Definition
Darrein presentment (also rendered "darrien presentment" or "darrein presentement") is an archaic English legal term meaning "the last presentment" — specifically, the most recent occasion on which a patron presented a clerk to a vacant ecclesiastical living (a church benefice). The term derives from the Anglo-Norman French and was operative as a technical phrase within the assize of darrein presentment, one of the possessory assizes established in medieval English common law. Standing alone, darrein presentment simply names the factual predicate — the last act of presentation — that gave rise to the assize bearing its name.
Common Confusion
Darrein presentment is not "presentment" in the constitutional or criminal procedure sense. The modern legal uses of presentment — a grand jury's written accusation made without a prior indictment, or the formal submission of a bill to the executive for signature or veto — are entirely unrelated. The shared word "presentment" reflects different roots: in darrein presentment, the act is the patron's nomination of a clerk to a bishop; in constitutional and criminal law, presentment concerns formal governmental process. A researcher encountering "presentment" in medieval ecclesiastical or property sources and "presentment" in criminal or constitutional sources is reading two distinct legal concepts that happen to share a word.
Why It Matters in Research
This term functions almost exclusively as a pointer. Neither Black's nor Burrill's treats darrein presentment as a free-standing concept; both entries redirect the reader immediately to the assize of darrein presentment, which is where the substantive doctrine lives. A researcher who encounters darrein presentment in a historical source — a plea roll, a year book entry, a Bracton passage, or a Blackstone discussion — should follow the redirect without hesitation.
The research trap here is terminological fragmentation. Historical sources use variant spellings (darrien, darrein, darrien, dernier presentment) and may abbreviate to "darrein" alone or embed the phrase mid-sentence in Law French without translation. Searching a corpus for "darrein presentment" without variant forms will produce incomplete results. Burrill and Black agree on meaning and redirect, which signals consensus across the historical dictionary shelf but also signals that neither source considered it worth developing independently — meaning the legal encyclopedia and treatise literature (Bracton, Glanvill, Coke, Blackstone's Commentaries Book III) is where substantive content resides.
Chronologically, the assize of darrein presentment was effectively superseded in English law by the Statute of Westminister II (1285) and later by quare impedit as the preferred action for disputed advowsons. By the time Blackstone wrote in the eighteenth century, the assize was largely historical. Researchers working in common law jurisdictions outside England will find almost no reception of this term; it did not transplant meaningfully into American law, where the ecclesiastical structure that made it necessary did not exist.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary and Burrill's Law Dictionary are in complete agreement: darrein presentment means "the last presentment" and the entry is a cross-reference, not a standalone definition. Neither source elaborates on the doctrine itself at this entry. This unanimous redirect is itself informative — it confirms the term has no independent legal content beyond its role as the factual trigger for the named assize. Researchers should treat both dictionary entries as navigational markers rather than substantive definitions.
What the historical dictionaries do not supply: the procedural mechanics of how proof of darrein presentment was established before the assize justices, the evidentiary standards for determining which presentation was "last," or the relationship between darrein presentment and competing actions like quare impedit and jus patronatus. For those questions, Glanvill's Tractatus (circa 1187–1189) and Bracton's De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae provide the foundational treatment; Blackstone's Commentaries Book III, Chapter 7 offers the clearest later synthesis.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
The Law Mind Encyclopedia entries on bicameralism and presentment (constitutional_14), compulsory process (criminal_184), and future damages (torts_18) address different legal meanings of "presentment" and are not directly relevant to darrein presentment as a medieval property and ecclesiastical law concept. No Law Mind Encyclopedia entry is a natural match for this term.