estate 
He [the chancellor] had said . . . that " if he had done 
anything that touched the king in his sovereign estate, he 
would not answer for it to any person alive save only to 
the king when he came to his age." 
Stubbs, Const. Hist., 333. 
4. Style of living: usually with a distinctive 
epithet, Jiiglt, great, etc., implying pomp or 
dignity. 
His doughter quene of Inde as ye shall here, 
Kepyng right grete estate withynne the lande. 
Generi/des (E. E. T. S.), 1. 18. 
5. In law : (a) The legal position or status of 
an owner, considered with respect to his prop- 
erty ; ownership, tenancy, or tenure ; property 
in land or other things. When the thing in question 
is an immovable, such as land, etc., the estate, if a fee, or 
for a life or lives, is termed real. (See real.) If it is only 
for a term of years, or relates only to movables, it is 
termed personal. 
Land was once not regarded as property at all. People 
owned not the land, but an estate in the land ; and these 
estates still continue to haunt, like ghosts, the language of 
real property law. 
Sir J. F. Stephen, National Rev., Laws relating to Land. 
(6) More technically, and with relation only to 
land, the degree or quantity of interest, con- 
sidered in respect to the nature of the right, its 
period of duration, or its relation to the rights 
of others, which a person has in land, if that 
interest, in a given case, does not amount to an absolute 
entire ownership, it is because there is at the same time 
another interest in the same thing pertaining to other per- 
sons. Thus, one man may have the ultimate right of prop- 
erty, another the right of possession, and a third actual 
possession : each of these interests being qualified or in- 
complete estates, which, if transferred to and merged in one 
person, would constitute an absolute estate or fee simple. 
(See merger.) Such special estates are said to be carved 
out of the fee. ^.future estate that is, one which is not 
to be enjoyed until a future time is nevertheless deemed 
to have a present existence in anticipation, even if it may 
never take effect, or if it is wholly uncertain who will be 
its owner ; it is, in such case, called a contingent estate. 
N. Y. Ren. St., III. 2175, 5. 
The grant of land to a man, without specifying what es- 
tate he is to take, will to this day give him no interest be- 
yond his own life. F. Pollock, Land Laws, p. 55. 
6. Property in general ; possessions ; particu- 
larly, the property left at a man's death : as, at 
his death his estate was of the value of half a 
million ; the trustees proceeded to realize the 
estate. 
Which charge of feeding so many beastly [beasts'] 
mouths is able to eat up a countryman's estate. 
The Great Frost (Arber's Eng. Garner, I. 80). 
7. A piece of landed property ; a definite por- 
tion of land in the ownership of some one : as, 
there is more wood on his estate than on mine. 
No need to sweat for gold, wherewith to buy 
Estates of high-priz'd land. Quarles, Emblems, v. 9. 
But that old man, now lord of the broad estate and the 
Hall, 
Dropt off gorged from a scheme that had left us flaccid and 
drain'd, Tennyson, Maud, i. 5. 
8f. The body politic; state; commonwealth; 
public ; public interest. 
The Moscouite, with no lesse pompe and magnificence, 
. . . sends his Ambassadors to forren Princes, in the af- 
faires of estate. Hakluyt's Voyagei, I. 251. 
The true Greatness of Kingdoms and Estates. 
Bacon, Title of Essay. 
I call matters of estate not only the parts of sovereignty, 
but whatever introduceth any great alteration, or danger- 
ous precedent, or concerneth manifestly any great portion 
of people. Bacon, Essays. 
9. One of the orders or classes into which the 
population of some countries is or has been di- 
vided, with respect to political rights and pow- 
ers. In modern times this division has been into nobility, 
clergy, and people (now, In Great Britain, lords temporal 
and spiritual and commons), called the three estates. For- 
merly in France a legislative assembly representing the 
three estates, called the states-general, was summoned only 
in emergencies; the last began the revolution of 1789. 
