Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 270

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Volume 3, Page 270

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[‘Was seised’]; of seisin ‘on the day he died.’

[002] ¹The words of the writ are ‘if such a one, the father [or other ancestor] was seised on
[003] the day he died.’² Seisin is acquired corpore and animo [and] may be retained corpore
[004] and animo, or corpore only without animo, after death, until the body is borne away
[005] from seisin,³ [or] animo without corpore, before death, for example, suppose that one
[006] sets out on a journey, as⁴ to a fair, leaving no one in possession in his name, and dies
[007] on the journey before he returns; he dies seised. If he abandons his possession because
[008] of poverty, so that the chieflord takes the tenement into his hand for failure of service
[009] and retains it, or gives it to another to cultivate, or to put a stronger case, enfeoffs
[010] another, the tenant dies sufficiently seised, because he retains it civilly animo
[011] though he is not physically in possession naturaliter, though this would not be so if
[012] while alive he had offered the service and arrears to the chief lord and seisin was
[013] denied him, for he would then be disseised and would not die seised.⁵ [One who has
[014] been ejected and dies] on the second or third day, or later, as long as it is lawful
[015] for him to re-eject [his disseisor], dies sufficiently seised;⁶ and so if he is in such illhealth
[016] that he cannot sue, as where he has been essoined of bed-sickness, or is so ill
[017] that he has lost his memory, because when one has once acquired seisin animo
[018] and corpore, and while he is in seisin an illness comes upon him by which he loses his
[019] memory, he dies sufficiently seised, because he can never cease (while that state
[020] lasts) to possess animo.⁷ The same is true if one makes a gift by charter so that a
[021] fine and chirograph is made with every formality in the lord king's court but no
[022] seisin follows, or only an insufficient seisin, as where the donor does not change his
[023] status with respect to his use, wholly or in part, when he uses after the gift by himself
[024] or with the donee, in his own person or by his people, so that the donee does not
[025] have vacant possession.⁸ ⁹It does not matter what sort of seisin the ancestor had, by
[026] disseisin or intrusion, by gift of a lord or a non-lord, provided he dies seised, so to
[027] speak, of a fee, as to which, if he were ejected while alive, he could recover his seisin
[028] by an assise of novel disseisin, not as of a free tenement, as where he held for life, but
[029] to himself and his heirs, as in fee. This is the general rule.¹⁰ [Who holds for life and
[030] who in fee is adequately explained above in the title on gifts.]¹¹ It does not matter
[031] whether one dies seised in his own person or in that of a tutor or procurator, as where
[032] a procurator stipulates and

Notes

1. Infra 285

2. ‘die quo obiit,’ from line 3

3. Supra ii, 130, 155

4. ‘ut’

5. Supra 157-8

6. Supra 158, 201

7. Supra ii, 134, iii, 158, 174

8. Supra ii, 107, 132, 151, 153, infra 290

9. New paragraph

10. Infra 273

11. Supra ii, 57