ALLOCUTION

A word of Latin origin and meaning something spoken to. The address of the presiding officer of a Supreme Council of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite is sometimes so called. First used by the Council for the Southern Jurisdiction of the United States, the expression is derived from the usage of the Roman Church, where certain addresses of the Pope to the Cardinals are called allocations, and this in turn is to be traced to the customs of Pagan Rome, where the harangues or forcible speeches of the Generals to their soldiers were called attocutions.