Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 50

Harvard Law School Library

Bracton Online -- English

Volume 3, Page 50

Next

Go to Volume: Page:

[001] impetration is rendered non-litigious by negligent prosecution, and if it is transferred
[002] to another during such delay, the first writ falls and another must be impetrated,
[003] which must include all, the first and principal disseisor as well as those to whom the
[004] thing has been transferred.¹ But if all has been diligently done, the writ delivered to
[005] the sheriff, pledges for prosecuting found and the disseisors attached, by such action,
[006] though the assise is not taken immediately the thing will be made litigious forever,
[007] as against the disseisors and their heirs, if they die, and if it is transferred to another
[008] in their lifetimes all need not be named, as was said above.² ³<Sometimes a thing is
[009] transferred to another not as a feoffment or as a free tenement, but for a term of
[010] years, or thus, ‘until the transferee has taken from it so many harvests’ or ‘as long as
[011] the tenement may be cultivated and bear crops,’ as in the case of common of pasture,
[012] where the lord of an estate, or he who bears himself as lord though he is not, has
[013] committed a disseisin, and others claim common [there], and they settle the matter
[014] between themselves in this way, that he who claims may cultivate some portion
[015] with the disseisor ‘until you have taken thence so many harvests’ or ‘as long as the
[016] land may be cultivated.’⁴ This will not be a free tenement, because it is granted for a
[017] certain time or a certain term. ⁵[If the disseisee recovers dominion of the thing
[018] against him who bears himself as lord,⁶ he recovers against the others who entered
[019] through the disseisor for a term, or an ‘until,’ as was said above, with the crop then
[020] growing, though they are not named in the writ. For this reason,⁷ because they have
[021] no free tenement, only a term or an ‘until,’ and so the crop passes with the tenement.
[022] It would be otherwise had the disseisor given the thing seized to the others for life or
[023] in fee, [or for] an uncertain time,⁸ as ‘I grant to such a one such land (or such a thing)
[024] until I shall provide for him to such an extent,’ or ‘until such a thing happens or
[025] does not.’]⁹ But if he says ‘I give and grant to you so much land until you have taken
[026] thence forty pounds,’ because it cannot be known how long it may take for so many
[027] pounds to be raised from so much land, because the term is uncertain and undetermined,
[028] it is evident that the tenement will remain a free tenement until so many
[029] pounds are raised, since it cannot be known or determined in how long a time they
[030] may be raised, in how many years, as [may be done in the case] above of ‘so many
[031] harvests,’ [where] a term certain may be fixed, since each harvest has its year, one
[032] in each.> It sometimes happens that after a disseisin, [the thing having been transferred
[033] to another or not transferred,] the disseisee dies, or the disseisor

Notes

1. Supra 44, 48, infra 57, 121

2. Supra 44

3. Supra i, 393

4. Om: ‘vel donec . . . non sit,’ erroneous

5-9. ‘Si disseisitus . . . vel sic,’ from lines 17-25; om: ‘Si autem dicat sic,’ a connective

6. ‘pro domino dominium rei’

7. ‘hoc ideo’

8. Supra ii, 90, iii, 39-40, infra 69, 127