In English
common law, fee tail or entail is a form of
trust established by deed or settlement which restricts the sale or
inheritance of an
estate
Estate or The Estate may refer to:
Law
* Estate (law), a term in common law for a person's property, entitlements and obligations
* Estates of the realm, a broad social category in the histories of certain countries.
** The Estates, representat ...
in
real property
In English common law, real property, real estate, immovable property or, solely in the US and Canada, realty, is land which is the property of some person and all structures (also called improvements or fixtures) integrated with or affixe ...
and prevents the property from being sold, devised by
will
Will may refer to:
Common meanings
* Will and testament, instructions for the disposition of one's property after death
* Will (philosophy), or willpower
* Will (sociology)
* Will, volition (psychology)
* Will, a modal verb - see Shall and will
...
, or otherwise
alienated by the tenant-in-possession, and instead causes it to pass automatically by
operation of law to an heir determined by the settlement deed. The term ''fee tail'' is from
Medieval Latin , which means "cut(-short)
fee" and is in contrast to "
fee simple
In English law, a fee simple or fee simple absolute is an estate in land, a form of freehold ownership. A "fee" is a vested, inheritable, present possessory interest in land. A "fee simple" is real property held without limit of time (i.e., perm ...
" where no such restriction exists and where the possessor has an absolute title (although subject to the
allodial title
Allodial title constitutes ownership of real property (land, buildings, and fixtures) that is independent of any superior landlord. Allodial title is related to the concept of land held "in allodium", or land ownership by occupancy and defens ...
of the monarch) in the property which he can bequeath or otherwise dispose of as he wishes. Equivalent legal concepts exist or formerly existed in many other European countries and elsewhere.
Purpose
The fee tail allowed a patriarch to perpetuate his blood-line, family-name, honour and armorials in the persons of a series of powerful and wealthy male descendants. By keeping his estate intact in the hands of one heir alone, in an ideally indefinite and pre-ordained chain of succession, his own wealth, power and family honour would not be dissipated amongst several male lines, as became the case for example in Napoleonic France by operation of the
Napoleonic Code which gave each child the legal right to inherit an equal share of the patrimony, where a formerly great landowning family could be reduced in a few generations to a series of small-holders or peasant farmers. It therefore approaches the true
corporation which is a legal body or person which does not die and continues in existence and can hold wealth indefinitely. Indeed, as a form of trust, whilst the individual trustees may die, replacements are appointed and the trust itself continues, ideally indefinitely. In England almost seamless successions were made from patriarch to patriarch, the smoothness of which were often enhanced by baptising the eldest son and heir with his father's Christian name for several generations, for example the
FitzWarin family, all named Fulk. Such indefinite inalienable land-holdings were soon seen as restrictive on the optimum productive ability of land, which was often converted to deer-parks or pleasure grounds by the wealthy tenant-in-possession, which was damaging to the nation as a whole, and thus laws against perpetuities were enacted, which restricted entails to a maximum number of lives.
An entail also had the effect of disallowing
illegitimate children from inheriting. It created complications for many propertied families, especially from about the late 17th to the early 19th century, leaving many individuals wealthy in land but heavily in
debt, often due to annuities chargeable on the estate payable to the patriarch's widow and younger children, where the patriarch was swayed by sentiment not to establish a strict concentration of all his wealth in his heir leaving his other beloved relatives destitute. Frequently in such cases the generosity of the settlor left the entailed estate as an uneconomical enterprise, especially during times when the estate's fluctuating agricultural income had to provide for fixed sum annuities. Such impoverished tenants-in-possession were unable to realise in cash any part of their land or even to offer the property as security for a loan, to pay such annuities, unless sanctioned by private Act of Parliament allowing such sale, which expensive and time-consuming mechanism was frequently resorted to. The ''beneficial owner'' (or tenant-in-possession) of the property in fact had only a
life interest in it, albeit an absolute right to the income it generated, the ''legal owners'' being the trustees of the settlement, with the
remainder passing intact to the next
successor or
heir
Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Officiall ...
in law; any purported bequest of the land by the tenant-in-possession was ineffective.
