Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 28

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Volume 3, Page 28

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[001] remedy by assise lies for one who was not himself ejected, in his own person, nor
[002] through his procurator, but has withdrawn from seisin, leaving no one in possession,
[003] and is denied admittance or repelled on his return.¹ And so where one who has no
[004] right attempts to use another's land, against the will of its lord, and so if he does not
[005] permit the lord to use his own land, as was said above, at the beginning.² Also if one
[006] is disseised by another pursuant to a judgment which is wrongful.³ The plaint and
[007] remedy by assise lies for a lunatic or one who is insane just as for one of sound mind,
[008] provided he is of sound mind at the time of acquiring the tenement, because, since
[009] they once had the animus retinendi, while sane, they cannot change it while insane,
[010] after insanity has come upon them,⁴ because they can neither consent nor dissent nor
[011] cease to possess.⁵ Thus they cannot lose by the passage of time what they acquired
[012] at a more fortunate moment or during a lucid interval. The remedy lies for him who
[013] has a fee farm as for him who holds in fee or for life, and for one who holds in socage
[014] by a rent certain as for one who holds by military service. Similarly, it lies for a wife
[015] for land given her by her husband (or given him by his wife) during marriage, despite
[016] the fact that the gift may afterwards be invalidated;⁶ if one⁷ of them is⁸ in seisin after
[017] the donor's death, he cannot be disseised without judgment provided that time which
[018] in other cases suffices for title has passed. It also lies for him whose father died in a
[019] free status, if after his father's death he is in seisin and in possession of his freedom
[020] beyond the potestas of his lords.⁹ It sometimes lies for a villein sokeman in the demesne
[021] of the lord king, if the manor is called a borough,¹⁰ as Cirencester, as [in the roll] of
[022] the eyre of the abbot of Reading and Martin of Pateshull in the county of Gloucester
[023] in the fifth year of king Henry, an assise of novel disseisin [beginning] ‘if Philip le
[024] Riche.’¹¹ Also for a free man, who holds a villeinage by villein service and customs,
[025] [whether he is married to a bondswoman or not,] for a tenement he elsewhere holds
[026] freely, despite the fact that he holds a villeinage and is joined to a neif.¹² Also for him
[027] who was enfeoffed by one who holds for life, in dower or by the law of England, or for
[028] a term, or in any other way, as is proved in many places by example. Also for a villein,
[029] depending upon the circumstances: against his lord and all others while he is outside
[030] the potestas of his lords, until the lord has recovered him as a bondsman. If within the
[031] potestas

Notes

1. D. 41.2.6.1; 43.16.1.24; ‘de domo processisset nemine suorum relicto, mox revertens prohibitus sit ingredi’; supra ii, 155, iii, 18

2. Supra 26, infra 75, 129

3. Infra 121

4. Supra ii, 134; om: ‘nec desinere possidere’

5. D. 41.2.27: ‘quia furiosus non potest desinere animo possidere’; infra 158

6. Supra ii, 54, 97

7. ‘quis’

8. ‘fuerit’

9. Infra 92

10. Infra 85, 104

11. Selden Soc. vol. 59, no. 83; not in B.N.B.

12. Infra 35