Escheator - Law Dictionary Search Results
Home Dictionary Name: escheator Page: 2Intestates Estates Act, 1884 (English)
Intestates Estates Act, 1884 (English) (47 & 48 Vict. c. 71), ss. 2 and 3, whereby administration for the Crown of the personal estate of an intestate is conducted on similar principles to those of an ordinary administration. The sections have been reproduced and amended by ss. 30 and 57, A.E. Act, 1925. The other provisions of the Intestates Estates Act,1884 (except s. 55), have been repealed by the A.E. Act, 1935. By the repealed s.s, when a person died intestate and without an heir, his estate, legal or equitable, in any incorporeal hereditament, and any equitable estate in any corporeal hereditament, escheated to the Crown. Provision was also made for the waiver of the rights of the Crown in certain cases. See ESCHEAT....
Intestate
Intestate, one who has left no will. In regard to all the deaths before 1925, if he left no heir, his real property escheated (see ESCHEAT) to the Crown or lord of the manor, and his personal property was administered by a nominee of the Crown for the benefit of the Crown. The (English) A.E. Act, 1925, s. 51, abolished the old rules of descent, and the intestate estates of persons dying after 1925 are, with some exceptions, administered and distributed according to the provisions of that Act. See DISTRIBUTION and ADMINISTRATOR; WIDOW.Swinburne, Godolphin, and others of the early writers on the subject apply the term to one who dies leaving a will, but not appointing an executor; the term testament being formerly applied only to a will which appointed an executor. See Swinburne, pt. 1, s. 1; and 1 Williams on Executors.A person is deemed to die intestate in respect of property of which he or she has not made a testamentary disposition capable of taking effect. [Hindu Succession Act, 195...
Inquest of Office
Inquest of Office, an inquiry made by the king's officer, his sheriff, coroner, or escheat or, virtute officii, or by writ sent to them for that purpose, or by commissioners specially appointed, concerning any matter that entitles the king to the possession of lands or tenements, goods or chattels. See Hubback on Succession, p. 80; and ESCHEATS....
Gavelkind
Gavelkind. A mode or rule of descent by custom abolished by the Administration of Estates Act, 1925, s. 45(1)(a), in the case of all deaths after 1925 except in regard to entailed estates, and descent from a person of unsound mind, as provided by s. 51 (ibid.), and see (English) L.P. Act, 1922, 12th Sched. (1)(d), and Re Price, 1928 Ch 579. The word is derived from the Saxon word 'gafol,' or, as it is otherwise written, 'gavel,' which signifies 'rent' or a 'customary performance of husbandry works'; accordingly the land which yielded this kind of service, in contradistinction to knight-service land, was called 'GAVELKIND' that is 'land of the kind that yields rent.' Lambarde (Perambulations of Kent, Edn. 1656, p. 585) first advanced and promulgated this supposition, which does not seem to be sufficiently comprehensive since 'gavelkind' does not necessarily denote land subject to rent, in opposition to the opinion of Lord Coke, who traced the word to 'gave all kinde' 'for the custom giv...
Bona vacantia
Bona vacantia, things found without any apparent owner which belong to the first occupant or finder, unless they be whale or sturgeon, wreck, treasure trove, waifs or estrays (see those titles), which belong to the Crown by virtue of its prerogative. So personal property held on trusts which have failed, or held in trust for a corporation which has been dissolved, belongs to the Crown as bona vacantia; see Re Higginson, (1898) 1 QB 325, and cases there cited. By the (English) Companies Act, 1929, s. 296, the property of a dissolved company including property held on trust for it shall, subject to the provisions of the Act, become bona vacantia. Before the Act was passed freehold and leasehold property reverted to the grantor. Hastings Corporation v. Letton, (1908) 1 KB 378, s. 296 is not retrospective, Re Katherine Ltd., (1932) 1 Ch 70, and (1933) 2 Ch 29. As to the rights of the Crown, the Duchy of Lancaster or the Duke of Cornwall to bona vacantia, see (English) Administration of Est...
