Fiars Prices

Last updated

Fiars Prices is an expression in old Scots law given to the average prices of each of the different sorts of grain grown in each county, as fixed annually by the sheriff, usually after the verdict of a jury. [1] The use of fiars prices gradually diminished, and was abolished as part of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973. [2]

Fiars Prices served as a rule for ascertaining the value of the grain due to feudal superiors, to the clergy or to lay proprietors of teinds, to landlords as a part or the whole of their rents and in all cases where the price of grain has not been fixed by the parties. The practice of "striking the fiars," as it is called, was probably first used to determine the value of the grain rents and duties payable to the Crown. In confirmation of this view it seems that at first the duty of the sheriffs was merely to make a return to the Court of Exchequer of the prices of grain within their counties, the court itself striking the fiars; and from an old case it appears that the fiars were struck above the true prices, being regarded rather as punishments to force the king's tenants to pay their rents than as the proper equivalent of the grain they had to pay. [1]

Co-existent, however, with these fiars, which were termed sheriffs' fiars, there was at an early period another class called commissaries' fiars, by which the values of teinds were regulated. They have been traced back to the Reformation, and were under the management of the commissary or consistorial courts, which then took the place of the bishops and their officials. Although long out of use, but they were perhaps of greater antiquity than the sheriffs' fiars, and the model upon which these were instituted. [1]

In 1723 the court of session passed an Act of Sederunt for the purpose of regulating the procedure in fiars courts. Down to that date the practice of striking the fiars was by no means universal over Scotland; and even in those counties into which it had been introduced, there was, as the preamble of the act puts it, "a general complaint that the said fiars are struck and given out by the sheriffs without due care and inquiry into the current and just prices." The Act in consequence provided that all sheriffs should summon annually, between the 4th and 10 February, a competent number of persons, living in the shire, of experience in the prices of grain within its bounds, and that from these they should choose a jury of fifteen, of whom at least eight were to be heritors; that witnesses and other evidence as to the price of grain grown in the county, especially since 1 November preceding until the day of inquiry, were to be brought before the jury, who might also proceed on "their own proper knowledge"; that the verdict was to be returned and the sentence of the sheriff pronounced by 1 March; and further, where custom or expediency recommended it, the sheriff was empowered to fix fiars of different values according to the different qualities of the grain. [1]

It cannot be said that this act remedied all the evils of which it complained. The propriety of some of its provisions were questioned, and the competency of the court to pass it was doubted, even by the court itself. Its authority was entirely disregarded in one county—Haddingtonshire (now East Lothian)—where the fiars were struck by the sheriff alone, without a jury; and when this practice was called in question the court declined to interfere, observing that the fiars were better struck in Haddingtonshire than anywhere else. The other sheriffs in the main followed the Act, but with much variety of detail, and in many instances on principles the least calculated to reach the true average prices. Thus in some counties the averages were taken on the number of transactions, without regard to the quantities sold. In one case, in 1838, the evidence was so carelessly collected that the second or inferior barley fiars were 2s. 4d. higher than the first. [1]

Formerly the price was struck by the boll, commonly the Linlithgowshire boll; [1] [lower-alpha 1] in later years the imperial quarter was always used.

Prices fixed by the Court for "Striking the fiars" were also used in the settling of contracts where no prices have been determined upon, e.g. in fixing stipends of ministers of the Church of Scotland, and were found useful in other ways. [3]

Notes

  1. ↑ The contemporary meaning of boll is the seed of plants such as flax or cotton; it is unclear what is meant in this archaic context.

Related Research Articles

A sheriff is a government official, with varying duties, existing in some countries with historical ties to England where the office originated. There is an analogous, although independently developed, office in Iceland that is commonly translated to English as sherif.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tenant farmer</span> Farmer whose land is owned by a landlord

A tenant farmer is a person who resides on land owned by a landlord. Tenant farming is an agricultural production system in which landowners contribute their land and often a measure of operating capital and management, while tenant farmers contribute their labor along with at times varying amounts of capital and management. Depending on the contract, tenants can make payments to the owner either of a fixed portion of the product, in cash or in a combination. The rights the tenant has over the land, the form, and measures of payment vary across systems. In some systems, the tenant could be evicted at whim ; in others, the landowner and tenant sign a contract for a fixed number of years. In most developed countries today, at least some restrictions are placed on the rights of landlords to evict tenants under normal circumstances.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Irish National Land League</span> Late 19th century Irish political organisation

The Irish National Land League was an Irish political organisation of the late 19th century which sought to help poor tenant farmers. Its primary aim was to abolish landlordism in Ireland and enable tenant farmers to own the land they worked on. The period of the Land League's agitation is known as the Land War. Historian R. F. Foster argues that in the countryside the Land League "reinforced the politicization of rural Catholic nationalist Ireland, partly by defining that identity against urbanization, landlordism, Englishness and—implicitly—Protestantism." Foster adds that about a third of the activists were Catholic priests, and Archbishop Thomas Croke was one of its most influential champions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">High Court of Justiciary</span> Supreme criminal court in Scotland

The High Court of Justiciary is the supreme criminal court in Scotland. The High Court is both a trial court and a court of appeal. As a trial court, the High Court sits on circuit at Parliament House or in the adjacent former Sheriff Court building in the Old Town in Edinburgh, or in dedicated buildings in Glasgow and Aberdeen. The High Court sometimes sits in various smaller towns in Scotland, where it uses the local sheriff court building. As an appeal court, the High Court sits only in Edinburgh. On one occasion the High Court of Justiciary sat outside Scotland, at Zeist in the Netherlands during the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing trial, as the Scottish Court in the Netherlands. At Zeist the High Court sat both as a trial court, and an appeal court for the initial appeal by Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.

