Obs. exc. Law. Forms: 4–5 beayell, 5 bysayeul, -sale, 6 besayle, 6–7 besaile, 7 besayel, (8 besail, 9 besael). [a. OF. besayel, besaiol (mod.F. bisaieul), f. bes:—L. bis twice + ayel, aiol, aieul grandfather (see AIEL). The earlier Eng. form was beayel from AFr.]
A grandfather’s father, a great-grandfather.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 13474. His beayell aboue on þe burne syde, On his modur halfe.
1480. Caxton, Ovid’s Met., XIII. ii. Jupiter, the god of goddes, is my bysayeul.
1586. Ferne, Blaz. Gentrie, 102. There is Bessile, Graundsire, father.
[1762. Ruffhead, Act 32 Hen. VIII., ii. § 2, note. The Tresail, that is, the Father of the Besail, or Great Grandfather.]
b. Law. Writ of besaile (see quot.).
1598. Kitchin, Courts Leet (1675), 424. In a Writ of Besayle he shall not have the View.
1641. Termes de la Ley, 40. Besaile is a writ that lies for the heire, where his great grandfather was seised the day that he died, or died seised of Land in fee-simple, & a stranger enters the day of the death of the great grandfather, or abates after his death, the heire shall have this writ against such a disseisor or abator.
[1865. Nichols, Britton, II. 59. Such kindred … shall have their remedy by our writs of Cosinage, of Ael, Aele, Besael, and Besaele.
