THE SEALING OF DOCUMENTS—FACT OR FICTION
| Date | 01 July 1980 |
| Published date | 01 July 1980 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1980.tb01601.x |
| Author | David C. Hoath |
THE SEALING
OF
DOCUMENTS-FACT
OR
FICTION
I.
INTRODUCTION
IT
is trite law that
a
deed is normally required to convey or create a
legal estate (by
s.
52 of the Law of Property Act 1925), and that if a
document is to constitute a deed,
it
must be signed (or marked),
sealed and delivered.
The fact of delivery will not be apparent from the face of the deed
itself, but may be inferred from the acts or words of the grantor.‘
However, the deed will normally contain on its face sufficient
indicia
of due signing and sealing. The only practical problem which
is
likely to occur regarding signature concerns the possibility of
forgery.
As
regards the seal, no practical difficulty arises in estab-
lishing compliance with this formality in the vast majority
of
cases:
a
modern deed will usually contain a red adhesive paper wafer
beside each signature, while an older deed will probably feature the
more dignified traditional impression upon melted wax, attached to
the document by green ribbon.
Nowadays the grantor’s signature has assumed greater practical
significance than the seal in showing the authenticity of
a
deed3
(especially as the seal is commonly a mass-produced wafer affixed by
the typist and not by the grantor himself). Yet until the Law
of
Property Act 1925 a signature was not essential for a deed‘
(although it was of course the usual practice for deeds to be signed
as well as sealed and delivered). In medieval times, a personalised
seal was of considerable practical importance, for the affixer
of
a
seal would often be unable to write his name; the impression of a
crest or coat of arms upon wax was the usual method of sealing, but
other means were permissible, for example by using
“
a
stick or any
such like thing which doth make a print,” or even by “biting the
wax with the foretooth
”
(a method adopting rather too literal an
interpretation of the word
“
indenture
”
!
).
The requirement of signature for
a
deed was introduced by
1
See
Hall
v.
Bainbridge
(1848) 12 Q.B. 699;
Xenos
v.
Wickham
(1866)
L.R.
2
H.L.C. 296, 312 (Blackburn
J.).
a
The question
of
what constitutes a signature
for
the purpose
of
the L.P.A.
1925,
s.
73 (which requires post-1925 deeds to be signed
or
marked as well as
sealed) does not appear to have been litigated,
no
doubt because the execution
of
deeds
is
so
often supervised by solicitors; compare the substantia) case law
on
the
meaning
of
“signature” in the Wills Act 1837,
s.
9. where the courts have
adopted
a
generous approach.
J
See,
e.g. Stromdale and
Ball
Ltd.
v.
Burden
[1952]
1
Ch. 223, 230,
per
Danckwerts
J.:
‘I.
. .
with the spread
of
education, the signature became
of
importance for the authentication
of
documents.”
4
See,
e.g.
Aveline
v.
Whisson
(1842)
4
Man.
t
G. 801.
5
Termes de la Ley,
“
Fait.” The more nearly orthodox method
of
using an
impression
of
a crest made in ink with a wooden block. in the usual place
for
a
seal,
was held sumcient in
R.
v.
The Inhobifants
of
St.
Paul,
Covenf Garden
(1845)
I
Q.B. 232. See further
Norton on Deeds
(2nd
ed. 1928). 8.
415
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