Under English feudal law, the payment of quit rent (Latin Quietus Redditus, pl.
Redditus Quieti)[1] freed the tenant of a holding from the obligation to perform such other services as were obligatory under feudal tenure,[2] or freed the occupier of the land from the burden of having others use their own distinct rights that affected the land (e.g. hunting rights which would have hindered farming).
In contrast, the only sanction for not paying a feudal quit rent was that the alternative burdens would return.
For example, in British North Borneo, Proclamation IX of 1902 made it a legal requirement for natives who claimed to own cultivated lands to take out separate land titles for themselves, charged at $2.00 per title with owners made to pay annual quit rent.
However, in other countries, such as Malaysia, quit rent remains an important means of raising revenue from landowners.