Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 2, Page 373

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Volume 2, Page 373

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[001] he acted lawfully in self-defence, he ought to be admitted to grace and to the peace
[002] without difficulty.¹

Where there is no cause at all.

[004] Where there is no cause, despite the fact that the outlawry is lawfully and properly
[005] done, he ought to be admitted to the peace of grace and without difficulty and as
[006] of some right, the grace of the prince accompanying it.]² ³When the outlawry is
[007] void ipso jure because promulgated contrary to the law of the land and the custom
[008] of the realm, ⁴he ought to be restored [and as may be drawn from what has been said
[009] above, admitted to grace of right] to everything de jure, as though he had never been
[010] outlawed.

A man is restored to nothing but the peace.

[012] ⁵When the outlawry has been properly done according to the law of the land,
[013] whether there is a true or a presumptive cause or none at all,⁶ he is restored only to
[014] the peace,⁷ that he may come and go and enter into new agreements. For what was
[015] dissolved by the outlawry cannot be conjoined by inlawry without a new agreement
[016] made by those who had previously contracted.⁸ The king cannot grant grace if it is
[017] to the harm and damage of others. He may give what is his own, that is his peace,
[018] which the outlaw lost by his flight and his contumacy, but by his grace he cannot
[019] give what belongs to another,⁹ ¹⁰<When the appellee has fled and the appellor has
[020] properly prosecuted to outlawry, the suit and the flight raise a strong presumption
[021] that the appellee is guilty, ¹¹and that he cannot be restored to anything except the
[022] peace and loses all his property; this presumption must stand until the contrary is
[023] proved, that is, that the act [on which the presumption rests] is void,¹² which may
[024] well be done, as where he who was alleged to be slain is produced alive after the outlawry.
[025] The outlaw will then be restored to everything,¹³ because the deed is void, and
[026] thus true proof destroys the presumption. But if the outlaw dies before [the presumption
[027] is overcome] he forfeits all his property for his heirs, unless by counsel and
[028] of grace another result is reached.>

A man lawfully and properly outlawed is restored to nothing but the peace so that he may come and go and have peace; he cannot be restored to his actions nor to other things because he is as it were a child newly born and a man newly created.

[030] nor restore him to his previous¹⁴ actions and obligations,

Notes

1. Infra 375, 378

2. ‘gratia tamen principis concomitante,’ from line 2; supra 359, infra 375

3. Continued from 372, n. 3

4. ‘sive subfuerit ... nulla,’ infra n. 6

5. Om: ‘In omnibus ... causa,’ redactor's introductory phrase; supra i, 140 (full collation)

6. Supra n. 4

7. Infra 374, 375

8. Supra 363, infra 374

9. Infra 376; Glanvill, vii, 17; C.R.R., xiv, no. 1427

10. Supra i, 387; belongs supra at n. 2

11-12. Reading: ‘culpabilis sit, [et] quod appellatus non poterit restitui nisi ad pacem tantum et quod omnia amittit; et huic praesumptioni standum erit semper donec probetur contrarium’

13. Not Bracton's usual view: infra 374, 375

14. ‘praehabitas’