Messuage

Messuage

In law, the term messuage equates to a dwelling-house and includes outbuildings, orchard, curtilage or court-yard and garden. At one time messuage supposedly had a more extensive meaning than that conveyed by the words house or site, but such distinction no longer survives.

A capital messuage is the main messuage of an estate, the house in which the owner of the estate normally lives.

The word messuage derives from the Anglo-French mesuage (holding), probably a corruption of popular Latin mansio, whence modern French maison (house), from manere (to dwell).

See also

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • messuage — mes·suage / mes wij/ n [Anglo French, probably alteration of Old French mesnage dwelling house, ultimately from Latin mansion mansio habitation, dwelling, from manēre to remain, sojourn, dwell]: a dwelling house with the adjacent buildings and… …   Law dictionary

  • messuage — (n.) legal term for dwelling, late 14c., (late 13c. in Anglo Latin), from Anglo Fr. messuage, which probably is a clerical error for mesnage (see MENAGE (Cf. menage)). Originally the portion of land set aside for a dwelling house and outbuildings …   Etymology dictionary

  • Messuage — Mes suage (?; 48), n. [Cf. OF. mesuage, masnage, LL. messuagium, mansionaticum, fr. L. mansio, onis, a staying, remaining, dwelling, fr. manere, mansum, to stay, remain, E. mansion, manse.] (Law) A dwelling house, with the adjacent buildings and… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • messuage — [mes′wij] n. [ME < Anglo Fr mesuage, prob. altered < OFr mesnage: see MÉNAGE] Law a dwelling house with its outbuildings and adjacent land …   English World dictionary

  • Messuage — That area of land taken up by a house and its associated buildings and land; the whole plot of land; also used of plots of land within a borough. *Bracton refers to a messuage in discussing a widow s dower. He says that a widow should be… …   Dictionary of Medieval Terms and Phrases

  • messuage — noun Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo French, from Medieval Latin messuagium Date: 14th century premise 3b …   New Collegiate Dictionary

  • messuage — /mes wij/, n. Law. a dwelling house with its adjacent buildings and the lands appropriated to the use of the household. [1350 1400; ME < AF, misreading (n taken as u) of OF mesnage MÉNAGE] * * * …   Universalium

  • messuage — noun /ˈmɛswɪʤ/ A plot of land as the site for a house; later, a residential building taken together with its outbuildings and assigned land. Dying intestate, Juan was sole heir / To a chancery suit, and messuages, and lands [...] …   Wiktionary

  • MESSUAGE —    a dwelling house with buildings and land attached for the use of the household …   The Nuttall Encyclopaedia

  • messuage — mes·suage || meswɪdÊ’ n. household, dwelling, estate (Law) …   English contemporary dictionary

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