Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 2, Page 174

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Volume 2, Page 174

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[001] will be valid. If the gift is made by a non-lord, as by those holding for a term or in
[002] some other way, as above, ¹though the gift is valid as between donor and donee, it
[003] will be invalid and in suspense until revoked or confirmed by the true lord,² [and
[004] thus] the collateral confirmation will be valid until the gift is revoked by the true
[005] lord, and when it is revoked will begin to be invalid, [with respect to the donor and
[006] donee and the true lord;] when confirmed by the true lord it then is valid and binding
[007] as though from³ the time the gift was first made [it then first begins to be valid in the
[008] person of the true lord.] If a gift is wholly void, because absolutely forbidden by law,
[009] as a gift between husband and wife, or because made by one who had no seisin of any
[010] kind which⁴ he could transfer and make the thing the property of the taker, a
[011] collateral confirmation will be invalid, and thus the rule is true⁵ that where the gift is
[012] wholly void the confirmation will be invalid. But generally when one is in possession
[013] through a causa of some kind, true or fictitious, and the true lord wittingly and
[014] advisedly agrees, confirming the gift or sale no matter by whom made, his confirmation
[015] will make what was done valid, since the lord wished it,⁶ for his will and
[016] the confirmation supplies all defects,⁷ though what was done was invalid at the
[017] beginning. I say this provided there was no initial error in the gift, for if there was
[018] the confirmation will be no better than the gift. In a gift (and also in a confirmation)
[019] there may be error as to the thing or the person, [and whether as to the person
[020] or the thing what is done will not be valid, for he who errs does not consent,]⁸
[021] [the person], as where one makes a gift to another as the heir of such a one though
[022] he is not his heir, and a confirmation subsequently follows; it will have no more
[023] validity than the gift, as where a chief lord, believing a claimant to be the heir
[024] though he is a supposititious child or someone other than the true heir, puts him in
[025] seisin of an inheritance and takes his homage and confirmations are made; what is
[026] done will be invalid because of error as to the person, and when discovered the homage
[027] must be extinguished,⁹ for he who did the homage had no right in the tenement
[028] from which he did it, nor ought he to hold of him the tenement from which he did
[029] the homage. As to the thing, ¹⁰as where the donor has one thing in mind and the
[030] donee another;¹¹ neither the gift nor the confirmation that follows upon such gift
[031] will be valid. Nor will a confirmation be valid where there is no error in the gift
[032] but there is in the confirmation.

[When one may make a confirmation].

[034] We must see when one may make a confirmation. It is clear that he may not do
[035] so before the right has accrued to him, that is, to the heir of the true lord,¹² so that he
[036] may invalidate¹³ the gift

Notes

1-2. Supra 173, n. 6

2. Supra 103, 134, 137

3. ‘ab,’ Y

4. ‘quae’

5. ‘et ita verum est,’ as above

6. Supra 126

7. Supra 108, 139

8. D. 2.1.15; ‘nihil valebit quod actum est ... cum non consentiant qui errent’; supra 137, infra 228

9. Infra 207, 227, 228; cf. iii, 246

10-11. Inst. 3.19.23: ‘Si de alia re stipulator senserit, de alia promissor ...’; supra 63, infra 285

12. ‘heredi veri domini’; supra 51; cf. supra 157, 173 n. 2

13. B.N.B., no. 467 (margin): ‘Nota quod carta de confirmacione facta ab eo qui possit donum infirmare valere debet, licet principalis non valeat, set tunc demum cum ius ad eum [acciderit qui] confirmaverit, quia confirmacio prius facta non valet.’