Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 392

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Volume 3, Page 392

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[001] on that jury etc. And meanwhile let them view that land. And let them in the meantime
[002] make themselves sufficiently certain of this matter that they may certify our
[003] aforesaid justices etc. more fully on the aforesaid day (if the knights-jurors are to
[004] come before the king's court).’ If it is to be held before the sheriff and coroners, then
[005] thus: ‘And make known the inquest which you make thereon to our justices on such
[006] a day by your letters sealed with your seal and the seals of the aforesaid jurors, and
[007] by two of those by whose oath you took that inquest.’ There are an infinite number of
[008] cases which may be brought within this inquest.

He may acknowledge that the husband was seised as of fee but that before he married her he gave it, so that never afterwards etc.

[010] He may except against the woman-demandant that if he was in seisin as of fee, he had
[011] given that land before he married her, so that neither on the day he married nor
[012] ever thereafter was he so in seisin that he could endow her. [Or that if he was entitled
[013] to seisin, he was never in seisin], because another held it in fee, or for life in some way,
[014] [so that] it was never delivered in the lifetime of the husband. To which the woman
[015] may replicate that though her husband never had seisin after he married her, she
[016] was endowed subject to the following condition, that the land should be assigned to
[017] her in dower when it was delivered.¹ On that [issue] we must proceed to an inquest.
[018] He may also except against the woman that if her husband had seisin as of fee, it was
[019] not so in fee that he could endow her, because² the land was the right of another and
[020] he lost it by judgment.³ ⁴<That the woman loses dower where it is established that
[021] her husband [lost] by judgment, may be found [in the roll] of the eyre of Martin of
[022] Pateshull in the county of Lincoln in the tenth year of king Henry, [the case] of
[023] Alice the wife of Richard the son of Dyva.>⁵ To this the woman may answer that he
[024] was so seised as of fee that he could endow her, and that if he lost it by judgment it
[025] was by fraud, which may be, as where a woman has been specifically endowed at the
[026] church door and the husband then alienates her named dower by some title of
[027] alienation, afterwards resumes his seisin in some way, is impleaded by reason of the
[028] first alienation, and thus loses by judgment. This will not prejudice her when she
[029] claims dower after his death, because she was endowed before the alienation and
[030] began to have right which could not be altered by her husband's act.⁶

The wife's replication if the husband wittingly lost by deceit or negligence in order to defraud his wife of dower after his death.

[032] She may replicate that if [the tenant] recovered by judgment it was by the deceit
[033] or negligence of her husband, as where a husband wittingly and in hatred of his wife

Notes

1. Supra ii, 268

2. ‘quia’

3. Supra ii, 272, 273, iii, 387, 390

4. Supra i, 409

5. Not in B.N.B.; no roll extant

6. Supra ii, 270, iii, 368