page_title: Cestui que
section_title: Medieval invention
hierarchical_section_title: Cestui que / Medieval invention
context_page_description: Cestui que is a shortened version of cestui a que use le feoffment fuit fait, literally, "The person for whose benefit the feoffment was made." It is a Law French phrase of medieval English invention, which appears in the legal phrases cestui que trust, cestui que use, or cestui que vie. In contemporary English the phrase is also commonly pronounced "setty-kay" or "sesty-kay". According to Roebuck, Cestui que use is pronounced "setticky yuce". Cestui que use and cestui que trust are more or less interchangeable terms. In some medieval materials, the phrase is seen as cestui a que.
  The cestui que use is the person for whose benefit the trust is created. The cestui que trust is the person entitled to the equitable, as opposed to the legal, estate in the trust assets. Thus, if land is granted to A, for the use of B while in trust, with remainder to C when the trust terminates, A is the trustee, B is cestui que use, and C the cestui que trust. Ordinarily B and C will be the same person, so the terms are generally synonyms. Owing mainly to their cumbersome nature, both have been virtually superseded by the term "beneficiary" in general trust law.
context_section_description: Many reasons have been given for the invention of the cestui que use as a legal device.  During the Crusades, and other wars on the Continent, landowners might be gone for long periods of time.  Others might be absent because of business adventures or religious pilgrimages.  There was no assurance they would ever return home.  The cestui que use allowed them to leave a trusted friend or relative with the sort of powers, discretions and they hoped, the duties.  Today, this power would be called the "power of attorney".  Religious orders such as Franciscans, Cistercians, Benedictines and other mendicant orders took vows of poverty, yet retained the use of donated property.  Cestui que use allowed them the benefits of land without legal ownership.
  Besides the obvious limitations placed on cestui que by the Statute of Mortmain, Statute of Uses and the Statute of Wills, its legality was shaped indirectly by provisions within the Magna Carta and Quia Emptores.
caption: Cistercian Buckland Abbey, established on land near Yelverton, Devon donated by Amicia, Countess of Devon in 1278
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