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Disposable Portion

Black's Law Dictionary · Henry Campbell Black, M.A. · 1910

Black's Law Dictionary

That portion of a man's property which he is free to dispose of by wlll to beneficiaries other than his wife and children. By the ancient common law, this amounted to one-third of his estate if he was survived by both wife and children.

2 Bl. Comm. 492; Hopkins v. Wright, 17 Tex. 36.

In the civil law (by the Lex Falcidia) it amounted to three-fourths.

Mackeld. Rom. Law, §§ 708, 771.