort of support—to do so was to commit the crime of aiding and abetting
Aiding and abetting is a legal doctrine related to the guilt of someone who aids or abets (encourages, incites) another person in the commission of a crime (or in another's suicide). It exists in a number of different countries and generally allo ...
, and to be in danger of the ban oneself. A more recent concept of " wanted dead or alive" is similar, but implies that a trial is desired (namely if the wanted person is returned alive), whereas outlawry precludes a trial.
An outlaw might be killed with impunity, and it was not only lawful but meritorious to kill a thief fleeing from justice—to do so was not murder
Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification (jurisprudence), justification or valid excuse (legal), excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. ("The killing of another person wit ...
. A man who slew a thief was expected to declare the fact without delay, otherwise the dead man's kindred might clear his name by their oath and require the slayer to pay weregild
Weregild (also spelled wergild, wergeld (in archaic/historical usage of English), weregeld, etc.), also known as man price (blood money), was a precept in some archaic legal codes whereby a monetary value was established for a person's life, to b ...
as for a true man.
By the rules of common law, a criminal outlaw did not need to be guilty of the crime for which he was an outlaw. If a man was accused of treason or felony
A felony is traditionally considered a crime of high seriousness, whereas a misdemeanor is regarded as less serious. The term "felony" originated from English common law (from the French medieval word "félonie") to describe an offense that resu ...
but failed to appear in court to defend himself, he was deemed to be convicted of the said offence. If he was accused of a misdemeanour
A misdemeanor (American English, spelled misdemeanour elsewhere) is any "lesser" criminal act in some common law legal systems. Misdemeanors are generally punished less severely than more serious felonies, but theoretically more so than adm ...
, then he was guilty of a serious contempt of court which was itself a capital crime.
In the context of criminal law
Criminal law is the body of law that relates to crime. It prescribes conduct perceived as threatening, harmful, or otherwise endangering to the property, health, safety, and moral welfare of people inclusive of one's self. Most criminal law i ...
, outlawry faded out, not so much by legal changes as by the greater population density of the country, which made it harder for wanted fugitives to evade capture; and by the adoption of international extradition
Extradition is an action wherein one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, over to the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdict ...
pacts. It was obsolete by the time the offence was abolished in 1938. Outlawry was, however, a living practice as of 1855: in 1841, William John Bankes
William John Bankes (11 December 1786 – 15 April 1855) was an English politician, explorer, Egyptologist and adventurer.
The second, but first surviving, son of Henry Bankes MP, he was a member of the Bankes family of Dorset and he had Sir Ch ...
, who had previously been an MP for several different constituencies between 1810 and 1835, was outlawed by due process of law for absenting himself from trial for homosexuality and died in 1855 in Venice as an outlaw.
Civil
There was also a doctrine of civil outlawry. Civil outlawry did not carry the sentence of capital punishment. It was however imposed on defendants who fled or evaded justice when sued for civil actions like debts or torts. The punishments for civil outlawry were nevertheless harsh, including confiscation of chattels (movable property) left behind by the outlaw.
In the civil context, outlawry became obsolescent in civil procedure
Civil procedure is the body of law that sets out the rules and standards that courts follow when adjudicating civil lawsuits (as opposed to procedures in criminal law matters). These rules govern how a lawsuit or case may be commenced; what ki ...
by reforms that no longer required summoned defendant
In court proceedings, a defendant is a person or object who is the party either accused of committing a crime in criminal prosecution or against whom some type of civil relief is being sought in a civil case.
Terminology varies from one jurisdic ...
s to appear and plead. Still, the possibility of being declared an outlaw for derelictions of civil
Civil may refer to:
*Civic virtue, or civility
*Civil action, or lawsuit
* Civil affairs
*Civil and political rights
*Civil disobedience
*Civil engineering
*Civil (journalism), a platform for independent journalism
*Civilian, someone not a membe ...
duty continued to exist in English law until 1879 and, in Scots law
Scots law () is the legal system of Scotland. It is a hybrid or mixed legal system containing civil law and common law elements, that traces its roots to a number of different historical sources. Together with English law and Northern Ireland l ...
until the late 1940s. Since then, failure to find the defendant and serve process is usually interpreted in favour of the plaintiff, and harsh penalties for mere nonappearance (merely presumed flight to escape justice) no longer apply.
