Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 280

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Volume 3, Page 280

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[001] And so, once they begin to be such, if several nearer heirs die successively, one after
[002] the other, in the lifetime of the ancestor, he always begins to be a nearer heir¹ who
[003] earlier was a near heir to the ancestor, whether in the right line descending or in the
[004] transverse,² provided that the right line always excludes the transverse, as may
[005] clearly be drawn from what has already been said.³ And so if the inheritance descends
[006] to a first-born son having no heir of his body, his younger brothers or sisters
[007] begin to be his near heirs and cease to be the heirs of their common father or other
[008] ancestor, but his next oldest brother begins to be [his] nearer heir because he is the
[009] older. The general rule is that he to whom the mere right descends is always the
[010] nearer heir, whether he is the true heir or [is taken] as heir or stands in the place of
[011] the heir, as a lord because of the felony of his tenant,⁴ because no one can be a nearer
[012] heir who does not have⁵ the mere right. What is said of near heirs is also true of remote
[013] heirs ad infinitum, of whom more will be said below, [of successions.]⁶

We must see whether he holds the whole as the ancestor held.

[015] ⁷The words of the writ are ‘Summon etc. such a one (or ‘such persons’) who hold
[016] that land (or ‘rent’) etc.’ Thus we must see whether he holds the whole as the
[017] ancestor, whose seisin the heir claims, held it, or part and not the whole. [It is clear
[018] that the whole may be claimed in many ways, either as a single whole, as where one
[019] claims a manor with the appurtenances or a carucate of land with the appurtenances,
[020] or⁸ in another way, as⁹ ten librates of land with the appurtenances,¹⁰ nor does it
[021] matter whether he does one or the other.] Hence when the demandant ought to
[022] make the view to the jurors, they must see what and how much he puts into his
[023] view and whether it is all that the ancestor held and as he held it, or not, for he
[024] ought to claim by the assise what the ancestor held and as he held it, or except if
[025] something thereof has been aliened or transferred after his ancestor's seisin, otherwise
[026] the writ ought to fall. If the heir claims his ancestor's seisin [of several parcels]
[027] against one person by parcels, whether the parcels are of different kinds or of the
[028] same kind, each is separate and distinct, whether they are in one place or in different
[029] places. If the tenant does not hold one of the parcels completely, the writ falls as to
[030] that entire parcel, but is good as to the other individual parcels, for though there is
[031] but a single demandant and a single tenant, there will be several different though
[032] similar actions because of the several parcels, as it would be if one claimed

Notes

1. Om: ‘ei qui . . . hereditatis’

2. Supra ii, 189, infra 306

3. Supra ii, 196, iii, 279

4. Supra ii, 195, infra 297

5. ‘habuerit’

6. Supra ii, 199 not infra; similarly 279, n. 10

7. Infra 291

8. ‘vel’

9. ‘ut’

10. Om: ‘vel alio modo’