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| Feudal land tenure in England |
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| Feudalism |
Gavelkind (/ˈɡævəlkaɪnd/) was a system of land tenure chiefly associated with the Celtic law in Ireland and Wales and with the legal traditions of the English county of Kent.
The word may have originated from the Old Irish phrases Gabhaltas-cinne or Gavail-kinne, which meant "family settlement" (Modern Gaelic gabhail-cine).[1] The term came to describe all tenure and inheritance practices where land was divided equally among sons or other heirs.[2][3]
Kent's inheritance pattern was a system of partible inheritance and bears a resemblance to Salic patrimony. As such, it may bear witness to a wider Germanic tradition that was probably ancient. Over the centuries, various acts were passed to disgavel individual manors, but the custom was only fully abolished in England and Wales by the Administration of Estates Act 1925.[4][5][6]
- ^ Collectanea de Rebus Hibernicus, Volume 1
- ^ Esmonde Cleary, A. S. (1990). The Ending of Roman Britain. Savage, Maryland: Barnes and Noble. p. 364. ISBN 0-389-20893-0.
- ^ "Gavelkind". Websters Dictionary. Retrieved 24 August 2012.
- ^ Elton. The tenures of Kent. ch. XVI – Disgavelled Lands
- ^ Friar, Stephen (2001), The Sutton Companion to Local History (rev. ed.), Stroud: Sutton Publishing, p. 182, ISBN 0-7509-2723-2
- ^ "Administration of Estates Act 1925. S.45 (1)". HMSO. Retrieved 24 August 2012.