In other countries
Outlawry also existed in other ancient legal codes, such as the ancient Norse and Icelandic legal code.
In early modern times, the term Vogelfrei
''Vogelfrei'' ( nl, Vogelvrij and af, Voëlvry) in German usage denotes the status of a person on whom a legal penalty of outlawry has been imposed. However, the original meaning of the term referred to independence, being "free as a bird";
Hi ...
and its cognates came to be used in Germany, the Low Countries
The term Low Countries, also known as the Low Lands ( nl, de Lage Landen, french: les Pays-Bas, lb, déi Niddereg Lännereien) and historically called the Netherlands ( nl, de Nederlanden), Flanders, or Belgica, is a coastal lowland region in N ...
and Scandinavia
Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion#Europe, subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, ...
, referring to a person stripped of his civil rights being "free" for the taking like a bird.
In Germany and Slavic countries in 15th–19th centuries groups of outlaws composed from former prisoners, soldiers etc. became an important social phenomenon. They lived off robbery and their activity was often supported by local inhabitants from lower classes. The best known are Juraj Jánošík
Juraj Jánošík (first name also ''Juro'' or ''Jurko'', ; baptised 25 January 1688, died 17 March 1713) was a Slovak highwayman. Jánošík has been the main character of many Slovak novels, poems, and films. According to the legend, he robbed ...
and Jakub Surovec
Jacob is a common male given name and a less well-known surname. It is a cognate of James, derived from Late Latin ''Iacobus'', from Greek ''Iakobos'', from Hebrew (''Yaʿaqōḇ''), the name of the Hebrew patriarch, Jacob son of Isaac and Rebe ...
in Slovakia, Oleksa Dovbush
Oleksa Dovbush ( uk, Олекса Довбуш) (born 1700, Pechenizhyn Kolomyia— died 24 August 1745) was a famous Ukrainian outlaw, leader of opryshky, who became a folk hero, often compared to Robin Hood.
Biography
Oleksa was born in the H ...
in Ukraine, Rózsa Sándor
Rózsa is a Hungarian language surname or female given name, which is equivalent to the English language, English name Rose (given name), Rose. The surname Rózsa is derived from the given name.''Dictionary of American Family Names''"Rózsa Family ...
in Hungary, Schinderhannes
Johannes Bückler (c.1778 – 21 November 1803) was a German outlaw who orchestrated one of the most famous crime sprees in German history. He has been nicknamed Schinderhannes and Schinnerhannes in German and John the Scorcher, John the Flaye ...
and Hans Kohlhase
Hans Kohlhase (c. 1500 – 1540), according to early modern German accounts, was a merchant whose grievance against a Saxon nobleman developed into a full-blown feud against the state of Saxony, thus infringing the Eternal Peace of 1495. The cam ...
in Germany.
The concept of outlawry was reintroduced to British law by several Australian colonial governments in the late 19th century to deal with the menace of bushranging
Bushrangers were originally escaped convicts in Australia, convicts in the early years of the History of Australia (1788–1850), British settlement of Australia who used The bush#Australia, the bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities. B ...
. The Felons Apprehension Act (1865 No 2a) of New South Wales
)
, nickname =
, image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, es ...
provided that a judge could, upon proof of sufficiently notorious conduct, issue a special bench warrant
An arrest warrant is a warrant issued by a judge or magistrate on behalf of the state, which authorizes the arrest and detention of an individual, or the search and seizure of an individual's property.
Canada
Arrest warrants are issued by a ju ...
requiring a person to submit themselves to police custody before a given date, or be declared an outlaw. An outlawed person could be apprehended "alive or dead" by any of the Queen's subjects, "whether a constable or not", and without "being accountable for using of any deadly weapon in aid of such apprehension." Similar provisions were passed in Victoria
Victoria most commonly refers to:
* Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia
* Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada
* Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory
* Victoria, Seychelle ...
and Queensland
)
, nickname = Sunshine State
, image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, established_ ...
