Old legal and record term 1600s-1900s
What does metes and bounds mean in an old deed?
A metes and bounds description walks a property's boundary landmark by landmark, with courses and distances: beginning at the white oak, thence north fifty poles. Neighbours named as abuttals are gold: families intermarried across fence lines, and platting the calls can literally map the community. You will meet it in deeds and land grants, mostly 1600s-1900s.
Where it appears: deeds, land grants.
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Related terms
Browse the full genealogy records glossary for more occupations, causes of death, and legal terms.
FAQs
Where will I see metes and bounds in the records?+
Mostly in deeds and land grants, 1600s-1900s. Clerks abbreviated freely and spelling wandered, so expect variant wordings around it.
Do these old terms still matter for family history?+
Yes, a single word can settle a relationship. Relict names a widow, et ux hides an unnamed wife, natural son points at a parent. The words are dry, but what they encode about a family is not.
Where do these definitions come from?+
They are drawn from period dictionaries, government archive glossaries, and standard genealogy references, cross-checked against each other; provenance is documented with the dataset. Inside AncestorIQ, Deep Research reads the record itself and explains terms like this in context, against your ancestor's own document.
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