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DevelopmentThe antecedents of the armed personnel provided by modern PMC were commonlyreferred to as ‘mercenaries’. The first part of this working paper describes the historyof mercenarism through to the development of today’s PMC. The paper’s initialdiscussion focuses on the key issue of terminology.TerminologyThe term mercenary entered the English language in the fourteenth century andis derived from the Latin mercenarius, which originally meant ‘working merely formonetary or other reward; actuated by self-interest’. Since the sixteenth century thisterm has specifically referred to ‘soldiers serving in a foreign army’. 1 For the purposesof this discussion, this working paper uses David Isenberg’s enduring definition ofmercenaries as: ‘non-nationals hired to take direct part in armed conflicts’. 2The word ‘mercenary’ contains a pejorative element that has largely arisen fortwo reasons. The first of these is linked to the notion that a mercenary is a ‘...hiredprofessional soldier who fights for any state or nation without regard to politicalinterests or issues’. 3 Such employment contradicts the ethos that military serviceshould have moral objectives. Implicit in this is the suspicion that those employedin this apparently amoral manner may also stray into immoral practices because theyalready operate outside the normal boundaries of society. Secondly, the generalrevulsion against the taking of human life has contributed to the belief that homicideis acceptable only in strictly defined circumstances. These include self-defence, thedefence of others and the defence of one’s nation—but they do not include killing for1 The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1983,Vol. 2, p. 1308; The Concise Oxford Dictionary, 5th Edition, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1964, p. 760;The Macquarie Concise Dictionary, 2nd Edition, The Macquarie Library, Macquarie University,p. 604.2 D Isenberg, Soldiers of Fortune Ltd: A Profile of Today’s Private Sector Mercenary Firms, Centerfor Defense Information Monograph, November 1977, ,accessed 12 November 1998, p. 2.3 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc., Chicago, 1985, ‘Micropaedia’, Vol. 8, p. 27.