chattel

What it means

1. Tangible, movable property.

   […] although of course the firm had changed hands many times over the centuries, […] But the box has always been part of the chattels, as it were.

   1990, Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, Corgi, page 387

2. A slave.

   Not all his servants and chattels are wraiths!

   1955, J. R. R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring [Book 2, Chapter 1 - Many Meetings]

In a sentence

[…] although of course the firm had changed hands many times over the centuries, […] But the box has always been part of the chattels, as it were.

1990, Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, Corgi, page 387

Where it comes from

1. Latincapitālis“of the head”
2. Medieval Latincapitāle
3. Old Frenchchatel
4. Middle Englishchatel
5. Englishchattel

From Middle English chatel, from Old French chatel, from Medieval Latin capitāle (English capital), from Latin capitālis (“of the head”), from caput (“head”) + -alis (“-al”). Compare the doublet cattle (“cows”), which is from an Anglo-Norman variant. Compare also capital and kith and kine (“all one’s possessions”), which also use “cow” to mean “property”.