in law, an act by which a person surrenders and transmits to another person a right which belonged to himself. Cession is more particularly used in the civil law for a voluntary surrender of a person's effects to his creditors, to avoid imprisonment. See the article **Bankrupt**.

In several places the cession carried with it a mark of infamy, and obliged the person to wear a green cap or bonnet; at Lucca, an orange one: to neglect this was to forfeit the privileges of the cession. This was originally intended to signify that the cessionary was become poor through his own folly. The Italian lawyers describe the ceremony of cession to consist in striking the bare breech three times against a stone, called *Lapis Vituperii*, in presence of the judge. Formerly it consisted in giving up the girdles and keys in court: the ancients used to carry at their girdles the chief utensils wherewith they got their living; as the ironworker his escritoire, the merchant his bag, &c. The form of cession among the ancient Gauls and Romans was as follows: The cessionary gathered up dust in his left hand from the four corners of the house, and standing on the threshold, holding the door-post in his right hand, threw the dust back over his shoulders; then stripping to his shirt, and quitting his girdle and bags, he jumped with a pole over a hedge; hereby letting the world know, that he had nothing left, and that when he jumped all he was worth was in the air with him. This was the cession in criminal matters. In civil cases, it was sufficient to lay a broom, a switch, or a broken straw, on the threshold: this was called *chrencreuda per durpillum et felucam*.

in the ecclesiastical law, is when an ecclesiastical person is created a bishop, or when a patron of a parish takes another benefice, without dispensation, or being otherwise qualified. In both these cases their first benefices became void by cession, without any resignation; and to those livings that the person had, who was created bishop, the king may present for that time, whoever is patron of them; and in the other case the patron may present: but by dispensation of remainder, a bishop may retain some or all the preferments he was intitled to before he was made bishop.