1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Excambion

EXCAMBION (a word connected with a large class of Low Latin and Romance forms, such as cambium, concambium, scambium, from Lat. cambire, Gr. κάμβειν or κάμπτειν, to bend, turn or fold), in Scots law, the exchange (q.v.) of one heritable subject for another. The modern Scottish excambion may consist in the exchange of any heritable subjects whatever, e.g. a patronage or, what often occurs, a portion of a glebe for servitude. Writing is not, by the law of Scotland, essential to an excambion. Chiefly in favour of the class of cottars and small feuars, and for convenience in straightening marches, the law will consider the most informal memoranda, and even a verbal agreement, if supported by the subsequent possession. The power to excamb was gradually conferred on entailed proprietors. The Montgomery Act, which was passed in 1770, to facilitate agricultural improvements, permitted 50 acres arable and 100 acres not fit for the plough to be excambed. This was enlarged by the Rosebery Act in 1836, under which one-fourth of an entailed estate, not including the mansion-house, home farm and policies, might be excambed, provided the heirs took no higher grassum (O.E. gersum, fine) than £200. The power was applied to the whole estate by the Rutherford Act of 1848, and the necessary consents of substitute heirs are now regulated by the Entail (Scotland) Act 1882.