The Requirement of a Deed in the Action of Covenant

The origin of the rule that an action of covenant required a deed is something of a mystery, although its consequences were of the greatest importance in the development of the common law. The most recent contribution to the debate has even doubted whether it was a rule of the action of covenant at all. The present article aims to cast as much light on this as possible given the surviving evidence. It restates the traditional view that it was indeed a rule of the action of covenant, dates its appearance, and tentatively suggests that it had may have had a legislative or quasi-legislative origin

Action (physics · Covenant · Deed · Law and economics · Legislature · Political science · Sociology · Historical Legal Studies and Society · Law · Medieval Literature and History · Multicultural Socio-Legal Studies