The History of British Wealth and Industry

[Sheilbh]

Well, in the 2nd list of richest Britons there were few of either to be found.

Yes. Largely because of literal robber barons

The full list would be interesting, but take the 1st Duke of Sutherland - guessed to be the richest man in the UK in the 19th century. Did his wealth diminish so much that the 2nd Duke isn't on the list? The full list apparently has 250 figures on it and given that by twenty we're talking a billion here and a billion there I imagine the 18th and 19th century will be better represented. Even then it was difficult to amass a fortune like a conquering lord.

[Richard Hakluyt]

The Daily Mail list looks very dubious to me, I think they may be conflating feudal obligations with outright ownership and then applying some inappropriate inflation multiplier. Take the Black Prince, they give him a fortune of £35bn, let us assume that the yield on that is 5% and that a soldier costs £20k pa to put in the field..........I get 87,500.........in practice he was usually in debt and struggled to field more than a few thousand.

[Syt]

The Daily Mail list looks very dubious to me, I think they may be conflating feudal obligations with outright ownership and then applying some inappropriate inflation multiplier. Take the Black Prince, they give him a fortune of £35bn, let us assume that the yield on that is 5% and that a soldier costs £20k pa to put in the field..........I get 87,500.........in practice he was usually in debt and struggled to field more than a few thousand.

But he was too big to fail.

[jimmy olsen]

The Daily Mail list looks very dubious to me, I think they may be conflating feudal obligations with outright ownership and then applying some inappropriate inflation multiplier. Take the Black Prince, they give him a fortune of £35bn, let us assume that the yield on that is 5% and that a soldier costs £20k pa to put in the field..........I get 87,500.........in practice he was usually in debt and struggled to field more than a few thousand.

It's from this book, don't know how they calculated wealth

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Richest-Rich-Philip-Beresford/dp/0857190652/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1384177342&sr=1-1

[Sheilbh]

According to the Daily Mail article probate and old documents. Apparently all told about 10% are industrialists and half are landowners.

[Neil]

Why wasn't anyone able to gain regional dominance over the mining in Wales or Northern England?

An established land ownership class on a relatively tiny landmass.  Duh.

[Admiral Yi]

Was/is there anything about British law that made it impossible to sell mineral rights?

[Sheilbh]

Was/is there anything about British law that made it impossible to sell mineral rights?

No. You can buy mineral rights and as long as you register them with the Land Registry they're something you can sell on. It's separate to owning the surface and I believe there are even circumstances where the owner of the mineral rights could give a mining license without the consent of the owner of the surface.

But that means it's down to private owners to grant licenses for exploration, unlike in Australia where the state's very involved and regulates exploration. So we're not as good at exploiting minerals as Australia or, I think, Canada.

A recent example is the Church of England's got mineral rights for something like 500 000 acres and they're busily making sure that's all registered now so if there's a boom due to fracking they'll benefit, but also so they can sell those rights on and so they won't be extinguished because they weren't registered.

Here's the Land Registry on it:

What are mine and mineral rights?

In many parts of England and Wales it is fairly common that someone will own the surface of the land but someone else will own the land below the surface. The land below the surface is usually called 'mines and minerals'.

There are varying types of rights and ownership relating to mines and minerals. These can range from owning the mines and minerals outright and being able to take them away, whether or not the owner of the surface agrees, to having some rights to them that can be exercised with the agreement of the surface owner.

Where someone owns the land comprising the mines and minerals below your property they will continue to own it indefinitely. They can apply to register it if they wish but they do not have to and this will not affect their ownership.

- See more at: http://www.landregistry.gov.uk/public/faqs/what-are-mine-and-mineral-rights#sthash.nFCOdwxz.dpuf