In English law, heirs of the body is the principle that certain types of

property Property is a system of rights that gives people legal control of valuable things, and also refers to the valuable things themselves. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property may have the right to consume, alter, share, re ...

pass to a descendant of the original holder, recipient or grantee according to a fixed order of

kinship In anthropology, kinship is the web of social relationships that form an important part of the lives of all humans in all societies, although its exact meanings even within this discipline are often debated. Anthropologist Robin Fox says that ...

. Upon the death of the grantee, a designated

inheritance 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. Offi ...

such as a parcel of land, a

peerage A peerage is a legal system historically comprising various hereditary titles (and sometimes Life peer, non-hereditary titles) in a number of countries, and composed of assorted Imperial, royal and noble ranks, noble ranks. Peerages include: A ...

, or a

monarchy A monarchy is a form of government in which a person, the monarch, reigns as head of state for the rest of their life, or until abdication. The extent of the authority of the monarch may vary from restricted and largely symbolic (constitutio ...

, passes automatically to that living, legitimate, natural descendant of the grantee who is most senior in descent according to

primogeniture Primogeniture () is the right, by law or custom, of the firstborn Legitimacy (family law), legitimate child to inheritance, inherit all or most of their parent's estate (law), estate in preference to shared inheritance among all or some childre ...

, males being preferred, however, over their sisters regardless of relative age; and thereafter the property continues to pass to subsequent descendants of the grantee, according to the same formula, upon the death of each subsequent heir.

Baron Baron is a rank of nobility or title of honour, often Hereditary title, hereditary, in various European countries, either current or historical. The female equivalent is baroness. Typically, the title denotes an aristocrat who ranks higher than ...

ies created by writ of summons to

Parliament In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

usually descend to heirs of the body of the grantee, and may thus be inherited by females. By the terms of the

Act of Settlement 1701 The Act of Settlement ( 12 & 13 Will. 3. c. 2) is an act of the Parliament of England that settled the succession to the English and Irish crowns to only Protestants, which passed in 1701. More specifically, anyone who became a Roman Catho ...

and the

Acts of Union 1707 The Acts of Union refer to two acts of Parliament, one by the Parliament of Scotland in March 1707, followed shortly thereafter by an equivalent act of the Parliament of England. They put into effect the international Treaty of Union agree ...

, the Crown of the

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

descends to heirs of the body of the Electress Sophia of Hanover who are not

Catholics The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

or married to Catholics, subject to subsequent modification by Parliament (e.g.

His Majesty's Declaration of Abdication Act 1936 His Majesty's Declaration of Abdication Act 1936 ( 1 Edw. 8. & 1 Geo. 6. c. 3) is the act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that recognised and ratified the abdication of King Edward VIII and passed succession to his brother King George ...

and the Succession to the Crown Act 2013). In

property law Property law is the area of law that governs the various forms of ownership in real property (land) and personal property. Property refers to legally protected claims to resources, such as land and personal property, including intellectual prope ...

, a conveyance by the owner O "To A and heirs of the body", without more, creates a

fee tail In English common law, fee tail or entail is a form of trust, established by deed or settlement, that restricts the sale or inheritance of an estate in real property and prevents that property from being sold, devised by will, or otherwise ali ...

for the grantee (A) with a reversion in the grantor (O) should the natural, lawful descendants of the grantee all die out. Each person who inherits according to this formula is considered an heir at law of the grantee. Since the inheritance may not pass to someone who is not a natural, lawful descendant of the grantee, the heir is necessarily also "of the body" of the grantee. Collateral kin, who share some or all of the grantee's ancestry, but do not directly descend from the grantee, may not inherit. When there are no more heirs of the body, the terms of the original grant are expired, and the property becomes extinct (e.g. peerage), or some other criterion for allocating the property to a new possessor must be applied. If the original grant stipulated an alternative formula for succession upon exhaustion of heirs, that formula is immediately applicable. Thus, if a peerage is granted to "heirs of the body of John Smith, failing which, to heirs general", the title would pass to a descendant of John Smith's sibling when all of John Smith's descendants die out. Thus property settled upon someone and the heirs of their body—whether male, female, or generally—will pass to children, grandchildren and so on, but not to nephews of the grantee, his or her sisters, uncles and their descendants. Nor will a limitation in a grant to someone's "heirs" carry the property to collateral heirs in England, since the law presumes that "heirs of the body" are meant though a grant to the grantee and his heirs male will. There are other kinds of formulae for inheritance than heirs of the body, such as heirs male, heirs of the line, heirs portioners, heirs general, etc.

References

{{reflist Inheritance English law