The History of the Law of Landlord and Tenant in England and Wales

Wildy's Book of the Month: February 2012

Who has not been a landlord or a tenant? It is one of the most common legal relationships between people, and has been since the medieval period. But there is very little academic interest in the law of landlord and tenant. Nobody before has attempted to write its history.

This book shows how the rules on each point of importance have developed. Sometimes it demonstrates how a wrong turn has been taken, or an important principle forgotten. But its practical use is to provide the material for understanding the old cases, and to put those cases in their proper context; for it is hard for any lawyer, advising on a doubtful point, to say where exactly we are now, without a thorough understanding of what the law once was and how and when it might have changed.

Mark Wonnacott is a barrister at Maitland Chambers in Lincoln's Inn, London, specialising in property litigation. If it is attached to the ground, he litigates about it, and the dustier corners of land law are his particular favourite. He was counsel for the successful appellant in Berrisford v. Mexfield Housing Co-operative Ltd. [2011] UKSC 52, which revived the rule that a tenancy for an uncertain term is a defeasible lease for life.