. Although the provisions of the New South Wales Felons Apprehension Act were not exercised after the end of the bushranging era, they remained on the statute book until 1976.
As a political weapon
There have been several instances in military and/or political conflicts throughout history whereby one side declares the other as being "illegal", notorious cases being the use of proscription
Proscription ( la, proscriptio) is, in current usage, a 'decree of condemnation to death or banishment' (''Oxford English Dictionary'') and can be used in a political context to refer to state-approved murder or banishment. The term originated ...
in the civil wars of the Roman Republic
The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kin ...
. In later times there was the notable case of Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...
whom the Congress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna (, ) of 1814–1815 was a series of international diplomatic meetings to discuss and agree upon a possible new layout of the European political and constitutional order after the downfall of the French Emperor Napoleon B ...
, on 13 March 1815, declared had "deprived himself of the protection of the law".
In modern times, the government of the First Spanish Republic
The Spanish Republic ( es, República Española), historiographically referred to as the First Spanish Republic, was the political regime that existed in Spain from 11 February 1873 to 29 December 1874.
The Republic's founding ensued after th ...
, unable to reduce the Cantonal rebellion
The Cantonal rebellion was a cantonalist insurrection that took place during the First Spanish Republic between July 1873 and January 1874. Its protagonists were the "intransigent" federal Republicans, who wanted to establish immediately the F ...
centered in Cartagena, Spain
Cartagena () is a Spanish city and a major naval station on the Mediterranean coast, south-eastern Iberia. As of January 2018, it has a population of 218,943 inhabitants, being the region's second-largest municipality and the country's sixth-lar ...
, declared the Cartagena fleet to be " piratic", which allowed any nation to prey on it. Taking the opposite road, some outlaws became political leaders, such as Ethiopia
Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...
's Kassa Hailu who became Emperor Tewodros II of Ethiopia
, spoken = ; ''djānhoi'', lit. ''"O steemedroyal"''
, alternative = ; ''getochu'', lit. ''"Our master"'' (pl.)
Tewodros II ( gez, ዳግማዊ ቴዎድሮስ, baptized as Gebre Kidan; 1818 – 13 April 1868) was Emperor of Ethiopi ...
.
Popular usage
Though the judgment of outlawry is now obsolete (even though it inspired the ''pro forma'' Outlawries Bill
A Bill for the more effectual preventing clandestine Outlawries, usually referred to as the Outlawries Bill, is customarily the first bill on the agenda of the United Kingdom's House of Commons at the start of each session of Parliament. It is use ...
which is still to this day introduced in the British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England.
The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 mem ...
during the State Opening of Parliament
The State Opening of Parliament is a ceremonial event which formally marks the beginning of a session of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It includes a speech from the throne known as the King's (or Queen's) Speech. The event takes place ...
), romanticised outlaws became stock character
A stock character, also known as a character archetype, is a fictional character in a work of art such as a novel, play, or a film whom audiences recognize from frequent recurrences in a particular literary tradition. There is a wide range of st ...
s in several fictional settings. This was particularly so in the United States, where outlaws were popular subjects of newspaper coverage and stories in the 19th century, and 20th century fiction and Western movie
The Western is a genre set in the American frontier and commonly associated with folk tales of the Western United States, particularly the Southwestern United States, as well as Northern Mexico and Western Canada. It is commonly referred ...
s. Thus, "outlaw" is still commonly used to mean those violating the law[Black's Law Dictionary at 1255 (4th ed. 1951), citing ''Oliveros v. Henderson'', 116 S.C. 77, 106 S.E. 855, 859.] or, by extension, those living that lifestyle, whether actual criminals evading the law or those merely opposed to "law-and-order" notions of conformity and authority (such as the " outlaw country" music movement in the 1970s).
See also
*Abrek
The word abrek (; ; ; ; ) is a North Caucasian term used for a lone Caucasian warrior living a partisan lifestyle outside power and law and fighting for a just cause. Abreks were irregular soldiers who abandoned all material life, including their ...
*American Old West
The American frontier, also known as the Old West or the Wild West, encompasses the geography, history, folklore, and culture associated with the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that began with European colonial ...