When the crowned Northman consulted on the welfare 
of his kingdom, he assembled the estates of his realm. Now 
an estate is a class of the nation invested with political 
rights. There appeared the estate of the clergy, of the 
barons, of other classes. In the Scandinavian kingdom to 
this day the estate of the peasants sends its representatives 
to the diet. Disraeli. 
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland is gov- 
erned by its king or queen and two Houses of Parliament. 
These are commonly known as the "Three Estates of the 
Realm ; but this phrase properly applies to the three 
classes of which Parliament is composed, viz., the Lords 
Spiritual, the Lords Temporal, and the Commons. 
A. Fonblanqm, How we are Governed, p. 11. 
10f. A person of high station or rank ; a noble. 
Richard, Duke of Gloucestre, [was] . . . harde fanoured 
of vysage, such as in estates is called a warlike vysage, and 
amonge coramen persons a crabbed face. 
Quoted in A T . and Q., 7th ser., II. 314. 
She is a dutchess, a great estate. Latimer. 
Herod on his birthday made a supper to his lords high 
captains, and chief estates [revised version, men] of O alilee. 
Mark vi. 21. 
2010 
Cap Of estate. Same as cap of maintenance (which see, 
under maintenance). Cloth Of estate. See eluth. Con- 
ditional estate, or estate upon condition, an estate 
the existence of which depends upon the happening or 
not happening of some uncertain event, whereby the 
estate may be either originally created or enlarged, or 
finally defeated. Blackstom. See condition., 8. Con- 
ventional estates. See conventional. Convention of 
estates. See convention. Equitable estate or title, 
a right to claim the profits or enjoyment of ownership 
from the person who holds the legal title as trustee ; a 
beneficial interest, recognized by courts of equity as be- 
longing to one person, while the legal title that is, the 
title recognized by courts of common law is in another 
person. Thus, sometimes a trustee is said to hold the legal 
title to the trust property, and the beneficiary an equitable 
estate or title. Estate at Will, that estate held by one who 
is in possession of the land of another by his consent, and 
holds it at the will of the latter, or at the will of both par- 
ties. Estate by statute. See statute. Estate by suf- 
ferance, ftee sufferance. Estate by the courtesy. See 
courtesy of England (under courtesy). Estate for life, an 
estate limited to a man to hold the same for the term of his 
own life, or for that of any other person, or for more lives 
than one. (Stephen.) When used without qualification, the 
phrase usually implies tenancy for one's own life. Estate 
for years, an estate which, by the terms of its creation, is 
measured by the lapse of a specified period of time (it may 
be a fraction of a year or more), so that it must expire by 
a certain date. An estate for years is often called a term. 
Estate in common. See tenancy. Estate in expec- 
tancy. See expectance. Estate in fee. See /-'. Es- 
tate in joint tenancy, an estate held, whether in fee, for 
life, for years, or at will, by several persons jointly (as dis- 
tinguished from an estate in severally, or held separately). 
Its characteristics are that it was created as a single es- 
tate, in which the owners were conjoined (unity of estate), 
and must therefore owe its origin to one act or deed (unity 
of title), the interest of each commencing at the same time 
(unity of time), and the possession of either being legally 
equivalent to the possession of all (unity of possession). 
It follows from these qualities that on the death of one 
the entire estate remains in the others, who are said to 
take by right of survivorship. A conveyance by one of his 
interest terminates the joint character of the interest con- 
veyed, because the unities are not preserved, and the 
transferee, if a stranger, is a tenant in common. To il- 
lustrate the distinction, trustees hold as joint tenants, 
heirs as tenants in common. See tenancy. Estate in 
possession. See possession. Estate in severally. 
