Bailiff Family History

English: occupational name for an officer of a court of justice from Middle English bailli baillif ‘manager administrator’ (Old French bailli(s) baillif). The term could denote the king's officer in a county hundred town castle or forest or an elected town officer a magistrate an officer of a court serving warrants and enforcing judgments.

In Middle English a bailiff often denoted the agent of a lord in managing a manor collecting rents etc. but in the early modern period the term gradually became specialized as denoting an officer of justice under a sheriff who executes writs and processes distraints and arrests.

Compare the variant Bayliff Bayliss and also Bailey.