HERITABLE JURISDICTIONS, in the lawof Scotland, were grants of jurisdiction made to a man and his heirs. They were a usual accompaniment to feudal tenures, and the power which they conferred on great families, being recognized as a source of danger to the state, led to frequent attempts being made by statute to restrict them, both before and after the Union. They were all abolished by the Act 20 Geo. II. c. 43, which enacts (§1) that all heritable jurisdictions of justiciary, and all regalities and heritable baileries, and all heritable constabularies, other than the office of high constable of Scotland, and all stewartries, being parts only of shires and counties, and all sheriffships and deputy-sheriffships of districts, being parts only of shires and counties, belonging to or possessed by any subject or subjects, shall be taken away and totally dissolved and extinguished. At the same time, constabularies and other jurisdictions having been recognized as rights of property by the Treaty of Union, the Act provides that compensation shall be awarded to all persons lawfully possessed of such jurisdictions, and the sum of £150,000 was afterwards voted by parliament to pay the claims for compensation for loss of jurisdiction, as settled by a report of the Court of Session (see Erskine’s Institutes, by Nicholson, p. 92).