Bastard
Bastard [fornication], one born not of lawful marriage. [(English) Age of Marriage Act, 1929 (19 & 20 Geo. 5, c. 36)]The civil and canon laws did not allow a child to remain a bastard if the parents afterwards intermarried, but a proposal by the bishops to assimilate the law of England to the canon law in this respect was rejected by Parliament in 1235. See MERTON, STATUTE OF. The law of England remained thus for nearly 700 years, until the Legitimacy Act, 1926 (16 & 17 Geo. 5, c. 60), legitimated a child born out of wedlock upon the subsequent marriage of parents if they were domiciled in England or Wales at the date of marriage. See LEGITIMATION. In Scotland, however, and in most other Christian countries, including most, if not all, of the British Dominions, and most, if not all, of the United States of America, legitimation of the children has always followed the intermarriage of the parents.The mother of a bastard cannot validly contract with another person for the transfer to tha...
Heir
Heir [fr. heire, Old Fr.; h'res, Lat.], a person who succeeds by descent to an estate of inheritance. It is nomen collectivum, and extends to all heirs; and under heirs, the heirs of heirs are comprehended in infinitum.A person who, under the laws of intestacy, is entitled to receive an intestate decedents property, esp. real property, Black's Law Dictionary, 7th Edn., p. 727.The (English) Admin. Of Estates Act, 1925, s. 45, having abolished all modes of descent of real property obtaining before 1st January, 1926, in regard to deaths taking place after 1925, except in a few cases (see DESCENT and DEVOLUTION), the importance of the 'heir' had diminished but the following note has been retained since the word 'heir' will be construed according to its meaning under the general law in force before 1926, in deeds and wills executed after 1925, under which the 'heir' may become entitled to an equitable interest in personality and realty corresponding to a real estate by purchase under the ol...
Tenure
Tenure, cannot be equated with 'terms and con-ditions of services' or payment of gravity or pension. Tenure when followed by words of office, means term of office, Punjab University v. Khalsa College, Amritsar, AIR 1971 P&H 479: 1971 Cur LJ 334.Means a right, term, or mode of holding lands or tenements in subordination to a superior; in fendal times, real property was held predominantly as part of a tenure system, Black's Law Dictionary, 7th Edn., p. 1481.Tenure, the mode of holding property. The only tenures in land now existing with a few unimpor-tant exceptions are (1) free and common socage in fee-simple, including enfranchised copyhold, which is subject to paramount incidents; and (2) a term of years absolute (see LAND). The idea of tenure or holding is said to derive from feudalism, which separated the dominium directum (the dominion of the soil), which it placed mediately, or immediately, in the Crown, from the dominium utile (the possessory title), the right to use the profits ...
Westminster the First, Statute of
Westminster the First, Statute of (3 Edw. 1, AD 1275). This statute, which deserves the name of a Code rather than an Act, is divided into fifty-one chapters. Without extending the exemption of churchmen from civil jurisdiction, it protects the property of the Church from the violence and spoliation of the king and the nobles, and provides for freedom of popular elections, because sheriffs, coroners, and conservators of the peace were still chosen by the freeholders in the county Court, and attempts had been made to influence the election of knights of the shire, from the time when they were instituted. It contains a declaration to enforce the enactment of Magna Charta against excessive fines, which might operate as perpetual imprisonment; enumerates and corrects the abuses of tenures, particularly as to marriage of wards; regulates the levying of tolls, which were imposed arbitrarily by the barons, and by cities and boroughs; corrects and retrains the power of the king's escheator and...
Feodary, or feudary
Feodary, or feudary, an officer of the Court of Wards, appointed by the master of that Court, under 32 Hen. 8, s. 26, whose business it was to be present with the escheator in every county at the finding of offices of lands, and to give evidence for the king as well concerning the value as the tenure; and his office was also to survey the land of the ward, after the office found, and to rate it. He also assigned the kings; widows their dower, and received all the rents, etc. Abolished by 12 Car. 2, c. 24....
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