a punchen, piece of metal, or other matter, usually either round or oval; wherein are engraven the arms, device, &c. of some prince, state, community, magistrate, or private person, often with a legend or inscription; the impression whereof in wax serves to make acts, instruments, &c. authentic.

The use of seals, as a mark of authenticity to letters and other instruments in writing, is extremely ancient. We read of it among the Jews and Persians in the earliest and most sacred records of history. And in the book of Jeremiah there is a very remarkable instance, not only of an attestation by seal, but also of the other usual formalities attending a Jewish purchase. In the civil law also, seals were the evidence of truth, and were required, on the part of the witnesses at least, at the attestation of every testament. But in the times of our Saxon ancestors, they were not much in use in England. For though Sir Edward Coke relies on an instance of King Edwyn's making use of a seal about 100 years before the Conquest, yet it does not follow that this was the usage among the whole nation: and perhaps the charter he mentions may be of doubtful authority, from this very circumstance of its being sealed; since we are assured by all our ancient historians that sealing was not then in common use. The method of the Saxons was, for such as could write to subscribe their names, and, whether they could write or not, to affix the sign of the cross; which custom our illiterate vulgar do for the most part to this day keep up, by signing a cross for their mark when unable to write their names. And indeed this inability to write, and therefore making a cross in its stead, is honestly avowed by Credwalla, a Saxon king, at the end of one of his charters. In like manner, and for the same infirmity, at their first settlement in France used the practice of sealing only, without writing their names; which custom continued when learning made its way among them, though the reason for doing it had ceased; and hence the charter of Edward the Confessor to Westminster-abbey, himself being brought up in Normandy, was witnessed only by his seal, and is generally thought to be the oldest sealed charter of any authenticity in England. SEA

At the Conquest, the Norman lords brought over into this kingdom their own fashions; and introduced waxen seals only, instead of the English method of writing their names, and signing with the sign of the cross. The imprestions of these seals were sometimes a knight on horseback, sometimes other devices; but coats of arms were not introduced into seals, nor indeed used at all till about the reign of Richard I., who brought them from the croisade in the Holy Land, where they were first invented and painted on the shields of the knights, to distinguish the variety of persons of every Christian nation who resorted thither, and who could not, when clad in complete steel, be otherwise known or ascertained.

This neglect of signing, and resting only upon the authenticity of seals, remained very long among us; for it was held in all our books, that sealing alone was sufficient to authenticate a deed: and so the common form of attesting deeds, "sealed and delivered," continues to this day; notwithstanding the statute 29 Car. II. c. 3, revives the Saxon custom, and expressly directs the signing in all grants of lands and many other species of deeds: in which, therefore, signing seems to be now as necessary as sealing, though it hath been sometimes held that the one includes the other.

The king's great seal is that whereby all patents, commissions, warrants, &c. coming down from the king are sealed; the keeping whereof is in the hands of the lord chancellor. The king's privy seal is a seal that is usually first set to grants that are to pass the great seal.