Frank Marriage

Frank-marriage [in libero maritagio, Lat.], a species of entailed estates, now grown out of use, but still capable of subsisting. When tenements are given by one to another, together with a wife, who is a daughter or cousin of the donor, to hold in frank-marriage, the donees shall have the tenements to them and the heirs of their two bodies begotten, i.e., in special tail, without the words of limitation such as 'heirs of his body.' The legal estate in estates tail has been abolished by L.P. Act, 1925, s. 1, and see s. 130, ibid. for the words of limitation necessary to create an equitable interest in tail. For the word frank-marriage, ex vi termini, both creates and limits an inheritance, not only supplying words of descent, but also terms of procreation. The donees are liable to no service except fealty, and a reserved rent would be void until the fourth degree of consanguinity be past between the issues of the donor and donee, when they were capable by the law of the church of intermarrying, Litt. S. 19; and see Challis on Real Property.

An entailed estate in which the donor retains control of land by refusing to accept feudal services from donee (usu. the donor's daughter) for three generation, Black's Law Dictionary, 7th Edn., p. 669.