History
Fee tail was established during
feudal
Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a wa ...
times by
landed gentry
The landed gentry, or the ''gentry'', is a largely historical British social class of landowners who could live entirely from rental income, or at least had a country estate. While distinct from, and socially below, the British peerage, th ...
to attempt to ensure that the high social standing of the family, as represented by a single patriarch, continued indefinitely. The concentration of the family's wealth into the hands of a single representative was essential to support this process. Unless the heir had himself inherited the personal and intellectual strengths of the original great patriarch, often a great warrior, which alone had brought him from obscurity to greatness, he would soon sink again into obscurity, and required wealth to maintain his social standing. This feature of English gentry and aristocracy differs from the aristocracy which existed in pre-
Revolution France, where all sons of a nobleman inherited his title and were thus inescapably members of a separate noble caste in society. In England,
primogeniture
Primogeniture ( ) is the right, by law or custom, of the firstborn legitimate child to inherit the parent's entire or main estate in preference to shared inheritance among all or some children, any illegitimate child or any collateral relativ ...
provided that an estate would be inherited entirely by the first-born legitimate son of a nobleman and that, accordingly, subsequent sons were born as mere gentlemen and
commoner
A commoner, also known as the ''common man'', ''commoners'', the ''common people'' or the ''masses'', was in earlier use an ordinary person in a community or nation who did not have any significant social status, especially a member of neither ...
s. Without the support of wealth, these younger sons might quickly descend into obscurity, and often did. On this eldest son was concentrated the honour of the family, and to him alone was granted all its wealth to support his role in that regard, by the process of the fee tail.
The effects of English primogeniture and entail have been significant plot details or themes in a number of notable works of English literature. (See some examples cited below.)
Statute of Westminster 1285
The
Statute of Westminster II
The Statute of Westminster of 1285, also known as the Statute of Westminster II or the Statute of Westminster the Second, like the Statute of Westminster 1275, is a code in itself, and contains the famous clause '' De donis conditionalibus'', one ...
, passed in 1285, created and fixed the form of this estate. The new law was also formally called the statute ''
De Donis Conditionalibus'' (Concerning Conditional Gifts).
Opponents
Fee tail was never popular with the monarchy, the merchant class and many holders of entailed estates themselves who wished to sell or divide their land.
Abolition
Fee tail as a legal
estate
Estate or The Estate may refer to:
Law
* Estate (law), a term in common law for a person's property, entitlements and obligations
* Estates of the realm, a broad social category in the histories of certain countries.
** The Estates, representat ...
in England was abolished by the
Law of Property Act 1925
The Law of Property Act 1925c 20 is a statute of the United Kingdom Parliament. It forms part of an interrelated programme of legislation introduced by Lord Chancellor Lord Birkenhead between 1922 and 1925. The programme was intended to moderni ...
.
Continuing use
A fee tail can still exist in England and Wales as an equitable interest, behind a strict settlement; the legal estate is vested in the current 'tenant for life' or other person immediately entitled to the income, but on the basis that any capital money arising must be paid to the settlement trustees. A tenant in tail in possession can bar his fee tail by a simple disentailing deed, which does not now have to be enrolled. A tenant in tail in reversion (i.e. a
future interest where the property is subject to prior life interest) needs the consent of the life tenant and any 'special protectors' to vest a
reversionary fee simple in himself. Otherwise he can only create a
base fee; a base fee only confers a right to the property on its owner, when its creator would have become entitled to it; if its creator dies before he would have received it, the owner of the base fee gets nothing. No new "fees tail" can now be created following the
Trusts of Land and Appointment of Trustees Act 1996
The Trusts of Land and Appointment of Trustees Act 1996c 47, usually called "TLATA" or "TOLATA", is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom, which altered the law in relation to trusts of land in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
B ...
.
In the US,
conservation easements are a form of entail still in use.
Creation
Traditionally, a fee tail was created by a trust established in a
deed
In common law, a deed is any legal instrument in writing which passes, affirms or confirms an interest, right, or property and that is signed, attested, delivered, and in some jurisdictions, sealed. It is commonly associated with transferring ...
, often a
marriage settlement, or in a will "to A and the heirs of his body". The crucial difference between the words of conveyance and the words that created a
fee simple
In English law, a fee simple or fee simple absolute is an estate in land, a form of freehold ownership. A "fee" is a vested, inheritable, present possessory interest in land. A "fee simple" is real property held without limit of time (i.e., perm ...
("to A and his heirs") is that the heirs "in tail" must be the children begotten by the landowner. It was also possible to have "fee tail male", which only sons could inherit, and "fee tail female", which only daughters could inherit; and "fee tail special", which had a further condition of inheritance, usually restricting succession to certain "heirs of the body" and excluding others. Land subject to these conditions was said to be "entailed" or "held in-tail", with the restrictions themselves known as ''entailments''.
