pedage

P3E1D2A1G2E1

noun

A toll or tax paid by passengers travelling through a specific place, entitling them to safe conduct and protection.

Scrabble 10

Meanings

nounpedage (countable and uncountable, plural pedages)

plural pedages

  1. countablehistoricalobsoleteuncountableA toll or tax paid by passengers travelling through a specific place, entitling them to safe conduct and protection.

    This charter specifies that "New Saresbury" shall be for ever a free city, enclosed with ditches, or trenches; that the citizens shall be quit throughout the land of toll, pontage, passage, pedage, lastage, stallage, carriage, and all other customs;[…].

    1814, John Britton, editor, The History and Antiquities of the Cathedral Church of Salisbury, page 26
    2 more examples

    He^([Richard III]) also excused them from danegeld, aids, scutage, or a tax of 40/s. payable out of every knight's fee; pontage, or a toll for the reparation of bridges; pedage, or money collected from foot passengers for passing through a forest or county; carriage, tolls for repairing of castles or cleaning of fosses; stallage, or a fee paid for erecting stalls in a fair or market; and talliage, or taxes in general; forbidding every man from arresting any person within their premisses, without license from the abbott and convent.

    1784, Francis Grose, The Antiquities of England and Wales, volume 6, page 99

    1819, "Pedage", entry in Abraham Rees (editor), The Cyclopædia: Or, Universal Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Literature, Volume 26, unnumbered page, Pedage is uſually levied for the repairing of roads, bridges, and cauſeways, the paving of ſtreets, &c. Anciently, thoſe who had the right of pedage were to keep the roads ſecure, and anſwer for all robberies committed on the paſſengers between ſun and ſun; […] .

Origin

  1. Latinpedagium
  2. Englishpedage

From Latin pedagium, for pedaticum. By surface analysis, ped- (“foot”) + -age.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

pedage. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/pedage

MLA

“pedage.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/pedage. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “pedage,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/pedage.

Source: pedage on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.