affiant

From affy (“(obsolete) to have faith in, trust; to formally affirm or promise; etc.”) +‎ -ant (suffix forming agent nouns from verbs).^[1]

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /əˈfaɪənt/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Audio (General American):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪənt
• Hyphenation: af‧fi‧ant

affiant (plural affiants)

1. (originally US, now Canada, US, law) An individual witness whose statement is contained in an affidavit; (generally) an individual who makes a sworn deposition; a deponent.
   • 1807 February 6, Lawson Flack, affiant, “Report of the committee appointed to examine into the cause of Mr. M‘Credie’s death”, in Virginia Argus, number 1350, Richmond, Va.: […] Samuel Pleasants, Junior, […], published 1 May 1807, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 1, column 3:

     This affiant looked at the wound after Mr. M‘Credie was dead, and from its appearance, which was very large, was of opinion that it was occasioned by a ball and two or three buck short. And farther this affiant saith not.

     From an affidavit sworn by Flack.

   • 1986 October 1 (date when affidavit sworn), Joseph McDonnell, “Impeachment of Judge Harry E[ugene] Claiborne”, in Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 99th Congress, Second Session (United States Senate), volume 132, part 19, Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, published 2 October 1986, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 27781, column 3:

     I am bringing this information forward now because if we were involved unknowingly in something that was wrong, I want it to be righted. Further affiant sayeth naught.

     From an affidavit sworn by McDonnell. The last sentence, meaning “The affiant has nothing further to say”, is centuries-old but still used on some legal documents as the final declaration prior to the affiant’s signature.

   • 2002 June, Elizabeth A. De Wolfe, “A Spectacle for Remark”, in Shaking the Faith: Women, Family, and Mary Marshall Dyer’s Anti-Shaker Campaign, 1815–1867, New York, N.Y.; Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, →ISBN, page 123:

     In these cases, it is not hard to imagine that outside of a supportive community of apostates who asserted the Shakers duped them into joining, the public thought the affiants strange for ever dallying with the suspect sect in the first place.

• affidavit on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• deposition (law) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “affiant”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.