Introduced in early UK lunacy legislation for patients who checked into county asylums of their own accord without a formal court or medical certificate.

The formal legal proceeding where concerned family, guardians, or peers formally petitioned the Crown/justices to declare an individual unfit to manage their own affairs.

Prior to modern "sectioning," the legal requirement for involuntary institutionalisation was a formal "Certificate of Two Medical Practitioners" confirming active insanity.

The highest legal asylum sanction. Used by magistrates and criminal courts for individuals judged dangerously insane and ordered into indefinite asylum confinement.