SG Heritage Dictionary

Privy [Adjective] Webster's Dictionary 1828

1. Private; pertaining to some person exclusively; assigned to private uses; not public; as the privy purse; the privy confer of a king.

2. Secret; clandestine; not open or public; as a privy attempt to kill one.

3. Private; appropriated to retirement; not shown; not open for the admission of company; as a privy chamber. Ezekiel 21:14 .

4. Privately knowing; admitted to the participation of knowledge with another of a secret transaction.

5. He would rather lose half of his kingdom than be privy to such a secret.

6. Myself am one made privy to the plot.

7. His wife also being privy to it. Acts 5:2 .

8. Admitted to secrets of state. The privy council of a king consists of a number of distinguished persons selected by him to advice him in the administration of the government.

9. A privy verdict, is one given to the judge out of court, which is of no force unless afterward affirmed by a public verdict in court.

Privy [Noun] Webster's Dictionary 1828

1. In law, a partaker; a person having an interest in any action or thing; as a privy in blood. Privies are of four kinds; privies in blood, as the heir to his father; privies in representation, as executors and administrators to the deceased; privies in estate, as he in reversion and he in remainder; donor and donee; lessor and lessee; privy in tenure, as the lord in escheat.

2. A necessary house.

3. Privy chamber, in Great Britain, the private apartment in a royal residence or mansion. Gentlemen of the privy chamber are servants of the king who are to wait and attend on him and the queen at court, in their diversions, etc. They are forty eight in number, under the lord chamberlain.

Privy [Adjective] Webster's Dictionary 1913

1. Of or pertaining to some person exclusively; assigned to private uses; not public; private; as, the privy purse.

2. Secret; clandestine.

3. Appropriated to retirement; private; not open to the public.

4. Admitted to knowledge of a secret transaction; secretly cognizant; privately knowing.

Privy [Noun] Webster's Dictionary 1913

1. A partaker; a person having an interest in any action or thing; one who has an interest in an estate created by another; a person having an interest derived from a contract or conveyance to which he is not himself a party. The term, in its proper sense, is distinguished from party.

2. A necessary house or place; a backhouse.

Privy council Encyclopedia Britannica

PRIVY COUNCIL. In England the king almost of necessity has been at all times guided by a council. The council, as it existed in the Norman period under the name of curia regis (a branch of the larger commune concilium regni), exercised judicial, legislative, and administrative functions. It contained the germs of the courts of law and equity, the Houses of Parliament, and the privy council. The Courts of King’s Bench and Common Pleas were gradually separated from it and became only courts of first instance, subject to appeal to the king’s council. From the time of Edward I. the concilium ordinarium, the ordinary or standing council of the king, superseded the curia regis. It exercised high judicial functions as the ultimate court of appeal, as the adviser of suitors on petition what court to choose for redress, and as the resort of those who failed to obtain justice in the ordinary course. It was also the supreme administrative body, and as such issued ordinances on matters of a local or temporary nature, with not infrequent usurpations at a later period of jurisdiction belonging more properly to the common law courts or to parliament. The council “consisted of the chief ministers, the chancellor, treasurer, lord steward, lord admiral, lord marshall, the keeper of the privy seal, the chamberlain, treasurer, and comptroller of the household, the chancellor of the exchequer, the master of the wardrobe; and of the judges, king’s serjeant, and attorneygeneral, the master of the rolls, and justices in eyre, who at that time were not the same as the judges at Westminster” (Hallam, Middle Ages, vol. iii. p. 205). The growing power of the ordinary council (it does not seem to have been called the privy council until after the reign of Henry VI.) led to many complaints ...

At the present day members of the privy council become so at the will of the crown, but it is understood that persons in certain positions have an ex officio claim to be nominated. The council consists of princes of the royal family or of some of the great officers of state, such as the principal members of the Government, the archbishops and the bishop of London, the judges of the House of Lords, the judicial committee, and the court of appeal, diplomatists of high rank, &c. Members of the privy council have the title of “right honourable” and social precedence next after knights of the Garter. Ireland has its own privy council. Scotland has had none of its own since 6 Anne c. 40, which provided for one privy council for Great Britain. The modern jurisdiction of the privy council may be divided into two branches, administrative and judicial.

Administrative.— This jurisdiction chiefly depends upon statutory authority, which practically makes of the privy council a subordinate legislature. It is exercised either by the whole council or by committees to which matters are referred by the crown in council. Examples of the latter are the board of trade, the committee of council on education, the local government board (see Public Health), the universities committee, with temporary powers under the Universities Act, 1877, and the committee of council for the consideration of charters of incorporation under the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882. Cases affecting the constitutional rights of the Channel Islands are referred to a committee for the affaire of Jersey and Guernsey. The committees report to the crown in council, and their report is adopted and enforced by an order in council, published in the Gazette. Among other Acts conferring administrative powers upon the privy council are the Pharmacy Act, 1852, as amended by 31 & 32 Vict. c. 121, the Medical Act, 1858, the Foreign Enlistment Act, 1870, the Destructive Insects Act, 1877, the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act, 1878, the Dentists Act, 1878, the Veterinary Surgeons Act, 1881.

