Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 2, Page 103

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Volume 2, Page 103

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[001] who so alienate to the disinheritance of the true heir ought to be taken as dead.]¹
[002] and thus such gifts are at once valid as between donors and donees and against
[003] [those] who have no right, but are invalid with respect to the owner and his heirs,
[004] or in suspense until by them set aside or confirmed.² One may [indeed] have
[005] the mere right and the property, the fee and the free tenement, [acquired]
[006] through some justa causa of acquisition and rightful title, and another have all
[007] these and the greater right, because of priority in time.³ But what shall be said of
[008] one who had no seisin at all, not the slightest spark of right? If he makes a gift
[009] of a thing another holds, either he himself or someone else in his name, the donor
[010] will not make it the property of the taker, since he himself holds nothing, because
[011] he cannot transfer a greater right to another than he himself has.⁴ A gift so made
[012] will have no more validity than if a person passing through a manor possessed by
[013] another should say to his fellow traveller ‘I give you this manor which such a one
[014] possesses,’ which would be to say nothing other than ‘[I give you] a large handful of
[015] nothing.’ Suppose that a villein, possessed by his lord, gives the villeinage he holds of
[016] him to another.⁵ Then let what was said above be observed, [let the lord bring his
[017] action or enter] according as the donee has a long or a short seisin, as is said among
[018] the pleas which follow the king in the twenty-first year of king Henry, an assise of
[019] novel disseisin [beginning] ‘if Simon son of Wydo.’⁶ Suppose that one makes a
[020] gift of land which is in part another's, as where the owner makes a gift of land a
[021] doweress holds for life, or a man holds by the law of England or in some other way for
[022] life; a gift of that kind is invalid unless the life tenant is willing to surrender his
[023] interest and withdraw from possession, for otherwise the donor, the owner, cannot
[024] put the donee into vacant possession; if she does not so withdraw the gift will not be
[025] effective before her death. But to the extent that it belongs to him [the donor] may
[026] put the donee into seisin⁷ and give him what he himself has, that is, the right of
[027] property and the fee,⁸ and attorn to that donee the woman's service, that she be
[028] intendant to him as the warrantor of her dower. Then, if the donee has first seisin
[029] after the woman's death and the donor or his heirs claim, the donee [or his heirs]
[030] in possession is protected by an exception.⁹ If the donor or his heirs secure first
[031] seisin, the donee or his heirs will be given an action on the agreement.¹⁰ Suppose the
[032] owner, the warrantor [of her dower], gives the second husband of a doweress

Notes

1. Infra 157, iii, 19; B.N.B., no. 153

2. ‘invalidae vel in pendenti sunt’; infra 134, 173

3. Supra 90

4. D. 50.17.54: ‘Nemo plus iuris ad alium transferre potest quam ipse haberet.’

5. Deleted

6. B.N.B., no. 1203

7. Infra 129, iv. 41, 42

8. Infra 106, 128, 129

9. Supra 56, infra 105

10. Cf. 105; not the assise: infra 129-30