Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 362

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Volume 3, Page 362

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[001] between co-heirs as to which of them is the more rightful heir, the action of dower or
[002] the petitio¹ will remain pending that dispute, [And so if the woman is pregnant,
[003] until her issue is certain.] because if she names or brings in the wrong warrantor,
[004] that is, someone other than the true heir, she loses her dower, as [in the roll] of the
[005] last eyre of Martin of Pateshull in the county of York in the tenth year of king Henry,
[006] [the case] of a certain Juliana who sought dower.² And that³ if there is a dispute
[007] among the co-heirs the plea of the woman claiming dower ought to remain until
[008] who the more rightful heir is has been determined, may be found among the pleas
[009] which follow the king in the twenty-first year, an assise of mortdancestor in Berkshire
[010] concerning Geoffrey the son of John and Gunnora de Bendenges.⁴ Also on this matter
[011] [a case] in Easter term in the eighth⁵ year of king Henry in Berkshire, [the case] of
[012] Gunnora, the wife of John son of Hugh, and Matilda de Berneres,⁶ in which Matilda
[013] answered that Gunnora ought not to have dower because the aforesaid John was
[014] her husband and not Gunnora's, and that Geoffrey, the son of the said Matilda and
[015] John, who was in the wardship of such a one,⁷ was the warrantor of her dower, and
[016] vouched him to warranty against the aforesaid Gunnora. To which the aforesaid
[017] Gunnora said that the aforesaid Matilda ought not to have a warrantor because she
[018] never was the wife of the same John, because of whom the said Geoffrey ought to be
[019] her warrantor, but that she herself was the wife of the said John and had issue by
[020] him, such a one. And Matilda said that she was the spouse of John and in seisin of
[021] him at the time of his death, and that in the lifetime of the same John the marriage
[022] between them was never questioned or dissolved. ⁸The son of one woman may be the
[023] warrantor of another woman's dower, yet his mother will have no dower, as where
[024] there has been a divorce because of consanguinity, compaternity or other affinity,
[025] or any of the other reasons for divorce, which are many.⁹ If the man then marries
[026] another woman, the son of the first woman will remain the heir,¹⁰ but his mother will
[027] not have dower, because two women will not have dower from the same inheritance
[028] by reason of one man, nor ought an heir to answer two women claiming dower, as
[029] will be explained below,¹¹ [and] because where there is no marriage there is no dower,
[030] and conversely, where there is a marriage there is dower.¹² Therefore as long as the
[031] first marriage continued, the constitution of dower in the first wife continued; when
[032] it was dissolved it ceased to exist and thus any exaction of dower ceased. ¹³<The
[033] nature of dower is such that the exaction of dower endures while the marriage
[034] endures;

Notes

1. ‘vel petitio’ for ‘petens’; om: ‘alia’

2. B.N.B., no. 1873

3. ‘quod’

4. B.N.B., no. 1176; see also no. 1573: infra 383

5. ‘septimo’: infra 383 (Mich. 7-8 H. 3); no roll for Easter 8 extant

6. C.R.R., xi, nos. 713, 1037 (B.N.B., no. 1649): infra 383

7. ‘talis’

8. Om: ‘si’

9. Infra 372

10. Infra 364

11. Infra 381

12. Supra ii, 266, iii, 38

13. Supra i, 409