A leasehold estate is an ownership of a temporary right to hold land or property in which a lessee or a tenant has rights of real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. Although a tenant does hold rights to real property, a leasehold estate is typically considered personal property.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anti-Rent War</span> Tenants revolt in upstate New York, 1839–1845

The Anti-Rent War was a tenants' revolt in upstate New York between 1839 and 1845. The Anti-Renters declared their independence from the manor system run by patroons, resisting tax collectors and successfully demanding land reform. The conflict resulted in the passage of laws that made feudal tenures illegal and outlawed leases greater than 12 years.

As a legal term, ground rent specifically refers to regular payments made by a holder of a leasehold property to the freeholder or a superior leaseholder, as required under a lease. In this sense, a ground rent is created when a freehold piece of land is sold on a long lease or leases. The ground rent provides an income for the landowner. In economics, ground rent is a form of economic rent meaning all value accruing to titleholders as a result of the exclusive ownership of title privilege to location.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Highland Potato Famine</span> Major agrarian crisis in the Scottish Highlands from 1846 to 1857

The Highland Potato Famine was a period of 19th-century Highland and Scottish history over which the agricultural communities of the Hebrides and the western Scottish Highlands saw their potato crop repeatedly devastated by potato blight. It was part of the wider food crisis facing Northern Europe caused by potato blight during the mid-1840s, whose most famous manifestation is the Great Irish Famine, but compared with its Irish counterpart, it was much less extensive and took many fewer lives as prompt and major charitable efforts by the rest of the United Kingdom ensured relatively little starvation. The terms on which charitable relief was given, however, led to destitution and malnutrition amongst its recipients. A government enquiry could suggest no short-term solution other than reduction of the population of the area at risk by emigration to Canada or Australia. Highland landlords organised and paid for the emigration of more than 16,000 of their tenants and a significant but unknown number paid for their own passage. Evidence suggests that the majority of Highlanders who permanently left the famine-struck regions emigrated, rather than moving to other parts of Scotland. It is estimated that about a third of the population of the western Scottish Highlands emigrated between 1841 and 1861.

The Napier Commission, officially the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Condition of Crofters and Cottars in the Highlands and Islands was a royal commission and public inquiry into the condition of crofters and cottars in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland.

Tenant-right is a term in the common law system expressing the right to compensation which a tenant has, either by custom or by law, against his landlord for improvements at the termination of his tenancy.

Thirlage was a feudal servitude under Scots law restricting manorial tenants in the milling of their grain for personal or other uses. Vassals in a feudal barony were thirled to their local mill owned by the feudal superior. People so thirled were called suckeners and were obliged to pay customary dues for use of the mill and help maintain it.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Assured tenancy</span> Type of housing tenancy in the United Kingdom

An assured tenancy is a legal category of residential tenancy to an individual in English land law. Statute affords a tenant under an assured tenancy a degree of security of tenure. A tenant under an assured tenancy may not be evicted without a reasonable ground in the Housing Act 1988 and, where periodic changes in rent are potentially subject to a challenge before a rent assessment committee.

The Ellis Act is a 1985 California state law that allows landlords to evict residential tenants to "go out of the rental business" in spite of desires by local governments to compel them to continue providing rental housing.

The history of rent control in England and Wales is a part of English land law concerning the development of rent regulation in England and Wales. Controlling the prices that landlords could make their tenants pay formed the main element of rent regulation, and was in place from 1915 until its abolition by the Housing Act 1988.

Rent control in Scotland is based upon the statutory codes relating to private sector residential tenancies. Although not strictly within the private sector, tenancies granted by housing associations, etc., are dealt with as far as is appropriate in this context. Controlling prices, along with security of tenure and oversight by an independent regulator or the courts, is a part of rent regulation.

The Tenancy Deposit Schemes (Scotland) Regulations 2011 came into force on 7 March 2011. Every landlord or letting agent that receives a deposit in Scotland must register with their local authority and join a tenancy deposit scheme.

A special jury, which is a jury selected from a special roll of persons with a restrictive qualification, could be used for civil or criminal cases, although in criminal cases only for misdemeanours such as seditious libel. The party opting for a special jury was charged a fee, which was 12 guineas just prior to abolition in England.

Rent regulation is a system of laws, administered by a court or a public authority, which aims to ensure the affordability of housing and tenancies on the rental market for dwellings. Generally, a system of rent regulation involves:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Housing Act 1988</span> United Kingdom legislation

The Housing Act 1988 is an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom. It governs the law between landlords and tenants. The Act introduced the concepts of assured tenancy and assured shorthold tenancy. It also facilitated the transfer of council housing to not-for-profit housing associations, which was then carried out partly through the system of Large Scale Voluntary Transfer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Housing and Planning Act 2016</span> United Kingdom legislation

The Housing and Planning Act 2016 is Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom that makes widespread changes to housing policy and the planning system. It introduces legislation to allow the sale of higher value local authority homes, introduce starter homes and "Pay to Stay" and other measures intended to promote home ownership and boost levels of housebuilding. The Act has been subject to a number of criticisms by those opposed to the loss of social housing promoted, the extension of right-to-buy to housing associations and possible work disincentives under "Pay to Stay".

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Wikisource-logo.svg One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain :  Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Fiars Prices". Encyclopædia Britannica . Vol. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 309. Citations:
    • Paterson's Historical Account of the Fiars in Scotland (Edin., 1852)
    • Connell, On Tithes
    • Hunter's Landlord and Tenant
  2. ↑ HL Deb, 14 July 1994 vol 556 cc1994-2026
  3. ↑ Wikisource-logo.svg  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain :  Wood, James, ed. (1907). "Fiars". The Nuttall Encyclopædia . London and New York: Frederick Warne.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.