English

Noun

feme covert ‎(plural femes covert or femes coverts)

1. (law, now chiefly historical) A married woman.
   • 1817, Walter Scott, Rob Roy, IX:

     ‘you, Diana Vernon, spinstress, not being a femme couverte, and being a convict popish recusant, are bound to repair to your own dwelling, and that by the nearest way, under penalty of being held felon to the king [...].’

   • 1851, Thomas W Waterman, American Chancery Digest, vol. II:

     A deed of a feme covert, to be valid, must be executed by the husband also.

   • 1986, Marylynn Salmon, Women and the Law of Property in Early America:

     Connecticut courts failed to recognize feme couvert property rights until 1723, when the legislature finally passed an act significantly reforming the law on conveyancing.

Related terms

• feme sole
• feme sole merchant

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