in middle-age writers, a kind of Netherland soldiery, infamous for rapine, being little better than commissioned banditti, who hired themselves to fight for any that could pay them best. The word is variously written by the historians of those days; all given them from the country of Brabant, which was the chief nursery of those troops. They are also frequently confounded with the Routiers, Ruptiers, Ruptarii, Ruterarii, Corteraux, &c.