*Attainder
In English criminal law, attainder or attinctura was the metaphorical "stain" or "corruption of blood" which arose from being condemned for a serious capital crime (felony or treason). It entailed losing not only one's life, property and hereditar ...
*Banditry
Banditry is a type of organized crime committed by outlaws typically involving the threat or use of violence. A person who engages in banditry is known as a bandit and primarily commits crimes such as extortion, robbery, and murder, either as an ...
*Bill of attainder
A bill of attainder (also known as an act of attainder or writ of attainder or bill of penalties) is an act of a legislature declaring a person, or a group of people, guilty of some crime, and punishing them, often without a trial. As with attai ...
*Border reivers
Border reivers were Cattle raiding, raiders along the Anglo-Scottish border from the late 13th century to the beginning of the 17th century. They included both Scotland, Scottish and England, English people, and they raided the entire border ...
*Bounty hunter
A bounty hunter is a private agent working for bail bonds who captures fugitives or criminals for a commission or bounty. The occupation, officially known as bail enforcement agent, or fugitive recovery agent, has traditionally operated outsid ...
*Brigandage
Brigandage is the life and practice of highway robbery and plunder. It is practiced by a brigand, a person who usually lives in a gang and lives by pillage and robbery.Oxford English Dictionary second edition, 1989. "Brigand.2" first recorded usa ...
*Buccaneer
Buccaneers were a kind of privateers or free sailors particular to the Caribbean Sea during the 17th and 18th centuries. First established on northern Hispaniola as early as 1625, their heyday was from Stuart Restoration, the Restoration in 16 ...
*Bushranger
Bushrangers were originally escaped convicts in the early years of the British settlement of Australia who used the bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities. By the 1820s, the term had evolved to refer to those who took up "robbery under ...
*Cangaço
''Cangaço'' () was a phenomenon of Northeast Brazil in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This region of Brazil is known for its aridness and hard way of life, and in a form of "social banditry" against the government, many men and women d ...
*Caput lupinum ''Caput lupinum'' or ''caput gerat lupinum'' is a term used in the English law, English legal system and its derivatives. The Latin language, Latin term literally means "wolf's head" or "wolfish head", and refers to a person considered to be an outl ...
*Civil death
Civil death ( la, civiliter mortuus) is the loss of all or almost all civil rights by a person due to a conviction for a felony or due to an act by the government of a country that results in the loss of civil rights. It is usually inflicted on per ...
*Dacoity
Dacoity is a term used for "banditry" in the Indian subcontinent. The spelling is the anglicised version of the Hindi word ''daaku''; "dacoit" is a colloquial Indian English word with this meaning and it appears in the ''Glossary of Colloquial ...
*List of depression-era outlaws
This is a list of the Great Depression-era outlaws spanning the years of Prohibition and the Great Depression known as the "Public Enemy" era. Those include high-profile criminals wanted by state and federal law enforcement agencies for armed ro ...
*Gangster
A gangster is a criminal who is a member of a gang. Most gangs are considered to be part of organized crime. Gangsters are also called mobsters, a term derived from ''mob'' and the suffix '' -ster''. Gangs provide a level of organization and ...
*List of Old West gunfighters
This is a list of Old West gunfighters, referring to outlaws or lawmen, of the American frontier who gained fame or notoriety during the American Wild West or Old West. Some listed were never gunfighters. The term ''gunslinger'' is a modern, 20th ...
*Hajduk
A hajduk ( hu, hajdúk, plural of ) is a type of irregular infantry found in Central and parts of Southeast Europe from the late 16th to mid 19th centuries. They have reputations ranging from bandits to freedom fighters depending on time, p ...
*Highwayman
A highwayman was a robber who stole from travellers. This type of thief usually travelled and robbed by horse as compared to a footpad who travelled and robbed on foot; mounted highwaymen were widely considered to be socially superior to footp ...
* Homo sacer
*Honghuzi
Honghuzi () were armed Chinese robbers and bandits in the areas of the eastern Russia-China borderland. Their activities extended over southeastern Siberia, the Russian Far East, and Northeast China (then known as Manchuria). They operated in ...
