[ad. med.L. cessionāri-us, f. L. cessio (bonorum) yielding up of goods: see -ARY.]
† 1. A bankrupt who makes cessio bonorum. Obs.
1611. Cotgr., Cessionnaire, a cessionarie; one that abandons, or giues vp his goods … who though hee looseth his credit thereby, yet is hee not held so base as a bankrupt.
1632. Sherwood, A cessionarie Bankerout, which renounceth his goods in open court, cessionaire. [Similarly in Bailey, Johnson, and mod. Dicts. as adj.]
1694. Falle, Jersey, iv. 111. The last Creditor is asked whether he will substitute, or put himself in the place of the Cessionary.
2. One to whom an assignment has been legally made; an assignee.
1754. Erskine, Princ. Sc. Law (1809), 342. He who grants the assignation is called the cedent, and he who receives it, the assignee or cessionary.
1818. Colebrooke, Oblig. & Contracts, I. 210. The right passes … from the cedent to the cessionary.
1880. Muirhead, Gaius, II. § 35. The cessionary becomes heir just as if the inheritance had devolved upon him by operation of law.
