Definition
Disturbance carries two distinct legal meanings that share a common root idea — wrongful interference with an established right or condition — but operate in wholly different areas of law.
1. Disturbance of an incorporeal hereditament. The primary legal meaning: a wrong done to an incorporeal hereditament by hindering or disquieting the owner in the lawful enjoyment of it. An incorporeal hereditament is a non-possessory property right that runs with land — a right of common, a franchise, an easement, a right of way, or a tenure. Disturbance occurs when a third party wrongfully obstructs the exercise of that right without physically trespassing on the land itself. Because the injury is to an intangible right rather than to physical possession, disturbance is the appropriate wrong to plead rather than trespass. The traditional remedy is an action on the case; equity may supply an injunction where damages are inadequate.
2. Disturbance of the peace / public disturbance. In criminal and public-order law, a disturbance is an interruption of public tranquility or the orderly conduct of lawful gatherings — a noisy commotion, a breach of public peace, or the disruption of a lawful assembly. This meaning is largely statutory in modern usage and varies considerably by jurisdiction.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): A noisy commotion that causes a hubbub or interruption; an act of disturbing or being disturbed; an interruption of what is normal or regular; a serious mental imbalance or illness.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): An interruption of a state of peace or quiet; derangement of the regular course of things; violent agitation in the body politic; public commotion; tumult.
The gap matters. In ordinary English, disturbance suggests noise, disorder, or commotion — something perceptible and public. In its primary legal sense, disturbance is a property wrong aimed at intangible rights, and no noise or physical commotion need occur at all. A landowner whose right of common is quietly and systematically blocked suffers a legal disturbance in the full technical sense while the scene remains perfectly calm. Researchers who encounter the term in older property sources without awareness of this distinction will systematically misread the pleadings.
Common Confusion
Disturbance (of incorporeal hereditament) is frequently conflated with nuisance and trespass. The distinction is structural: trespass requires physical entry onto land; nuisance addresses unreasonable interference with use and enjoyment of land generally. Disturbance is the specific wrong applicable when the injured right is incorporeal — a right of common, a franchise, a right of way — rather than the physical land itself. Anderson's makes the categories explicit by cross-referencing ENJOYMENT, Quiet and listing the specific types: franchise, common, way, tenure. Researchers treating disturbance as a synonym for nuisance in historical pleadings will misidentify the cause of action and misread the available remedies.
In modern statutory sources, disturbance appears in criminal codes governing public order, where it overlaps with breach of the peace and disorderly conduct. These are related but not identical offenses; the precise boundary is jurisdiction-specific.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
The historical sources recognize disturbance according to the type of incorporeal hereditament affected:
Disturbance of common — interference with a commoner's right to take profits from another's land (pasture, piscary, estovers, turbary).
Disturbance of a franchise — obstruction of a privately held public right or privilege granted by the crown or state.
Disturbance of a way — wrongful obstruction of a right of way or right of road.
Disturbance of tenure — interference with the incidents of a tenurial relationship.
Anderson's supplies this taxonomy directly. Burrill confirms the scope: "It may be of a franchise, a common, a way, or a tenure."
Why It Matters in Research
The term is a research trap because it straddles two entirely different bodies of law — property and criminal/public order — and historical sources treat the property meaning as primary while modern usage has largely inverted that hierarchy. A researcher searching Law Mind sources for "disturbance" without tracking which meaning is operative in a given passage will produce confused results.
For property researchers: The incorporeal hereditament meaning is the controlling sense in all the major historical dictionaries. It appears in the context of common law real property actions — specifically the action on the case — and connects directly to the older law of incorporeal hereditaments that has been substantially modified or abolished in most American jurisdictions. English sources remain essential because the doctrinal structure was never fully transplanted to American law. Where American courts did adopt the concept, it typically survived only in easement and water rights contexts.
For criminal law researchers: The public-order meaning dominates modern statutes and cases. Look for "disturbing the peace," "disorderly conduct," and "breach of the peace" as the operative categories in contemporary sources. Anderson's bridge definition — "interruption of a state of peace; disquiet; disorder: as, the disturbance of a lawful public meeting" — is the historical ancestor of these statutes.
Corpus connection: Disturbance of an incorporeal hereditament appears in pleading treatises and real property treatises far more than in case reporters, particularly in American sources. Researchers using Law Mind's encyclopedia materials on incorporeal hereditaments should read those entries alongside this one to track which specific rights were actually litigated as disturbances versus nuisances in the relevant period and jurisdiction.
Historical Dictionary Support
The historical dictionaries converge almost entirely on the incorporeal hereditament meaning as the primary legal definition. Black's (1st Ed.), Bouvier's, Burrill's, and Black's (2nd Ed.) all define disturbance in substantially identical terms derived from Blackstone's Commentaries (3 Bl. Comm. 235–236) and Finch's Law. This uniformity is itself informative: these dictionaries are not independently arriving at the same definition — they are transmitting a shared doctrinal tradition traceable to Blackstone.
Bouvier adds the remedial dimension explicitly — action on the case, or injunction in equity — which is operationally important for identifying this cause of action in historical court records. Burrill supplies the richest account, quoting Finch directly: "The hindering of that which in right belongeth unto one to do," which usefully captures the wrong's essence without limiting it to land-related rights.
Anderson's is the outlier and the most useful for modern researchers because it presents both meanings as coordinate definitions, acknowledging the public-order sense that the others ignore. His taxonomy of subtypes (franchise, common, way, tenure) is not found as systematically in the other sources and provides the best analytical framework for categorizing historical cases.
What the historical dictionaries collectively miss: the modern statutory criminal meaning receives no sustained treatment. Researchers expecting coverage of disturbance as a public-order offense will find the historical sources nearly silent.
Jurisdictional Note
The incorporeal hereditament meaning is most fully developed in English law and in American jurisdictions with strong common law property traditions. Many American states modified or abolished the underlying property forms (rights of common, franchises as property rights) through statute or constitutional provision, which largely eliminated disturbance as a freestanding cause of action in those states. In the public-order context, statutory definitions vary significantly — what one state codes as "disturbing the peace" another may capture under "disorderly conduct" or "breach of the peace."
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Law Mind Encyclopedia — Incorporeal Hereditaments
Law Mind Encyclopedia — Public Order Offenses
Law Mind Encyclopedia — Action on the Case