("red beards")
*Klepht
Klephts (; Greek κλέφτης, ''kléftis'', pl. κλέφτες, ''kléftes'', which means "thieves" and perhaps originally meant just "brigand": "Other Greeks, taking to the mountains, became unofficial, self-appointed armatoles and were know ...
*Merchant raider
Merchant raiders are armed commerce raiding ships that disguise themselves as non-combatant merchant vessels.
History
Germany used several merchant raiders early in World War I (1914–1918), and again early in World War II (1939–1945). The cap ...
*Nazi hunter
A Nazi hunter is an individual who tracks down and gathers information on alleged former Nazis, or SS members, and Nazi collaborators who were involved in the Holocaust, typically for use at trial on charges of war crimes and crimes against huma ...
* Nithing
*Ostracism
Ostracism ( el, ὀστρακισμός, ''ostrakismos'') was an Athenian democratic procedure in which any citizen could be expelled from the city-state of Athens for ten years. While some instances clearly expressed popular anger at the cit ...
*Outlaw (stock character)
Romanticised outlaws are stock characters found in a number of fictional settings.
This was particularly so in the United States, where outlaws were popular subjects of newspaper coverage and stories in the 19th century, and 20th century fiction a ...
*Outlaw motorcycle club
An outlaw motorcycle club is a motorcycle subculture generally centered on the use of Cruiser (motorcycle), cruiser motorcycles, particularly Harley-Davidsons and chopper (motorcycle), choppers, and a set of ideals that purport to celebrate fre ...
*Piracy
Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, v ...
*River pirate
A river pirate is a pirate who operates along a river. The term has been used to describe many different kinds of pirate groups who carry out riverine attacks in Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, and South America. They are usually prosecuted ...
*Robber baron (feudalism)
A robber baron or robber knight (german: Raubritter) was an unscrupulous feudal landowner who, protected by his fief's legal status, imposed high taxes and tolls out of keeping with the norm without authorization by some higher authority. Some re ...
*Robber
Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take anything of value by force, threat of force, or by use of fear. According to common law, robbery is defined as taking the property of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the perso ...
*Shanlin
The term shanlin () was frequently used to describe bandits in northeast China from the time of the Qing dynasty, because they knew the local wooded and mountainous terrain very well. Most operated in a fairly small district and took pains to mai ...
*Shifta
Shifta is a term used in East Africa meaning ''rebel'', ''outlaw'', or ''bandit''. The Swahili word was loaned from the Somali shufta during the Shifta War, which is in turn derived from Amharic ሽፍታ (šəfta). Historically, the shifta serv ...
*Social banditry
Social banditry or social crime is a form of lower class social resistance involving behavior that by law is illegal but is supported by wider "oppressed" society as being moral and acceptable. The term ''social bandit'' was invented by the Marx ...
, a term invented by Eric Hobsbawm
Eric John Ernest Hobsbawm (; 9 June 1917 – 1 October 2012) was a British historian of the rise of industrial capitalism, socialism and nationalism. A life-long Marxist, his socio-political convictions influenced the character of his work. H ...
*Thug
Thug or THUG may refer to:
People
* Thug, a common criminal, who treats others violently and roughly, often for hire
* Thug, a member of the former Indian cult Thuggee
** Thug Behram (ca 1765–1840), leader of the Thuggee cult
Video game
* ''T ...
*Untouchability
Untouchability is a form of social institution that legitimises and enforces practices that are discriminatory, humiliating, exclusionary and exploitative against people belonging to certain social groups. Although comparable forms of discrimin ...
*Vigilante
Vigilantism () is the act of preventing, investigating and punishing perceived offenses and crimes without Right, legal authority.
A vigilante (from Spanish, Italian and Portuguese “vigilante”, which means "sentinel" or "watcher") is a pers ...
*Warg
In the philologist and fantasy author J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fiction, a warg is a particularly large and evil kind of wolf that could be ridden by orcs. He derived the name and characteristics of his wargs by combining meanings and myth ...
* Wolf's Head, a Yale University
Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
senior society named for the legal maxim associated with outlawry
Notes
References
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{{Authority control
Criminal law
Legal history
Punishments