See severally. Estate in tail, an estate in fee cut down 
(faille) by restricting it to certain descendants or classes 
of descendants, leaving usually a right of reentry in the 
creator of the estate, in the event of the failure of such 
descendants. See tail and entail. Estate of inheri- 
tance, an estate that on the death of the owner survives, 
and if he dies intestate passes to his heirs. One subject 
to a condition that might prevent its passing (as where 
the lord's consent was necessary) has been termed an 
estate of inheritance qualified. Estate tail female, an 
estate limited to females and female descendants of fe- 
males. Estate tail general, an estate limited to the 
heirs of the donee's body generally, without restriction, 
in which case it would descend to every one of his lawful 
posterity who could take in due course. Estate tail 
male, an estate limited to males and male descendants of 
males, thus securing that the land should always be owned 
by one of the same surname as the ancestor. Estate 
tail special, an estate limited to certain heirs of the 
holder s body, usually the issue of a particular marriage. 
Executed estate, an estate in possession, as distin- 
guished from an executory estate, which depends on some 
contingency for coming into existence in enjoyment in 
the future. Executory estate, a future estate which is 
contingent, but yet is not necessarily dependent, for its 
commencement in possession upon the time when some 
precedent estate shall have terminated, as distinguished 
from one which is limited to take effect on the termina- 
tion of a precedent estate, and is termed a remainder. 
See executory devise, under devise, and remainder. Ex- 
pectant estate. See expectance. Fourth estate, (a) A 
name for the lowest classes of society, as the artisans, ser- 
vants, day-laborers, etc., as distinguished from the third 
estate or commons; the proletariat, (b) A name humor- 
ously given in recent times to the newspaper press, or the 
body of journalists, as constituting a power in the state 
distinct from that of the three recognized political orders. 
Freehold estate. See freehold. Future estate. See 
def. 5 (b). Landed Estates Court. See court. Legal 
estate. See equitable estate, and legal. Merger Of es- 
tates. See merger. Particular estate, the estate, 
usually a lesser one, that precedes a remainder. See par- 
ticular. Settled. Estates Act. See settle. Third es- 
tate, the common people in their relations to the state or 
to political power: a phrase made famous by the struggles 
of the representatives of this order (the tiers etat) in the 
last French states-general for power equal to that of both 
the other orders, and their final assumption of supreme 
authority, consummating the great revolution. Vested 
estate, an estate in which there is an immediate right 
of present enjoyment or a present fixed right of future 
enjoyment, or in regard to which, if all precedent estate 
should instantly terminate, the right to enjoyment would 
immediately be in an existing person. If, however, not- 
withstanding such supposed termination, the right of en- 
joyment would still depend on an unascertained contin- 
gency, the estate is said to be contingent. 
estate (es-taf), v. t.; pret. and pp. estated, ppr. 
estating. [< estate, .] If. To establish in pos- 
session; settle. 
Sir, I demand no .more than your own offer ; and I will 
estate your daughter in what I have promised. 
Fletcher (and another), Two Noble Kinsmen, ii. 1 . 
Our nature will return to the innocence and excellency 
in which God first estated it. 
Jer. Taylor, Works (cd. 1835), I. 672. 
2f. To settle as a possession; bestow; deed. 
A contract of true love to celebrate ; 
And some donation freely to estate 
On the bless'd lovers. Shak., Tempest, iv. 1. 
esteem 
He intended that son to my profession, and had provided 
him already 300. a-year, of his own gift in church livings, 
and hath estated 300. more of inheritance for their chil- 
dren. Donne, Letters, Ixx. 
To the onely use and behoof of my s'd child, I do hereby 
estate and intrust all the particulers hereafter mentioned. 
Wint/irop, Hist. New England, II. 458. 
3. To settle an estate upon; endow with an 
estate or other property. 
Then would I, 
More especially were he, she wedded, poor, 
Estate them with large land and territory 
In mine own realm beyond the narrow seas. 
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine. 
estatelyt, a. [< ME. estately, estatly, estatlich ; 
< estate + -lyi. Hence, by apheresis, stately.] 
Stately ; dignified. 
It peined hire to conntrefeten chere 
Of court, and ben estatlich of manere, 
And to ben holden digne of reverence. 
