Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An estate in land that may only be passed on to lineal descendants.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun law (obsolete) An estate in land at common law wherein the land is inherited, but can not be sold, devised by will, or otherwise alienated by the owner, but which passes by operation of law to the owner's heirs upon his death.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a fee limited to a particular line of heirs; they are not free to sell it or give it away
  • verb limit the inheritance of property to a specific class of heirs

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English fe taille, from Anglo-Norman fee taile : fee, fee; see fee + Old French taile, past participle of tailier, to cut; see tailor.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Derived from the Middle Latin foedum talliatum.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word fee tail.

Examples

    Sorry, no example sentences found.

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.