Breaking of fee tail
The breaking of a fee tail was simplified by the
Fines and Recoveries Act 1833
The Fines and Recoveries Act 1833The act was assigned this name by the Short Titles Act 1896. (3 & 4 Will. IV c.74) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ire ...
, which replaced the conveyance for making a tenant to the
praecipe for suffering a common recovery. This was the usual preliminary to a recovery with a disentailing assurance, which had to be enrolled. The need for this to be followed by the
fictitious proceeding of a common recovery was abolished.
The requirement that a disentailing assurance should be enrolled was abolished in 1926.
Mortgage of entailed lands
Lending upon security of a
mortgage on land in fee tail was risky, since at the death of the tenant-in-possession, his personal estate ceased to have any right to the estate or to the income it generated. The absolute right to the income generated by the estate passed by operation of law to parties who had no legal obligation to the lender, who therefore could not enforce payment of interest on the new tenants-in-possession. The largest estate a possessor in fee tail could convey to someone else was an estate for the term of the grantor's own life. If all went as planned, it was therefore impossible for the succession of patriarchs to lose the land, which was the idea.
Failure of issue
Things did not always go as planned, however. Tenants-in-possession of entailed estates occasionally suffered "failure of issue" – that is, they had no legitimate children surviving them at the time of their deaths. In this situation the entailed land devolved to male cousins, i.e. back up and through the family tree to legitimate male descendants of former tenants-in-possession, or reverted to the last owner in fee simple, if still living. This situation produced complicated
litigation
-
A lawsuit is a proceeding by a party or parties against another in the civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used in reference to a civil actio ...
and was an incentive for the production and maintenance of detailed and authoritative family pedigrees and supporting records of marriage, births, baptisms etc.
Depending on how the original deed or grant was worded, in the event of there being daughters but no sons, all the sisters might inherit jointly, it might pass to the eldest sister, it might be held in trust until one of them should produce a (legitimate) son, or it might pass to the next male-line relative (an uncle, say, or even a cousin, sometimes very distant). The last possibility, commonly called 'entailment to heirs male', is used in Jane Austen's ''Pride and Prejudice''; the estate of Longbourn is entailed to a distant male cousin rather than the incumbent's five daughters or their offspring.
Common recovery
In the 15th century, lawyers devised "
common recovery", an elaborate legal procedure which used collaborative lawsuits and
legal fiction
A legal fiction is a fact assumed or created by courts, which is then used in order to help reach a decision or to apply a legal rule. The concept is used almost exclusively in common law jurisdictions, particularly in England and Wales.
Deve ...
s to "bar" a fee tail, that is to say to remove the restrictions of fee tail from land and to enable its conveyance in fee simple. Biancalana's book ''The Fee Tail and the Common Recovery in Medieval England: 1176–1502'' (2001) discusses the procedure and its history at length.
Resettlement
In the 17th and 18th centuries the practice arose whereby when the son came of age (at 21), he and his father acting together could bar the existing fee tail, and could then re-settle the land in fee tail, again on the father for life, then to the son for life and his heirs male successively, but at the same time making provision for annuities chargeable on the estate for the father's widow, daughters and younger sons, and most importantly, and as an incentive for the son to participate in the re-settlement, an income for the son during his father's lifetime. This process effectively evaded the law against perpetuities, as the entail in law had been terminated, but in practice continued. In this way an estate could stay in a family for many generations, yet emerged on re-settlement often fatally weakened, or much more susceptible to agricultural downturns, from the onerous annuities now chargeable on it.
