The Law Relating to Manorial Titles

This is the most important part of the web site. It explains the English law that enables you to acquire a Lord of the Manor title that has been restored using a unique legal process.

Please click here to see a pdf letter from our solicitor.

This page details our approach to Manorial Titles and the Law. Please read this page before you make a purchase.

IMPORTANT NOTICE:

•  Burton & Bamford V Walker December 2010 adjudication stated ownership of a manorial title cannot be created through Prescription or Adverse Possession
• Legal opinion states legal possession of manorial titles is highly doubtful
• Proof of ownership of a manorial title can only be shown by 700 years of correctly completed deeds or by a court order
• The majority of manorial titles will now be lost, forever, unless something is done
• A London Barrister has provided The Liberty Hundred with a legal solution to enable lost manorial titles to be restored and be used by new custodians
• The legal solution only works with an "intellectual right" created & owned by The Liberty Hundred so that no others can restore titles in this way.

Below is a summary of how The Liberty Hundred has adapted to cope with the events that happened above.

I ran this business for a few years using the law of adverse possession (as advised by legal advisors) and decided to have a full legal review of the law by a London Barrister to ensure I was completely compliant with the law.

It transpired that the law relating to claiming possession of manorial titles was very unclear and a case with the Adjudicator of HM Land Registry in December 2010 at last defined the law.  My review could not have been better timed as I do not wish to mislead anyone.  The barrister confirmed that I had not committed a criminal offense as I had been acting on poor advice and I decided not to take any legal action (we all make mistakes and the law was not clear).  He also confirmed that the use of Prescription and Lost Modern Grant were also not a viable method, in the majority of cases, to obtain legal title to a manorial title.  As I hope you all already know you cannot obtain a copyright over a manorial title as a copyright has to be for something that is unique, not something that has existed for hundreds of years.  If these legal terms do not make sense do not worry I merely state them for those that know the terms and to explain they have now been repealed.  They have no impact on my methods used here.

The barrister's work then turned to finding all there was to know about manorial law and to find a solution so that I could ratify titles already sold and to continue with the business.  Previously I had been open about what law I was relying on and at least one other business was started using my published knowledge.  I do not mind competition however starting a business of this nature without legal support is a recipe for breaking the law.  Unwittingly I had given out just enough information to help potential competitors to start a titles businesses.

I have therefore taken the decision that with the new legal solution provided by the barrister it will remain a secret between my legal team and I.  To provide customers with confidence I am employing a solicitor to confirm, they have read, understood the barrister's direction and that I am using it.

The way forward.

In law a manorial title was part of the rights package (a seigniory) that went with a Manor.  In law the right to the title is classed as an incorporeal hereditament.  In simple terms: incorporeal - not "physical", hereditament - can be inherited.

To own a title, the right to use the title has to be legally passed from one individual to another.  As the title has no physical presence this is a rather difficult thing to do.   Ownership of a title is proved, but is not the ownership, by a set of paper deeds that stretch back through time to when the Manor was first created.  As you will see from the History page on this web site most manorial titles were created shortly after the Norman Conquest as William the Conqueror claimed all land in England as being his (the Crown).  Keeping a set of paper deeds for 900 years is a difficult task so the law very early on recognised that a legal remedy was required for losing the deeds, adverse possession and prescription were created.

Everything was fine until the new found interest in manorial titles.  Looking back at the law which in my opinion, "took its eye off the ball", we have been left with an impossible situation where most manorial titles do not have a legal owner that can prove their ownership.  As it stands you must have a set of deeds going back to 1289.  To further make things difficult before 1882 in order to transfer the seigniory (including the lordship title) with the physical land the legal professional handling the death or transfer must have included specific wording to transfer the seigniory with the land.  It would probably be no surprise you that this did not happen all the time.  So today, to have proof of legal ownership the owner must have a set of deeds for over 700 years and each of those deeds, must have the correct wording, otherwise legal ownership cannot be proved.  The Barrister recommended for a particular lordship, the owner could petition a court to have them review the deeds they did have and there would be a ruling whether they believe the intention would have been for the current owner to have ownership.  Probably highly expensive with no guarantees!!!

To add another negative I am afraid, the Barrister in his opinion also believes that it is not possible to take legal possession of a manorial title due to its lack of physical state.  I disagree with this, however until a court or parliament adjudicates that a manorial title can be legally possessed this is the closest we can have to what the law states.  He also directed me to another Barrister's work on the subject who agreed with his opinion.

So what do we do now if we want English Manorialism and manorial titles to survive? 

The two paragraphs above are basically saying that by far the majority of titles are now lost and cannot be enjoyed and used for honorable practices today.  I am not prepared to accept this was the intention of the law.

As for our ability to enjoy a manorial title now the Barrister and I needed to come up with a legal solution to restore the lost titles.  By this I mean create an incorporeal hereditament (a title you can inherit) which is created through the previous existence of a Manor and everything we know about that Manor.  I would compare this to a period house that has been completely destroyed by fire.  Although the majority of the finished restored building is new we all still regard it as being a representation of the old.

As I stated at the beginning I am not going to share the method of saving the manorial titles but what I can confirm is that, a title I can now sell you will be a legal entity, an incorporeal hereditament, it will exist on the basis that it replaces a specific lost manorial title and the history of that title.

So what is an owner comes forward with proof of ownership and the title has been restored and sold? 

The likelihood is extremely small however because so many titles exist I am confident that I can provide a replacement title with the minimum of inconvenience to the client.  I cannot emphasis enough how difficult it would be to safe guard a set of deeds through 700 years to prove ownership of a manorial title.

Another great bi-product is that because the new legal entity is based on the old title the owner will also be in possession of the old title.  I remind you that the barrister said this is not possible but what this does is attach whatever possessory title can be had until we can argue to get the law changed so that the possessory element of your new title can be recognised in law.

Although this is a different legal solution than that of adverse possession (creating a new legal entity by holding the property without the permission of the true owner) and prescription with lost modern grant (a legal fiction where the law creates a new grant of the lordship that it says has been lost even if it didn't exist) the solution is very similar in that the legal solution is based on the previous existence of the Lordship.

Yes it is confusing

I have tried explaining this, together with an explanation of the legal solution, to various friends and they have all struggled to understand it.  I am hoping that without the legal solution and just the concept it will be easier to understand.

I shall be happy to field any questions you may have, by email please so that I can try and develop the best possible wording for communicating what I have not made clear here.

To finish my explanation and give you the best possible confidence in what I am doing I have requested the Barrister to produce the deeds that enable the titles to be restored.  He has also built in protection into the deeds to stop the copying that was a feature of the last legal documents.