mortmain, n. Law.
(ˈmɔːtmeɪn)
Forms: 5–6 mortmayn(e, mortemayn(e, 6 mortemeyn, morttmayne, 6–8 mortmaine, 6– mortmain.
[a. OF. mortemain, AF. morte mayn (Britton c 1290), ad. med.L. mortua manus, manus mortua (cf. F. mainmorte, Sp. manos muertas, Pg. mão morta, It. mano morta) ‘dead hand’ (L. mortua, fem. of mortuus dead, manus hand).
It seems probable that ‘dead hand’ in English legal use is a metaphorical expression for impersonal ownership, and is unconnected with the older feudal use of manus mortua to denote the custom by which serfs (and other classes included under the term homines manus mortuæ) had no power of testamentary disposition, their possessions, if they died without legitimate offspring, reverting to the lord.]
The condition of lands or tenements held inalienably by an ecclesiastical or other corporation. Also attrib.
Alienations in mortmain, as being injurious to the rights of the crown and the mesne lords, were forbidden by 7 Edw. I, st. 2 (see quot. 1279) and many subsequent Acts, known as the ‘Statutes of Mortmain’. The intention of these statutes was to a great extent evaded by judicial interpretations. The Mortmain Act: the statute 9 Geo. II, cap. 36, passed in 1736, imposing restrictions on the devising of property to charitable uses; also, the title of various later statutes having a similar object. licence of mortmain: an instrument conveying the permission of the king to alienate property in mortmain.
| [1279 Act 7 Edw. I (Statutum de Viris Religiosis), Providimus..quod nullus Religiosus aut alius quicumque terras..emere vel vendere..præ sumat..per quod ad manum mortuam terre..hujusmodi deveniant quoquo modo.] c 1450 Godstow Reg. 446 That hit shold not be lawfull to Religious peple to entre the fee of ony or of other, so that hit shold come into morte-mayne, without his licence. 1494 Fabyan Chron. vii. 385 This yere was the statute of Mortmayn enacted firste. c 1550 Bale K. Johan (Camden) 8 This cumpany hath provyded for me morttmayne. 1590 Swinburne Testaments 71 Citizens, burgesses and freemen, maie bequeath their burgage landes to Mortmain, which others can not doe. 1623 Sir T. Crew Sp. Ho. Com. in Rushw. Hist. Coll. (1659) I. 117 The Subjects thereby were enabled to found Hospitals without Licence of Mortmain. 1642 D. Rogers Naaman 165 There was a Statute we know of Mortmaine,..to cut of the validity of such gifts as were given to the Clergy for Popish ends. 1736 Ld. Bruce in Buccleuch MSS. (Hist. MSS. Comm.) I. 389, I intend being at London..to attend the Mortmain Bill. 1827 Jarman Powell's Devises (ed. 3) II. 13 The statute 7 and 8 Wm. III. c. 37..provides that the Crown..may grant licenses to aliene, or take in mortmain, of whomsoever the tenements shall be holden. 1844 Williams Real Prop. (1877) 69 The stringency of the provisions in the Mortmain Act. 1846 M{supc}Culloch Acc. Brit. Empire (1854) II. 373 In some parishes..money has been placed in mortmain..for the better endowment of parish schools. 1903 A. Robertson Rom. Cath. Ch. in It. v. (1905) 114 The Mortmain Statutes were framed to prevent the Church Corporations from getting hold of real property. |
b. A licence of mortmain.
| 1567 in W. H. Turner Select. Rec. Oxford (1880) 320 In purchasinge a mortmayne. 1596 Spenser State Irel. Wks. (Globe) 680/2 For mayntenaunce of..which [school-houses] it were meete that some severall portion of lande were allotted, sith no more mortmains are to be looked for. 1655 Fuller Hist. Cambr. 153 They humbly requested of Her Highnesse a Mortmaine to found a Colledge. a 1661 ― Worthies, Northumbld. (1662) ii. 308 He bought three tenements..and (by a Mortmain procured from King Edward the fourth) erected of them a small Colledge. |
c. transf. and fig.
The figurative use is often based on the notion that the ‘dead hand’ means the posthumous control exercised by the testator over the uses to which the property is to be applied.
| 1625 Jackson Creed v. xxi. §3 Alexander..seeks afterward to solace his griefs by procuring mortmain from the oracle for his dead friend to hold greater honours than this great conqueror..could have bestowed upon him. 1852 Longfellow Haunted Houses v, Owners and occupants of earlier dates From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands, And hold in mortmain still their old estates. 1876 Lowell Among my Bks. Ser. ii. 228 Sir George Beaumont, dying in 1827,..contrived to hold his affection in mortmain by the legacy of an annuity of {pstlg}100. 1876 J. B. Mayor in Contemp. Rev. XXVII. 892 There was a time when the thought of Christendom was in mortmain no less than its land. |
Hence † ˈmortmain v. trans., to grant in mortmain. † mortˈmainer (nonce-wd.), one who lays a ‘dead hand’ upon.
| 1530 Palsgr. 641/1, I mortmayne landes, I gyve landes to the churche to be payed for{ddd}He hath mortmayned his chiefe maner..to the next abbaye to hym. 1534 Cranmer Let. to Crumwell in Misc. Writ. (Parker Soc.) II. 287 The said lands, which the said prebendaries shall have of him, to be mortmained by a certain day. 1808 J. W. Croker Sk. St. Irel. (ed. 2) 39 One-third of them [sc. clergy] are not resident–absentees from their duties–mortmainers upon the land! |