"The Action Was Prescribed"

(Eugene Volokh)

In most states' legalese, this means the same as in normal English: the action was (more or less) ordered by some authority, such as a statute or regulation. But in civil law lingo, for instance in Louisiana courts, it means that a legal claim is barred by the statute of limitations, because it was filed too late — a rare situation in which "prescribed" ends up meaning something like "proscribed."

I just learned this a few days ago, and thought I'd pass it along. Those of us who studied outside Louisiana might recall seeing a similar usage in first-year property, when we studied "easements by prescription."

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