Ancestor

One who has preceded another in a direct line of descent; an ascendant. A former possessor; the person last seised. Termes de la Ley; 2 Sharswood, Bl. Comm. 201. In the common law, the word is under^ stood as well of the immediate parents as of those that are higher; as may appear by St. 25 Edw. III., De natis ultra mare, and by St. 6 Rich. II. c. 6, and by many others. But the civilians' relations in the ascending line, up to the great-grandfather's parents, and those above them, they term majores, which common lawyers aptly expound antecessors, or ancestors, for in the descendants ' of like degree they are called posteriores. Gary, Litt. 45. The term "ancestor" is applied to natural persons. The words "predecessors" and "successors" are used in respect to the persons composing a body corporate. See 2 Bl. Comm. 209; Bac. Abr.; Ayliffe, Pand. 58; Reeve, Descents.

One who has preceded another in a direct line of descent; an ascendant. A former possessor; the person last seised. Termes de la Ley; 2 Bla. Com. 201. In the common law, the word is understood as well of the immediate parents as of those that are higher; as may appear by the statute 25 Edw. III., De natis ultra mare, and by the statute 6 Ric. II. c. 6, and by many others. But the civilians' relations in the ascending line, up to the great-grandfather's parents, and those above them, they term majores, which common lawyers aptly expound antecessors or ancestors, for in the descendants of like degree they are called poster lor es; Cary, Litt. 45. The term ancestor is applied to natural persons. The words predecessors and successors are used in respect to the persons composing a body corporate. See 2 Bla. Com. 209; Bacon, Abr.; Ayliffe, Pand. 58. It designates the ascendants of one in the right line, as father and mother, grandfather and grandmother, and does not include collateral relatives as brothers and sisters; Valentine v. Wetherill, 31 Barb. (N. Y.) 659.

One who has preceded another in a direct line of descent; a lineal ascendant. A former possessor; the person last seised. Termes dela Ley; 2 BI. Comm, 201. A deceased person from whom another has inherited land. A former possessor, The term differs from “predecessor,” in that it is applied to a natural person and his progenitors, while the latter is applied also to a corporation und those who have held effieces before those who now Gill them. Co. Litt. 7806.

The person from whom cessarily related lineally. Ancestral action, Action. punishment by disgrace, infamy, or satisfactory apology. A penalty, like a fine, but imof record, and of uncertain to be in the mercy of the king and the amount was assessed by Prosecute. cite; to bring the body of a party friend. Amicus curiae: a friend person who makes a suggestion, Amici consilia credenda: trusted. by consent of both parties to setfacts being usually agreed upon. lose one's frank-law. Amitlaw of the land. Both expreswho has lost the privilege of or suing, in court. Part of become infamous; i. e. who has So, Amittere curiam: to above. lands in mortmain. Alienation in mortmain.; carrying away. remove the hands; v. Ouster-leenlarge; extend; defer. Ampliafter further consideration.: next friend. jour et -waste: year, day, and Compound interest. an estate is inherited; not ne-

[L. Fr. auncestre; L. Lat. antecessor, from antecedere, to go before.] In the law of descents. One who has gone before, or preceded in the seisin or possession of real estate; a deceased person from whom an estate has passed to another by operation of law, in consequence of his decease. The person last seised of an estate of inheritance, and from whom such estate is transmitted by descent to the heir. 2 Bl. Com. 200, 208. 1 Steph. Com. 218. See Antecessor, Predecessor, Ascendant. It is said in the old books, that the word ancestor, in the forensic sense, was not properly applied to the ancestor of a family, but either to the pre-possessor of an estate, or the predecessor in an office. Termes de la ley. It seems to have originally been, like its correlative heir, strictly a nomen juris, though it acquired the popular sense in which it is now used, at a very early period. Richardson's Diet. Its technical meaning was very significantly expressed by its Latin form, (antecessor, q. v.); but it appears from Bracton that even the latter word had begun to be used in his time, in senses not strictly appropriate, as where it was employed to denote a living person. Bract. fol. 67. A similar misapplication of the word ancestor sometimes occurs in modern law; an instance of which is furnished by the recent English statute for the improvement of the law of inheritance, in which "descent" is defined to be "the title to inherit land by reason of consanguinity, as well where the heir shall be an ancestor, or collateral relation, as where he shall be a child or other issue." Stat. 3 & 4 Will. IV., c. 106. 1 Steph. Com. 357, note (b). Ancestor is here used in the sense of a living person in the ascending line of kindred, and in such connexion with the word heir as to confound the established relation between the terms. Ancestor and heir, are, in law, strictly the correlatives of each other, having a fixed meaning, and not admitting of being interchangeably or indifferently applied, as between two given persons. An ancestor is a deceased person from whom an estate has passed, just as an heir is the living person to whom it has passed; nor can the same person properly be said to stand in the relations both of ancestor and heir to another. That ancestor imports, ex vi termini, a deceased person, seems to be settled by the maxim which fixes the meaning of heir: Nemo est haeres viventis, (q. v.) See Heir, Descent.