{{Short description|Chief seat of a barony}} {{Use dmy dates|date=July 2017}} {{Use British English|date=July 2017}} {{Title lang|la}} In the customs and laws of the kingdom of England, the '''{{lang|la|caput baroniae}}''' ({{ety|la||head of the barony}}) was the ancient, or chief, seat or castle of a nobleman — the primary place of his baronial court. The ''caput baroniae'' was not to be divided between multiple daughters (if there was no son to inherit); instead, the whole of it was to descend entirely to the eldest daughter {{lang|la|caeteris filiabus aliunde satisfactis}}, {{gloss|other daughters having been satisfied elsewhere}}.
The {{lang|la|Leges Henrici Primi}} stated that a lord's tenants would (when escalating disputes or like matters) have to go to the {{lang|la|caput}} of their [land-] lord, even if it was in another county.<ref name="middictionary">{{cite dictionary|dictionary=A Dictionary of Medieval Terms and Phrases|first=Christopher|last=Corèdon|year=2004|page=157|entry=Honour|publisher=D.S. Brewer|publication-place=Cambridge|isbn=978-1-84384-023-7 |oclc=316719708 |jstor=10.7722/j.ctt14brrmq }}</ref>
The central settlement of an Anglo-Saxon multiple estate (an estate which had main and subsidiary settlements) was called a {{lang|la|caput}}<ref>{{cite book | last=Aston | first=Michael | author-link=Mick Aston | title=Interpreting the Landscape | publisher=Psychology Press | publication-place=London; New York | date=1997 | orig-date=First published 1985 | edition=Revised | isbn=978-0-415-15140-5 | oclc=37626605 | lccn=97196478 | page=34}}</ref> (also short for {{lang|la|caput baroniae}}).
The word is also used for the centre of administration of a hundred, as well as of the early feudal honour.
== References == {{Reflist}}
=== Bibliography === {{Cyclopaedia 1728|title=CAPUT: Caput ''Baroniæ''|url=http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/HistSciTech/HistSciTech-idx?type=turn&entity=HistSciTech.Cyclopaedia01.p0310&id=HistSciTech.Cyclopaedia01|volume=1|pages=156-7}}
Category:English family law Category:Feudalism in England Category:Latin legal terminology Category:Society of England