What is "tenement"

Tenement \Ten"e*ment\, n. [OF. tenement a holding, a fief, F. t[`e]nement, LL. tenementum, fr. L. tenere to hold. See Tenant.]

1. (Feud. Law) That which is held of another by service; property which one holds of a lord or proprietor in consideration of some military or pecuniary service; fief; fee.

2. (Common Law) Any species of permanent property that may be held, so as to create a tenancy, as lands, houses, rents, commons, an office, an advowson, a franchise, a right of common, a peerage, and the like; -- called also free tenements or frank tenements.

   The thing held is a tenement, the possessor of it a ``tenant,'' and the manner of possession is called ``tenure.''
   --Blackstone.

3. A dwelling house; a building for a habitation; also, an apartment, or suite of rooms, in a building, used by one family; often, a house erected to be rented.

4. Fig.: Dwelling; abode; habitation.

   Who has informed us that a rational soul can inhabit no tenement, unless it has just such a sort of frontispiece?
   --Locke.

5. A tenement house.

   Tenement house, commonly, a dwelling house erected for the purpose of being rented, and divided into separate apartments or tenements for families. The term is often applied to apartment houses occupied by poor families, often overcrowded and in poor condition.

   Syn: House; dwelling; habitation.

   Usage: Tenement, House. There may be many houses under one roof, but they are completely separated from each other by party walls. A tenement may be detached by itself, or it may be part of a house divided off for the use of a family. In modern usage, a tenement or tenement house most commonly refers to the meaning given for tenement house, above.

c.1300, "holding of immovable property" (such as land or buildings,) from Anglo-French (late 13c.), Old French tenement "fief, land, possessions, property" (12c.), from Medieval Latin tenementum "a holding, fief" (11c.), from Latin tenere "to hold" (see tenet). The meaning "dwelling place, residence" is attested from early 15c.; tenement house "house broken up into apartments, usually in a poor section of a city" is first recorded 1858, American English, from tenament in an earlier sense (especially in Scotland) "large house constructed to be let to a number of tenants" (1690s).

n. 1 a building that is rented to multiple tenants, especially a low-rent, run-down one 2 (context legal English) any form of property that is held by one person from another, rather than being owned 3 (context figurative English) Dwelling; abode; habitation.

n. a rundown apartment house barely meeting minimal standards [syn: tenement house]

A tenement is, in most English-speaking areas, a substandard multi-family dwelling in the urban core, usually old and occupied by the poor. In Scotland it still has its original meaning of a multi-occupancy building of any sort, and in parts of England, especially Devon and Cornwall, it refers to an outshot, or additional projecting part at the back of a terraced house, normally with its own roof.

Tenement is a three piece rock band from Appleton, Wisconsin formed in 2006. They are often associated with the American hardcore punk scene. Their recorded output has been described as everything from "noise pop" to "fuzz punk", while in a live setting they are often known for experimentation, improvisation, and high-energy performance. The visual art of singer/guitarist Amos Pitsch is associated with most of their records, as well as several records by other notable punk and hardcore bands. In 2016, they were included in Rolling Stone Magazine's "10 Great Modern Punk Bands".

Tenement (also known as Game of Survival and Slaughter in the South Bronx) is a 1985 American exploitation thriller film directed by Roberta Findlay.

The film follows the violent chaos that ensues when the tenants of an apartment house in a South Bronx slum rise up against the brutal, drug-pushing street gang that attempts to take over their apartment and terrorize them. The film was given an X rating by the Motion Picture Association of America, and is one of a small number of films to receive such a rating solely for violence.

A tenement (from the Latin tenere to hold), in law, is anything that is held, rather than owned. This usage is a holdover from feudalism, which still forms the basis of all real-estate law in the English-speaking world, in which the monarch alone owned the allodial title to all the land within his kingdom.

Under feudalism, land itself was never privately "owned" but rather was "held" by a tenant (from Latin teneo "to hold") as a fee, being merely a legal right over land known in modern law as an estate in land. This was held from a superior overlord, ( a mesne lord), or from the crown itself in which case the holder was termed a tenant-in-chief, upon some manner of service under one of a variety of feudal land tenures. The thing held is called a tenement, the holder is called a tenant, the manner of his holding is called a tenure, and the superior is called the landlord, or lord of the fee. These forms are still preserved in law, even though feudalism itself is extinct, because all real estate law has developed from them over centuries.

Feudal land tenure existed in many varieties. The sole surviving form in the United States is that species of freehold known as free socage. Here the service to be performed is known and fixed, and not of a base or servile nature; the "lord of the fee" is the State itself, and the service due to this "lord" is payment of the taxes upon the real estate. The major consequences, in the modern world, of this feudal approach, as distinguished from ownership, are, first, the forfeiture of the tenement upon failure to perform the service (that is, non-payment of taxes), and second, the doctrine of eminent domain, whereby the "lord of the fee" might take back the estate, provided he make just compensation. Also existing in a vestigial form is the concept of escheat, under which an estate of a holder without heirs returns to the ownership of the state.

An interesting side effect of this is that government entities do not pay real estate taxes to other government entities since government entities own the land rather than hold the land. Localities that depend on real estate taxes to provide services are often put at a disadvantage when the state or federal government acquires a piece of land. Sometimes, to mollify local public opinion, the state or federal government may volunteer to make payments in lieu of taxes ( PILOT or PILT programs) to local governments.

A tenement is, in most English-speaking areas, a substandard multi-family dwelling in the urban core, usually old and occupied by the poor.

Tenement may also refer to:

• Tenement (law), a concept in property or mining law
• Tenement (band), an American rock band
• Tenement (film), a 1985 film
• Tenement House (Glasgow), a museum in Glasgow