Definition
An entail is a form of real property ownership in which the inheritance of an estate is restricted to a specified line of heirs — typically the body-heirs (lineal descendants) of the original grantee — and cannot be alienated, devised, or otherwise diverted from that prescribed line of descent. The grantee holds what is called a fee tail: a freehold estate that passes automatically to qualifying issue and extinguishes upon the failure of that line rather than reverting to general heirs or passing by will.
As a verb, to entail means to create such a restricted estate — to settle land upon a person and a defined class of their descendants by deed or devise, cutting off the power of any intervening holder to sell or encumber the property free of the restriction.
Two dimensions of the term appear in legal sources:
1. The estate itself: the fee tail, defined by its limited descent rather than by the holder's power of disposition.
2. The act of creation: the legal instrument or conveyance by which the restriction is imposed.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To imply or require something as a consequence or condition; to necessitate. ("The renovation entails significant expense.")
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): To settle or fix inalienably on a person or their descendants; also, in obsolete usage, decorative carved work ("a work of rich entail," Spenser).
The everyday sense — "to involve" or "to require" — carries no legal weight. In legal sources, entail is a term of art describing a specific and now largely abolished property regime. A researcher encountering the word in a deed, case report, or treatise must read it in its technical sense; the casual modern meaning is an entirely separate development and has no application in property law contexts.
Common Confusion
Entail is frequently treated as synonymous with fee tail, and for most practical purposes the terms describe the same thing from different angles: fee tail names the estate; entail names both the estate and the act of creating it. The distinction matters in older sources where "entail" can appear as noun or verb in the same document. Separately, entail is sometimes confused with trust or settlement — related mechanisms for controlling the transmission of family property — but trusts operate through equitable ownership and trustee management, whereas an entail operated directly on the legal freehold.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Entails were historically classified by the class of heirs to whom descent was limited:
- Fee tail general: descent to any lineal heirs of the body of the grantee, regardless of which spouse they were born of.
- Fee tail special: descent restricted to the issue of a particular marriage (e.g., to A and the heirs of his body by his wife B).
- Fee tail male / fee tail female: descent limited to male-line or female-line issue only.
- Quasi-entail: used in some sources (including Bouvier) to describe entail-like restrictions on personal property or leasehold interests, which at common law could not technically be entailed but were sometimes treated analogously in equity.
Why It Matters in Research
Entail sits at the center of centuries of English and American real property law and generated an enormous volume of litigation, statutory reform, and doctrinal writing. Researchers face several specific challenges:
Historical layering: The Statute De Donis Conditionalibus (1285) created the fee tail as a formal estate. Subsequent centuries produced the device of the common recovery as a method to bar entails — a fictitious legal proceeding that effectively defeated the restriction. Researchers reading cases from roughly 1400 through the late 18th century will encounter extensive discussion of this workaround. Statutes converting fee tail to fee simple were enacted in most American states after independence and in England under the Fines and Recoveries Act 1833; sources from before these reforms operate under entirely different rules.
American abrogation: Most U.S. states abolished the fee tail either at the founding or by 19th-century statute, typically converting a fee tail grant into a fee simple in the first taker. A handful of states retained modified forms. Researchers using American sources must identify the jurisdiction and date before assuming entail rules apply — a deed using fee tail language in a post-abolition state may be read as conveying a fee simple.
Corpus connections: Entail analysis in Law Mind sources connects heavily to fee simple, fee tail, De Donis, common recovery, barring the entail, remainder, and reversion. Bouvier's cross-reference to FEE-TAIL is the correct place to find full doctrinal treatment in that dictionary. Anderson's redirection to TAIL performs the same function.
Drafting traps in historical documents: Deeds and wills using "to A and the heirs of his body" or similar language may or may not create an entail depending on jurisdiction and date. The magic words of limitation are critical, and their effect changed across time and geography.
Historical Dictionary Support
The four source dictionaries converge on the core definition — a fee abridged or limited to certain heirs — but differ in depth of treatment. Bouvier provides the most structured entry, distinguishing the noun (the estate) from the verb (the act of creation) and cross-referencing FEE-TAIL for extended doctrine. Burrill is the most etymologically attentive, tracing the term to the Law French tailler and Latin talliare, meaning to cut or limit, which illuminates why the estate is described as "abridged" or "curtailed." Both Bouvier and Burrill cite Blackstone's Commentaries (2 Bl. Com. 112-113) as the authoritative common law exposition — the standard reference for this doctrine in the 18th and 19th century.
Rapalje & Lawrence's entry appears in fragmentary form in the available text, referencing the rule that a fee tail combined with remainder to the right heirs of the tenant produces a fee simple — a technical point about merger doctrine rather than a definition. Anderson redirects entirely to TAIL, offering no independent definition. Neither Rapalje & Lawrence nor Anderson adds materially to the Bouvier and Burrill accounts.
All four sources reflect common law doctrine as it existed before comprehensive American statutory reform. None addresses the nearly universal American abrogation of the fee tail, which means researchers using these dictionaries for American property questions after roughly 1800 must supplement with state statutory history.
Jurisdictional Note
The fee tail was abolished or substantially modified in most American states by statute, often converting tail language into a fee simple in the first taker or their issue. Maine, Massachusetts, and a small number of other states retained versions of the fee tail for longer periods. England abolished it by the Fines and Recoveries Act 1833 and then again reformed the law under the Law of Property Act 1925. Research into any specific entail question requires identifying the controlling jurisdiction and the date of the instrument.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Fee Tail; Estates in Land; Statute De Donis Conditionalibus