Formedon
Formedon (or ''form down'' etc.) was a right of writ exercisable by a holder in fee for claiming property entailed by a lessee beyond the terms of his feoffment. A letter dated 1539 from the
Lisle Letters describes the circumstances of its use:
I received your ladyship's letter by which ye willed me to speak with my Lady Coffyn for her title in East Haggynton in the county of Devon who had one estate in tail to him and to his heirs of her body begotten; and now he is dead without issue of his body so that the reversion should revert to Mr John Basset and to his heirs so there be no let nor discontinuance of the same made by Sir William Coffyn in his life. Howbeit Mr Richard Coffyn, next heir to Sir William Coffyn, claimeth the same by his uncle's feoffment to him and to his heirs so that the law will put Mr John Basset from his entry and to compel him to take his action of ''form down'' which is much dilatory as Mr Basset knoweth
Historical examples
Marquess of Hertford
An English example of a fee tail may be the main estates of the wealthy art collector
Richard Seymour-Conway, 4th Marquess of Hertford (d. 1870). His only child was his illegitimate son,
Sir Richard Wallace, 1st Baronet, to whom he left as much of his property as he could. The main land holdings and
Ragley Hall were inherited by his distant cousin,
Francis Seymour, 5th Marquess of Hertford, descended from a younger son of the
1st Marquess who had died in 1794. Most of the 4th Marquess's art collection had been acquired by himself or his father, went to Wallace, and is now the
Wallace Collection. Other works were covered by the fee tail, however, and passed to the 5th Marquess.
Earl of Pembroke
Another example was
George Herbert, 11th Earl of Pembroke, who died in 1827. He had quarreled with his eldest son, later the
12th Earl, and left his unentailed estate to
Sidney Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Lea, his son by a second marriage.
Fees tail in fiction
Fees tail figure in the
plot
Plot or Plotting may refer to:
Art, media and entertainment
* Plot (narrative), the story of a piece of fiction
Music
* ''The Plot'' (album), a 1976 album by jazz trumpeter Enrico Rava
* The Plot (band), a band formed in 2003
Other
* ''Plot' ...
s of several well known
novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...
s and stories, particularly in the 19th century, including:
* ''
Pride and Prejudice
''Pride and Prejudice'' is an 1813 novel of manners by Jane Austen. The novel follows the character development of Elizabeth Bennet, the dynamic protagonist of the book who learns about the repercussions of hasty judgments and comes to appreci ...
'' by
Jane Austen
Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots of ...
* ''
Middlemarch'' by
George Eliot
* ''
The Belton Estate
''The Belton Estate'' is a novel by Anthony Trollope, written in 1865. The novel concerns itself with a young woman who has accepted one of two suitors, then discovered that he was unworthy of her love. It was the first novel published in the '' ...
'' (1866) and ''
Ralph the Heir
''Ralph the Heir'' is a novel by Anthony Trollope, originally published in 1871. Although Trollope described it as "one of the worst novels I have written",Trollope, Anthony (1883).''An Autobiography'', chapter 19. Retrieved 2010-05-19.
it was w ...
'' (1871) by
Anthony Trollope
Anthony Trollope (; 24 April 1815 – 6 December 1882) was an English novelist and civil servant of the Victorian era. Among his best-known works is a series of novels collectively known as the '' Chronicles of Barsetshire'', which revolves ar ...
* ''
The Master of Ballantrae'' by
Robert Louis Stevenson
* ''
Kidnapped
Kidnapped may refer to:
* subject to the crime of kidnapping
Literature
* ''Kidnapped'' (novel), an 1886 novel by Robert Louis Stevenson
* ''Kidnapped'' (comics), a 2007 graphic novel adaptation of R. L. Stevenson's novel by Alan Grant and Ca ...
'' by
Robert Louis Stevenson mentions it by implication in a dispute over the House of Shaws that drives the plot
* ''
The Adventure of the Priory School'' by
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
* ''
Brideshead Revisited'' by
Evelyn Waugh
* ''
Wideacre
''Wideacre'' is a 1987 historical novel by Philippa Gregory. This novel is Gregory's debut, and the first in the ''Wideacre'' trilogy that includes ''The Favoured Child'' (1989) and ''Meridon'' (1990). Set in the second half of the 18th centur ...
'' by
Philippa Gregory
Philippa Gregory (born 9 January 1954) is an English historical novelist who has been publishing since 1987. The best known of her works is ''The Other Boleyn Girl'' (2001), which in 2002 won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award from the Roman ...
* ''
The Quincunx'' by
Charles Palliser (written in 1989, but it takes the form of a Dickensian mystery set in early-19th-century England)
* ''
Downton Abbey'' by
Julian Fellowes
Julian Alexander Kitchener-Fellowes, Baron Fellowes of West Stafford, (born 17 August 1949) is an English actor, novelist, film director and screenwriter, and a Conservative peer of the House of Lords.
He is primarily known as the author of s ...
