[f. TENANT sb. + -SHIP.] The condition or position of a tenant; tenancy, occupancy.
1683. Nye & Robinson, Lawfulness of Hearing Publick Ministers, etc., 8. Receiving of Rents and Tenantship are so nearly related, that if the Person with whom I partake thus, have forfeited his Tenantship, and of right is no Tenant, yet by my accepting of Rent from him, I make him one notwithstanding his forfeiture.
1820. Eclectic Rev., XIII. (N.S.), Feb., 104. Mr. [James] Mill has clearly shewn [in British India], that though the Ryot has, by long prescription, acquired an hereditary tenantship, equivalent to right of possession, the sovereign had always reserved the privilege of exacting as large a portion as he might choose to claim, of the produce of the land.
1883. A. Wilder, in Max Müller, India, ii. 67. The tenure and law of inheritance varies with the different native races, but tenantship for a specific period seems to be the most common.
1889. T. Gift, Not for Night-time, 127. Kilmoyle and I shook hands laughingly today over our victory as he handed me the key in token of my new tenantship.
1892. Daily News, 25 March, 4/8. To aim at the extension of tenantships as well as that of peasant proprietorships.
