BANN, is also used to denote proscription or banishment for a crime proved; because anciently published by sound of trumpet; or, as Vossius thinks, because those who did not appear at the above-mentioned summons, were punished by proscription. Hence, to put a prince under the bann of the empire, is to declare him divested of all his dignities. The sentence only denotes an interdict of all intercourse, and offices of humanity, with the offender; the form of which seems taken from that of the Romans, who banished persons by forbidding them the use of fire and water. Sometimes also cities are put under the imperial bann; that is, stripped of their rights and privileges.
BANN also denotes a pecuniary mulct, or penalty, laid on a delinquent for offending against a bann.