(written in 2009–2015, but set in England in the period 1912–1927)
* ''
To Kill a Mockingbird'' by Harper Lee (referred to as an "entailment")
* ''
Wives and Daughters'' by
Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (''née'' Stevenson; 29 September 1810 – 12 November 1865), often referred to as Mrs Gaskell, was an English novelist, biographer and short story writer. Her novels offer a detailed portrait of the lives of many st ...
''Pride and Prejudice''
''Pride and Prejudice'' contains a particularly thorny example of the kind of problems which could arise through the entailing of property. Mr. Bennet, the father of protagonist
Elizabeth Bennet, had only a life interest in the Longbourn estate, the family's home and principal source of income. He had no authority to dictate to whom it should pass upon his death, as it was strictly arranged to be inherited by the next male heir. Had Mr. Bennet fathered a son it would have passed to him, but since he did not it could not pass to any of his five daughters. Instead, the next nearest male heir would inherit the property—Mr. Bennet's cousin, William Collins, a boorish minister in his mid-twenties. The inheritance of the Longbourn property completely excluded the five Bennet daughters, who were thus to lose their home and income upon their father's death. The need for the daughters to make a good marriage to ensure their future security is a key motivation for many episodes in the novel. Many fees tail arose from wills, rather than from marriage settlements which usually made some provision for daughters. Austen was very familiar with the law of entail; her brother, Edward, had inherited similarly entailed estates at
Chawton,
Godmersham
Godmersham is a village and civil parish in the Ashford District of Kent, England. The village straddles the Great Stour river where it cuts through the North Downs and its land is approximately one third woodland, all in the far east and west o ...
and
Winchester
Winchester is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs Nation ...
from distant cousins under the will of Elizabeth Knight, who died in 1737.
Law professor Maureen B. Collins (2017) cites several other authors debating the accuracy of Austen's depiction of the entailment, including Appel (2013), Treitel (1984), Redmond (1989), and Grover (2014).
[
]
Other countries
Scotland
In Scotland, the Abolition of Feudal Tenure etc. (Scotland) Act 2000 (section 50) abolished all feudal tenures including the entail. Today, the doctrines of ''legitim
In civil law and Roman law, the legitime (''legitima portio''), also known as a forced share or legal right share, of a decedent's estate is that portion of the estate from which he cannot disinherit his children, or his parents, without suffici ...
'' and '' jus relictae'' restrict owners from willing property out of their family when they die with children or have a surviving partner.
A Scottish example of fee tail is the case of Alfred Douglas-Hamilton, 13th Duke of Hamilton
Lieutenant Alfred Douglas Douglas-Hamilton, 13th Duke of Hamilton and 10th Duke of Brandon TD, DL (6 March 1862 – 16 March 1940) was a Scottish nobleman and sailor.
Early life
Hamilton was born at Shanklin, Isle of Wight, in 1862, the son ...
, who in 1895 inherited from the 12th Duke, his fourth cousin, who had attempted to marry his daughter to the heir.
Ireland
In the Republic of Ireland, Section 13 of the Land and Conveyancing Law Reform Act 2009 largely abolished the fee tail and converted existing fees tail to fees simple.''Land and Conveyancing Law Reform Act'' 2009, section 13.
/ref> For constitutional reasons, this section is subject to a saving clause which prevents the conversion of fees tail to fees simple where the protector of the settlement is still alive. Therefore, some fees tail still exist in the state.
United States
The fee tail has been abolished in all but four states in the United States: Massachusetts, Maine, Delaware and Rhode Island. However, in the first three states, property can be sold or deeded as any other property would be, with the fee tail only applying in case of death without a will. In Rhode Island, a fee tail is treated as a life estate with remainder in the life tenant's children. New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
abolished fee tail in 1782, while many other states within the U.S. never recognized it at all. In most states in the United States, an attempt to create a fee tail results in a fee simple
In English law, a fee simple or fee simple absolute is an estate in land, a form of freehold ownership. A "fee" is a vested, inheritable, present possessory interest in land. A "fee simple" is real property held without limit of time (i.e., perm ...
; even in those four states that still allow fee tail, the estate holder may convert his fee tail to a fee simple during his lifetime by executing a deed.
In Louisiana, the common law concept of estates in land never existed. The concept of forced heirship and the marital portion protects force heirs and surviving spouses from total divestment of value of the estate of the decedent, who has a duty to provide for their care.
