entail

entail in law, restriction of inheritance to a limited class of descendants for at least several generations. The object of entail is to preserve large estates in land from the disintegration that is caused by equal inheritance by all the heirs and by the ordinary right of free alienation (disposal) of property interests. Legal devices similar to entail were known in Roman law and in all the countries of Europe. In England the entail became common in the early 13th cent., and in its most usual form was a conveyance by a grantor (owner) of real property to a grantee and the "heirs of his body," i.e., his lawful offspring, in successive generations. In the inheritance the rule of primogeniture was observed. The subsequent development of the entail reflects a continuing struggle between the effort to preserve large estates and the need for free alienation. By the mid-13th cent. the courts interpreted the birth of a live baby as the satisfaction of a condition that vested the grantee with the power of alienation. This result was overcome by the statute De donis conditionalibus [conditional gifts] (1285), which gave effect to the grantor's intent. In time the grantee was able to get control of the property despite the statutory prohibition by use of the fine and other technical legal devices. Current English law permits the holder of entailed property (either real or personal) to dispose of it by deed ; otherwise the entail persists. In the United States for the most part entails are either altogether prohibited or limited to a single generation.

Entail, The, a novel by J. Galt, published 1823, a satire on the corrupting effects of greed.

entail The growth of landed estates in England from the mid‐16th cent. until the 1880s was partly a product of the system of ‘entailing’ property. Until the mid‐17th cent., the available forms of entail were restricted, but thereafter the courts agreed to permit an owner to tie up his estate to the second and third generation, through a process of ‘contingent remainders’. It was once held that as a result great estates were kept together, but modern research holds that the system of entailing property was introduced partly to protect the financial interests of younger children, that entailed estates could be partially or completely freed, and that the consolidation of estates was due to factors other than entail.