Few Dulwich residents can by now be unaware of the difference between freehold and leasehold, which since 1925 have been the only two ways in which a person can own land.  Prior to that date, however, there was a third major category of tenure, namely copyhold, which many people have heard of but seemingly few fully understand - hence this article.

Medieval land law drew a distinction between free men, whose property rights would be protected in the Royal Courts, and unfree men (or 'villeins') who had to look to the lord of their manor for protection. The former were freeholders (although eventually lease-holders were similarly protected); the latter, in theory at least, held their lands only at the will of their lord.  In practice, the lord's will could be fettered by the established customs of the manor in ques-tion, so that his tenants could hold their lands for life, or for a number of lives, or even in perpetuity.  Nevertheless, the theoretical basis of the law is emphasised by the fact that such land could only be transferred to another person through the lord.  The earliest Dulwich court rolls, of 1333, give an excellent example of the procedure:

Ralf Carpenter comes to this Court and gives into the hands of the lord of the manor a third part of one cottage with a courtyard and half an acre of land with appurtenances, to the use of Juliana Colles.  And the said Juliana comes and gives to the lord for entering into possession of the aforesaid holdings 6d, sponsored by Richard Berling and William Walden.  And she was sworn in as tenant.

After such a transaction, the new tenant (the 'alienee') would be given a copy of the entry on the court roll, and since this constituted his title deed the term 'copyholder' was applied to him.

As the example shows, the alienee was required to pay the lord for the privilege of being enrolled as tenant, as Robert Wythe found out in 1574, when John Hunt surrendered a house and ten acres to his use, but the lord of the manor (at that time Joan Calton) would not accept the surrender because Wythe refused to pay the entry fine, which by local custom (or so she claimed) was such reasonable amount as the lord or his steward should think fit.

With the passage of time, the tendency was for copyholds to be converted into more lucrative leaseholds, and in Dulwich this process was certainly hastened by Edward Alleyn, who not only purchased the lordship of the manor from Sir Francis Calton in 1606, but at about that time also acquired almost all the various freehold properties and, as tenant, many of the copyholds, which thus merged with the manor freehold.  After 1626 only three copyholds were left, two of them in College Road (one opposite the Dulwich Picture Gallery, the other comprising the site of 'Oakfield' and Allison Grove), the third near the Turney Road junction with Croxted Road, where the railway lines intersect.  A fourth was created out of the former common land between Acacia Grove and Park Hall Road when the Common was enclosed in 1809, and allocated amongst the existing copyholders.

The Law of Property Act 1922 converted copyholds into either freeholds or leaseholds, depending on whether or not they were perpetually renewable, and the Act of 1925 finally abolished them, with one main qualification, and that is the retention of the old 'manorial incidents'.  Thus, if you look at your Land Certificate and see mention of mineral and sporting rights reserved to the lord of the manor or, more improbably, look out of your window and see the Estates Governors riding to hounds across your back garden, you will know that you live on what was once copyhold land.

[First published July 1978, in The Dulwich Society Newsletter No. 41; my first published piece.  Re-formatted 9 July 2024.]