Fee tail-like restrictions still exist though contractual obligations. For example, owners of inholdings
An inholding is privately owned land inside the boundary of a national park, national forest, state park, or similar publicly owned, protected area. In-holdings result from private ownership of lands predating the designation of the park or fo ...
inside public lands may be prevented from selling or giving their land to non-family members. In this case, the restrictions result from an agreement between the government and the land owner, and is not a part of a deed or settlement.
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
In the Kingdom of Poland and later in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, fee tail estates were called ''ordynacja'' (; landed property in ''fideicommis''). ''Ordynacja'' was an economic institution for governing of landed property introduced in late 16th century by king Stefan Batory. ''Ordynacja'' was abolished by the agricultural reform
Land reform is a form of agrarian reform involving the changing of laws, regulations, or customs regarding land ownership. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed property redistribution, generally of agricultural ...
in the People's Republic of Poland
The Polish People's Republic ( pl, Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, PRL) was a country in Central Europe that existed from 1947 to 1989 as the predecessor of the modern Republic of Poland. With a population of approximately 37.9 million nea ...
. ''Ordynat'' was the title of the principal heir
Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Officiall ...
of ''ordynacja''.
According to the rules of ''ordynacja'', which became a statute approved by the Sejm, the estate was not to be divided between the heirs but inherited in full by the eldest son (primogeniture
Primogeniture ( ) is the right, by law or custom, of the firstborn legitimate child to inherit the parent's entire or main estate in preference to shared inheritance among all or some children, any illegitimate child or any collateral relativ ...
).[Peter Paul Bajer.]
Short history of the Radziwill Family
Women were excluded from inheritance (Salic Law
The Salic law ( or ; la, Lex salica), also called the was the ancient Frankish civil law code compiled around AD 500 by the first Frankish King, Clovis. The written text is in Latin and contains some of the earliest known instances of Old Du ...
).[ ''Ordynacja'' could not be sold or mortgaged.][
''Ordynacja'' was similar to the French law of '' majorat'' or German and Scandinavian ''fideicommis'', and succession to such resembles that of British peerages.
Many Polish ]magnate
The magnate term, from the late Latin ''magnas'', a great man, itself from Latin ''magnus'', "great", means a man from the higher nobility, a man who belongs to the high office-holders, or a man in a high social position, by birth, wealth or ot ...
s' fortunes were based on ''ordynacja'', among them those of the Radziwiłłs, Zamoyski
The House of Zamoyski (plural: Zamoyscy) is the name of an important Polish noble (szlachta) family, which used the Jelita coat of arms. It is the Polish term for "de Zamość" (Polish "z Zamościa"), the name they originally held as lords of Z ...
s, Czartoryskis, Potocki
The House of Potocki (; plural: Potoccy, male: Potocki, feminine: Potocka) was a prominent Polish noble family in the Kingdom of Poland and magnates of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The Potocki family is one of the wealthiest and ...
s and Lubomirski
The House of Lubomirski is a Polish princely family. The Lubomirski family's coat of arms is the Drużyna coat of arms, which is similar to the Szreniawa coat of arms but without a cross.
Origin and the coat of arms
The Lubomirski fa ...
s. Most important ''ordynacja'' were veritable little principalities. The earliest and most extensive ''ordynacjas'' include:
* Ordynacje Radziwiłłów, created for Mikołaj VII Radziwiłł
Mikołaj Radziwiłł, also known as ''Mikołaj Radziwiłł The Seventh'' (1546–1589) was Reichsfürst of the Holy Roman Empire and a Polish–Lithuanian noble ( szlachcic), Great Chamberlain of Lithuania in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania ...
, Albrecht Radziwiłł
Albrecht ("noble", "bright") is a given name or surname of German origin and may refer to:
First name
*Albrecht Agthe, (1790–1873), German music teacher
*Albrecht Altdorfer, (c. 1480–1538) German Renaissance painter
*Albrecht Becker, (1906–2 ...
and Stanisław Radziwiłł
:''See also Stanisław Albrecht Radziwiłł.''
Stanisław "the Pious" Radziwiłł ( lt, Stanislovas Radvila II) (12 May 1559 – 19 March 1599) was a sixth generation Radziwill family noble ( szlachcic) of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the Po ...
in 1589, centered on Olyka
Olyka ( uk, Оли́ка, pl, Ołyka, yi, אליק ''Olik'') is an urban-type settlement in Lutsk Raion, Volyn Oblast, Ukraine. It is located east of Lutsk on the Putylivka Rriver. Its population is .
History
The village of Olyka was founde ...
