Daily AncestorL.S.
L.S. on a deed or bond stands for locus sigilli, Latin for place of the seal, and marks where a seal belongs.
Older deeds, bonds and wills were made under seal. By the 1800s many courts accepted a printed word Seal, a scrawl made with a pen, or the letters L.S. in place of a wax seal.
So L.S. after a signature, often in a little circle or bracket, is not someone's initials. It marks the place where a seal belongs, and a recorded copy may show it in place of the original wax or paper seal.
As seen in a recordSignature line of a recorded deed
Jacob Hoover (L.S.)
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "L.S.." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/abbreviations/ls. Last checked 2026-10-10.