Notes of some Curiosities of Old Scottish Tenures and Investitures

Abstract

The author discusses how changes in land ownership were demonstrated before legal records were introduced. He demonstrates how in some cases a physical gift, such as a piece of the land's turf or a knife, was given to the new landowner in order to symbolise that the transfer of land had taken place. Several of the examples he cites are from England or Europe, but he also covers Scottish examples of this practice from the early medieval period.