, Nesvizh, and Kletsk
* , created for Janusz Ostrogski in 1609, later inherited by the Zaslawski, Lubomirski
The House of Lubomirski is a Polish princely family. The Lubomirski family's coat of arms is the Drużyna coat of arms, which is similar to the Szreniawa coat of arms but without a cross.
Origin and the coat of arms
The Lubomirski fa ...
and Sanguszko
150px, Paweł Karol Sanguszko
150px, Dymitr Sanguszko
150px, Roman Sanguszko
150px, Janusz Sanguszko
150px, Hieronim Sanguszko
150px, Barbara Sanguszko née Dunin
150px, Eustachy Erazm Sanguszko
150px, Władysław Hieronim Sanguszko
150p ...
families, centered on Ostroh
* Ordynacja Zamojska
The Zamoyski family entail (Polish: Ordynacja Zamojska) was one of the first and largest fee tails in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was owned by the Zamoyski family, the richest aristocratic family in Poland. It was established upon th ...
, created for Jan Zamoyski in 1589, centered on Zamość
* Ordynacja Jarosławska
In English common law, fee tail or entail is a form of trust established by deed or settlement which restricts the sale or inheritance of an estate in real property and prevents the property from being sold, devised by will, or otherwise alienat ...
, created for Rafał Jarosławski
Rafał is the Polish form of the male given name Raphael.
Rafał (Polish pronunciation: ) may refer to:
*Rafał Śliż (born 1983), Polish ski jumper
*Rafał A. Ziemkiewicz (born 1964), Polish fiction author and journalist
* Rafał Andraszak (bo ...
in 1470, centered on Jarosław
* Ordynacja Pińczowska, created for Piotr and Zygmunt Myszkowski in 1601, later inherited by the Wielopolski family, centered on Pińczów
Other
Other European legal systems had comparable devices to keep estates together, especially in Spain and Northern European countries like Prussia. They are derived from '' fideicommissum'', a legal institution in Roman law. Unlike most of the English aristocracy, the Prussian ''junkers'' supported fees tail, and succeeded in reinstating them in 1853, after they had been abolished in a recent Constitution. In Germany and Austria the ''Familienfideikommiss'' was only abolished in 1938, and in Scandinavia they persisted even later – a few old Swedish fees tail still remain in force, though no new ones may be established. For the law of German and Austrian fideicommissa in particular, an 862-page manual by the German legal scholar Philipp Knipschildt Philipp Knipschildt (1595 – September 29, 1657) was a jurist and legal historian.
Life
Philipp Knipschildt was born in Treisbach (Waldeck (state), Waldeck), the son of Melchior Knipschildt and Catharina née Lefart. From c. 1604 he attended ...
, entitled ''Tractatus de fideicommissis nobilium familiarum – von Stammgütern'' (), was the standard reference work. First published in 1654, this grand systematization of existing legal opinion was frequently reprinted and continued to be consulted until well into the 19th century.
See also
* Fee simple
In English law, a fee simple or fee simple absolute is an estate in land, a form of freehold ownership. A "fee" is a vested, inheritable, present possessory interest in land. A "fee simple" is real property held without limit of time (i.e., perm ...
* Majorat
* Primogeniture
Primogeniture ( ) is the right, by law or custom, of the firstborn legitimate child to inherit the parent's entire or main estate in preference to shared inheritance among all or some children, any illegitimate child or any collateral relativ ...
* Reichserbhofgesetz The ''Reichserbhofgesetz'', the Hereditary Farm Law, of 1933 was a Nazi law to implement principles of blood and soil, stating that its aim was to: "preserve the farming community as the blood-source of the German people". As farmers appeared in Na ...
* Rule in Wild's Case
The Rule in Wild's Case is a common law rule of construction dating back to 1599 concerning a particular type of ambiguity in devises (such as grants or bequests) of real property: If a grantor (O) grants, by deed or will, property to another pers ...
* Tailzie (Scots law)
* Taltarum's Case
''Taltarum's Case'' is the name given to an English legal case heard in the Court of Common Pleas, with decisions being handed down in 1465 and 1472. The case was long thought to have established the operation of the common recovery, a collusive ...
* Easement
References
Further reading
* ''The Fee Tail and the Common Recovery in Medieval England 1176–1502'', by: Joseph Biancalana, University of Cincinnati
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Inheritance
Legal history
Real property law
Scots law legal terminology
Land tenure