Chaucer, Gen. Prol. to C. T., 1. 140. 
estatutet, . An obsolete form of statute. Chau- 
cer. 
estet, See esfi. 
esteem (es-tem'), r. [First at end of 16th cen- 
tury; < F. estimer = Pr. Sp. Pg. estimar = It. 
estimare, stimare,( L. aistimare, testmnare, value, 
rate, weigh, estimate : see estimate, and aim, 
an older word, partly a doublet of esteem."] I. 
trans. 1. To estimate; value; set a value on, 
whether high or low ; rate. 
Then he forsook God which made him, and lightly es- 
teemed the Rock of his salvation. Deut. xxxii. 15. 
One man esteemeth one day above another ; another es- 
teemeth every day alike. Rom. xiv. 5. 
You would begin then to think, and value every article 
of your time, esteem it at the true rate. 
B. Jonson, Epicuene, i. 1. 
Specifically 2. To set a high value on ; prize ; 
regard favorably, especially (of persons) with 
reverence, respect, or friendship. 
Will he esteem thy riches? Job xxxvi. 19. 
Not he yat hath scene most countries is most to be es- 
teemed, but he that learned best conditions. 
/..'////. Euphues and his England, p. 245. 
On the backs of these Hawksbill Turtle grows that shell 
which is so much esteem'd for making Cabinets, Combs, 
and other things. Dampier, Voyages, I. 103. 
3. To consider; regard; reckon; think. 
Those things we do esteem vain, which are either false 
or frivolous. Bacon, Advancement of Learning, i. 38. 
When I consider his disregard to his fortune, I cannot 
esteemhlm covetous. Steele, Tatler, No. 211. 
Conversation in its better part 
May be esteeni'd a gift, and not an art. 
Cowper, Conversation, 1. 4. 
= Syn. 2. Value, Prize, Esteem, etc. (see appreciate); to re- 
spect, revere. 3. To think, deem, consider, hold, account. 
II. intrans. To regard or consider value ; en- 
tertain a feeling of esteem, liking, respect, etc. : 
with of. 
For his sake, 
Though in their fortunes fain, they are esteem'd of 
And cherish'd by the best. 
Fletcher, Spanish Curate, i. 1. 
They [the Tamoyes] esteem of gold and gems, as we of 
stones in the streets. Purchas, Pilgrimage, p. 841. 
We our selves esteem not of that obedience or love or 
gift, which is of force. Stilton, Areopagitica, p. 25. 
esteem (es-tem'), . [< esteem, r.] 1. Estima- 
tion ; opinion or judgment of merit or demerit. 
And live a coward in thine own esteem. 
Shak., Macbeth, i. 7. 
Specifically 2. Favorable opinion, formed 
upon a belief in the merit of its object ; respect ; 
regard ; liking. 
Who can see, 
Without esteem for virtuous poverty, 
Severe Fabricius? Dryden, .JJneid. 
I am not uneasy that many, whom I never had any es- 
teem for, are likely to enjoy this world after me. Pope. 
3. The character which commands considera- 
tion or regard ; value ; worth. 
This arm that hath reclaim'd 
To your obedience fifty fortresses, . . . 
Besides five hundred prisoners of esteem 
Lets fall his sword before your highness' feet. 
Shak., 1 Hen. VI., iii. 4. 
And let me tell you that angling is of high esteem, and 
of much use in other nations. 
/. Walton, Complete Angler, p. 50. 
4f. Valuation; price. 
I will deliver you in ready coin 
The full and dearest esteem of what you crave. 
Webster and Rowley, Cure for a Cuckold, ii. 2. 
= Syn 1 and 2. Estimate, Esteem, Etiiatian. Respeel, 
Regard; honor, admiration, reverence, veneration. Es- 
timate, both as noun and as verb, supposes an exercise of 
the judgment in determining external things, as amount, 
weight, size, value; or internal things, as intellect, ex- 
cellence, it may be applied to that which is unfavor- 
able : as, my estimate of the man was not high. Esteem 
as a noun has commonly the favorable meanings of the 
verb; it is a moral sentiment nuide up uf respect and 
