Holder of an estate in fee simple, as distinguished from an estate for life.
Definition source
Kinnear, J. B., Digest of House of Lords Cases Decided on Appeal from Scotland, 1709-1864 — Glossary of Scottish Law Terms (Edinburgh, 1865). Public domain.
Legal Subject: Fiar |
| Case | Date | Legal Subject | Abstract |
|---|---|---|---|
| James Sinclair v. Robert Anderson and Others | 1771 | Liferent, Succession, Sequestration, Assignment, Fiar, Contract of marriage | In 1705, James Fraser concluded a marriage contract with Margaret Torry, the daughter of John Torry, who held lands and tenants in Elgin. Margaret was heir to her father's property, and the marriage contract granted James the right to the rents, fees, duties, etc. of the Elgin tenants for his life should Margaret pre-decease him. Margaret and James had three children, and by the time of this lawsuit only their daughter, Margaret Fraser, remained alive. In the 1720s, James's financial affairs began to fall in disarray and he attempted to sell his wife's heritable lands, triggering a series of legal disputes resulting in the land's sequestration. After the death of James and his eldest son, John, James's creditors laid claim to the Elgin rents and fees. James Sinclair challenged the creditors in the Court of Session, arguing that his grandfather's right to his grandmother's heritable lands ceased with his death, devolved on his now dead uncle, and subsequently now fell to his mother. In other words, the heritable lands ceased to be part of James Fraser's estate when he died and reverted to his wife's estate, subsequently inherited by her children. Sinclair contended that as the heritable lands constituted part of James Fraser's estate in life only, his creditors had no claim to them after his death. The Court of Session agreed and found for James Sinclair. |
| Rollo v. Irving and Others | 1800 | Liferent, Succession, Fiar, Trustees, Liferenter, Trust | Pursuer Margaret Rollo (alias Houstoun) held stock of the Bank of Scotland in liferent, while the fee interest was held by trustees of her late husband, Alexander Houstoun. When the Bank paid an extraordinary dividend, Mrs. Houstoun brought this case to determine whether the dividend belonged to her (i.e., to the liferenter) or to the trustees. |
| Rose v. Duff | 1796 | Liferent, Freeholder, Sasine, Fiar, Oath, Wadset | William Rose of Ballivat petitioned the Court to alter the freeholders' enrolment that recorded him as fiar of Gaval and to restore his right to vote in virtue of his original qualification as freeholder of Newton and Easter Gauldwal. Colonel Patrick Duff of Carnousie resisted the petition, asserting that Rose could not remain enrolled for those lands because he had refused to swear the qualifying oath upon them, and that the qualification was nominal and fictitious. Rose replied that Duff's answers were designed to prejudice the Court against his titles rather than meet the substance of the complaint, and subsequently sought to homologate a reversion granted by the Earl of Fife in 1790, while Duff continued to deny that Newton and Gauldwall could be included under the designation 'Gaval and others' in any trust-oath. |
| William and Henry Knox and Co Merchants in Dunbar v. William Law, Esq Sheriff-depute of Haddington, and Others | 1771 | Teind, Evidence, Fiar, Reduction, Court of Session, Interest | Pursuers William Knox and Henry Knox, merchants in Dunbar, supplied barley to brewers in Glasgow and Edinburgh. Knox and Knox alleged that defender William Law, the sheriff of the county of East Lothian, had set the fiar (fixed price) of barley too high. An Act of Sederunt in 1723 established the process by which a sheriff of a given county in Scotland would set friars. The Act required the sheriff to appoint a jury of at least eight landowners in the county, with knowledge of the good at issue, to set the price. According to the pursuers, the sheriff's responsibilities were purely ministerial, setting a price agreeable with the verdict of the jury. Knox and Knox alleged that Law did not comply with the 1723 Act when he set the fiar for barley. |
Documents discussing this subject (28)
- Alexander Don v. Sir Andrew Cathcart and Richard Alexander Oswald — Replies, 9 Feb 1813
- Andrew Zuill v. Thomas Bryce — Reclaiming, 15 May 1833
- Archibald Seton v. Gideon Gray — Duplies, 20 Jan 1789
- Colonel Patrick Duff v. William Rose — Duplies, 8 Mar 1796
- Elizabeth and Isobel Grays, Daughters of John Gray of Rogart, deceased v. John Wood, and Others, Creditors of said John Gray — Answers, 10 Jul 1770
- Elizabeth and Isobel Grays, Daughters of John Gray of Rogart, deceased v. John Wood, and Others, Creditors of said John Gray — Answers, 18 Nov 1772
- Gideon Gray v. Archibald Seton — Answers, 4 Dec 1788
- James Sinclair v. Robert Anderson and Others — Memorial, 18 Jul 1771
- John Peter Grant and James Grant v. James Fraser of Gortuleg and Thomas Fraser — Petition and Complaint, 1 Dec 1802
- Logan and Others v. Reid — petition, 28 May 1799
- Mrs Houstoun v. Alexander Irving — answers, 15 Oct 1801
- Mrs Houstoun v. Alexander Irving — information, 6 Dec 1800
- Mrs Margaret Rollo v. Alexander Irving, Robert Rollo, James Fraser, and Forrest Dewar — information, 6 Dec 1800
- Petition and Complaint — & Compt.—John Morrison, Esq
- Petition — Colin Gillies against Lord Swinton's interlocutor
- Petition — David MᶜCulloch, Esq; Charles Steuart
- Ramsay v. Moray, et al — Petition, 25 Feb 1794
- Reclaiming Petition — Honourable Mrs. Westenra against Inner-House Interlocutor
- Rollo v. Irving and Others — petition, 8 Jul 1801
- Rose — Petitionand Complaint, 19 Jan 1796
- Sir Godfrey Macdonald, Bart., Lord Macdonald and the Honourable Archibald Macdonald v. William Thomas Grant, Esq. — Answers, 7 Jul 1826
- Sir James Colquhoun v. Walter Dickson — Replies, 8 Apr 1824
- Sir John Paterson v. John Ord — Duplies, 3 Jan 1781
- The Right Honourable Godfrey Lord Macdonald and the Hon. Archibald Macdonald v. William Thomas Grant, Esq. — Answers
- Thomas Coutts v. James Moffat, Charleton Palmer, and William Walker — Answers, 26 Nov 1793
- Thomas, Alexander, and Ann Frasers v. Alexander Macdonell and Farquhar Macgillivray — Information, 6 Jun 1793 [2]
- William and Henry Knox and Co Merchants in Dunbar v. William Law, Esq Sheriff-depute of Haddington, and Others — Petition, 18 Jul 1771
- William Rose v. Patrick Duff — Answers, 25 Feb 1796