Judicial.— Up to 1833 the judicial authority of the privy council was exercised by judicial committees appointed from time to time for the hearing of appeals referred to them by the crown in council. In 1833 the judicial committee of the privy council was established as a permanent court by 3 & 4 Will. IV. c. 41. Under this and later Acts the judicial committee now consists of the lord president, the lord chancellor, and other persons who fill or have filled high judicial offices (all unpaid), of two retired Indian or colonial judges who receive an allowance for attending the sittings of the committee, and of paid members, now two in number, appointed under 34 & 35 Vict. c. 91. The Appellate Jurisdiction Act, 1876, provides for what is in effect the union of the House of Lords and of the privy council in their judicial capacities by the lords of appeal in ordinary gradually becoming judges of both courts. After the death or resignation of the present paid members these two high judicial bodies will be practically combined, and a near approach will be made to the mediaeval magnum concilium in an ultimate court of appeal from the whole of the British dominions.

In proceedings under the Church Discipline Act archbishops and bishops who are members of the privy council are members of the judicial committee, 3 & 4 Vict. c. 86. In proceedings under the Public Worship Act, 1874, archbishops and bishops attend as assessors according to rules made by order in council, 39 & 40 Viet c. 59, § 14. The jurisdiction of the judicial committee is either original or appellate. The original jurisdiction is the less important, and consists of certain powers conferred by the Copyright, Patent, Endowed Schools, and other Acts. The power most frequently exercised is that of extending the term of patents. The appellate jurisdiction is entirely regulated by statute, with the exception of the rarely occurring appeal from orders made by the lord chancellor of Great Britain or of Ireland in exercise of powers conferred by royal sign manual for the custody of idiots and lunatics. Appeals lie from the Arches Court of Canterbury, from a vice-admiralty court abroad, and from the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man, India, and the colonies. Appeals are either of right or by leave. Appeals lie as of right when the value of the matter at issue is of a certain amount (the amount varying according to the appeal rules of the different foreign possessions), and in a few other cases. Appeals lie at the discretion of the judicial committee, on leave being obtained by petition for special leave to appeal. The proceedings in all cases alike, whether original or appellate, are by petition (see Petition). The petition is addressed to the crown in council in the first instance.

See, in addition to the writers on constitutional history, Sir Harris Nicolas, Proceedings and Ordinances of the Privy Council of England ; Dicey, The Privy Council ; Macpherson, Practice of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. (J. W+.)

9th ed. Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 19, p. 765
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Privy-counselor [Noun] Webster's Dictionary 1828

1. A member of the privy council.

2. Privy-counselors are made by the king's nomination without patent or grant.

Privy-seal [\N] Webster's Dictionary 1828

1. PRIV'Y-SEAL

2. PRIVY-SIG'NET, noun In England, the seal which the king uses previously in grants, etc. which are to pass the great seal, or which he uses in matters of subordinate consequence, which do not require the great seal.

3. privy-seal is used elliptically for the principal secretary of state, or person entrusted with the privy-seal

4. The king's sign manual is the warrant to the privy-seal who makes out a writ or warrant thereon to the chancery. The sign manual is the warrant to the privy-seal and the privy-seal is the warrant to the great seal.

King James Bible KJV Bible

Berean Standard Bible BSB Bible

11 KJV and 0 BSB verses contain “Privy”

Deuteronomy 23:1

He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD.

No man with crushed or severed genitals may enter the assembly of the LORD.

1 Kings 2:44

The king said moreover to Shimei, Thou knowest all the wickedness which thine heart is privy to, that thou didst to David my father: therefore the LORD shall return thy wickedness upon thine own head;

The king also said, “You know in your heart all the evil that you did to my father David. Therefore the LORD will bring your evil back upon your head.

Ezekiel 21:14

Thou therefore, son of man, prophesy, and smite thine hands together, and let the sword be doubled the third time, the sword of the slain: it is the sword of the great men that are slain, which entereth into their privy chambers.

‘So then, son of man, prophesy and strike your hands together. Let the sword strike two times, even three. It is a sword that slays, a sword of great slaughter closing in on every side!

Acts 5:2

And kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

With his wife’s full knowledge, he kept back some of the proceeds for himself, but brought a portion and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

Wisdom of Solomon 8:4

For she is privy to the mysteries of the knowledge of God, and a lover of his works.

Susanna 1:18

And they did as she bade them, and shut the garden doors, and went out themselves at privy doors to fetch the things that she had commanded them: but they saw not the elders, because they were hid.

Susanna 1:26

So when the servants of the house heard the cry in the garden, they rushed in at the privy door, to see what was done unto her.

Bel and the Dragon 1:13

And they little regarded it: for under the table they had made a privy entrance, whereby they entered in continually, and consumed those things.

Bel and the Dragon 1:21

And took the priests with their wives and children, who shewed him the privy doors, where they came in, and consumed such things as were upon the table.

2 Maccabees 1:16

And opening a privy door of the roof, they threw stones like thunderbolts, and struck down the captain, hewed them in pieces, smote off their heads and cast them to those that were without.

2 Maccabees 8:7

But specially took he advantage of the night for such privy attempts, insomuch that the fruit of his holiness was spread every where.