Daily AncestorPremises
In a deed, the premises means the land and buildings being conveyed; older lawyers also used it for the opening part of the deed, before the to have and to hold clause.
Today premises means land and the buildings on it, and in a deed it usually means exactly the property just described: "the above granted premises."
In older legal usage the word also meant the opening part of a deed, everything before the habendum ("to have and to hold"); Webster's 1828 defines premises in law as "land or other things mentioned in the preceding part of a deed." Either way it points back to what came earlier, not to a new piece of land.
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "Premises." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/legal-land/premises. Last checked 2026-10-10.