The clause pictures for us the family group as bound together by paternal rites (_sacris paternis_). The grandfather is alive and is the _paterfamilias_. A son who is a _filiusfamilias_ (_i.e._, as we shall see presently, not an emancipated son) has married and brought into the _mansio_, or family homestead of the grandfather, property which he had with his wife. This, not having been ‘defined’ on marriage, so as to keep it separate, has become, in the phrase of the Latin text, ‘added to the property of the grandfather.’ The husband has died leaving several sons, it matters not how many. The question is, what share these grandsons are to take in the property which their father had with their mother, which, for want of ‘definition,’ has become added to the grandfather’s property, or, in other words, become part of the ‘_substantia communis_.’ [Sidenote: There was no succession by representation to a deceased parent during the grandfather’s lifetime.] The answer is that the parents’ property does not go exclusively to their children as it would have done if it had been defined and separate property. It has become merged in the family property, and there is no sharing of this till the grandfather’s death. But apparently by a compromise, due probably to recent legislation, they are allowed on their father’s death, according to the Latin text, to take equal shares in his property _per capita_ ‘with the grandfather and other _consortes_,’ or, according to the Danish text, a ‘full lot’ in it. We are not told who were the ‘_consortes_’ with whom and the grandfather it was to be shared. The _consortes_, whether uncles or cousins or both, were the co-sharers in the ‘_communis substantia_’ of the family holding. In the final paragraph of the clause both texts give the alternative rule applying to cases, probably the most frequent, in which proper ‘definition’ of the wife’s property had been made on the marriage. And the rule is stated to be that the property so defined and made joint or partnership property on the marriage, and that alone (_illa sola_), would go to the children of the marriage at their father’s death during the life of the grandfather. According to the Latin text, they were excluded from the other family property ‘by the prior grade.’ As the Danish version puts it: ‘not a whit of the other property would they get except what the grandfather chose to give them.’ That this is the true meaning of these clauses is confirmed by other chapters. [Sidenote: Permission to the grandfather to give succession to a deceased son’s children.] Chapter XVI. is headed: ‘How much may be conferred by a father upon the sons of a deceased son during the lives of the other sons, their uncles.’ The text is as follows:-- Licet cuique post mortem filii quantum ipsi deberetur si viveret, ejus filio nepoti conferre.