1. In one of its original meanings, this term denoted a tribute paid by English dwellers along the Scottish border to influential chieftains of Scotland, as a condition of securing immunity from raids of marauders and border thieves. 2. It also designated rents payable in cattle, grain, work, and the like. Such rents were called “black-mail,” (rcditus nigri,) in distinction from white rents , (blanche firmes,) which were rents paid in silver. 3. The extortion of money by threats or overtures towards criminal prosecution or the destruction of a man’s reputation or social standing. In common parlance, the term is equivalent to, and synonymous with, “extortion,”
Black’s Law Online Dictionary
