Definition
Ne dona pas (Law French: "did not give") is the general issue plea in a writ of formedon. When a tenant in tail or other defendant wished to deny the foundational gift or grant alleged by the plaintiff in a formedon action, the proper response was to plead ne dona pas — that the donor "did not give" the land or tenancy in the manner claimed. The plea put the entire basis of the plaintiff's title in issue, requiring proof that the original grant was made as alleged.
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Common Language
This is pure legal jargon with no meaningful counterpart in ordinary English. The phrase is Law French, not modern French, and would not appear in general dictionaries. The COMMON LANGUAGE section is omitted.
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Common Confusion
The Burrill entry contains what appears to be a compositing error: the definition of ne dona pas is immediately followed by text describing the management of ships and vessels and citing Chief Justice Marshall on commerce and shipping. This text belongs to a separate entry (likely "navigation" or a related maritime term) and was run together with the ne dona pas entry in the source. Researchers consulting Burrill directly should be aware that the maritime language is not part of the definition of ne dona pas.
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Core Elements
Ne dona pas functioned as the general issue in formedon. Three points define its operation:
1. The plea denied the gift. It placed in dispute whether the original donor made the grant in the form the plaintiff alleged — the foundational act from which the plaintiff's entire chain of title descended.
2. It was the general issue, not a special plea. Pleading ne dona pas put everything at issue rather than confessing the gift and raising a distinct bar. This made it the broadest defensive posture available to the tenant.
3. It was specific to formedon. The writ of formedon — an action to recover land held in fee tail or by gift in tail — had its own procedural vocabulary. Ne dona pas was the tailored general issue for that action, just as not guilty served as the general issue in criminal proceedings and nil debet served in debt.
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Why It Matters in Research
This term is almost entirely a historical artifact. Formedon was abolished in England by the Fines and Recoveries Act of 1833, and the writ had largely fallen into disuse long before then. Researchers encountering ne dona pas in pre-nineteenth-century English legal records, year books, or common law pleading treatises should understand it as the defendant's foundational denial in a formedon action — nothing more, nothing less.
The compositing error in Burrill (discussed under COMMON CONFUSION) is a practical trap. Researchers relying on Burrill's entry in isolation may carry forward garbled text about maritime commerce as though it were part of the definition. Cross-checking against Kent's Commentaries — which Burrill cites at 3 Kent's Com. 159 — will confirm the correct scope of the term.
Because fee tail was also received, modified, and in some colonies and states abolished at varying times in American legal history, researchers working in colonial and early American sources may encounter formedon and its associated pleading vocabulary. The frequency drops sharply after the Revolution and disappears from active practice in most American jurisdictions by the mid-nineteenth century.
The term has no modern procedural equivalent and no current statutory life. Its research value is purely historical and contextual.
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Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's entry — once the compositing error is set aside — is brief but accurate. The citation to 3 Kent's Commentaries at page 159 is the key secondary authority. Kent's treatment of formedon and fee tail provides the substantive context that Burrill's dictionary format cannot accommodate.
Burrill gives no etymology beyond the Law French notation, which is standard for entries of this type in nineteenth-century legal dictionaries. The meaning of the phrase is transparent from its component words and requires no additional unpacking.
Other historical legal dictionaries in the Law Mind corpus (Black's, Bouvier's, Tomlin's) treat ne dona pas in similar fashion when they include it at all — as a brief cross-reference to formedon rather than as a term requiring independent development. The scholarly weight on this topic sits with the common law pleading treatises and with Kent, not with the dictionary literature.
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Jurisdictional Note
Formedon was an English common law action tied to the doctrine of fee tail. American jurisdictions varied in their reception of fee tail: some states abolished it early by statute, others modified it, and a few retained it longer. Where formedon was never available or was quickly displaced, ne dona pas as a pleading term had no practical application.
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