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Part 3 - The Person

Read Time: 20 minutes

In Parts 1 and 2 we looked at language and writing — what they are, where they come from, and how the written world operates. Now we need to ask a more personal question. Who does the legal world actually see when it looks at you? The answer is not what most people expect.

Who are you?

Philosophy

When you sign a document — when you put your name to something and enter into an agreement — who is doing the signing? This sounds like a strange question. You are, obviously. But which you? The man or woman who picked up the pen? Or the legal entity whose name appears at the top of the document?

And when you are talking to someone in an official capacity — a police officer, a judge, a government official, a bank representative — who are they? Not as a human being. In what capacity are they acting? Because that word — acting — is more precise than it might seem. Every official in the legal world is acting in a capacity. A role. A legal function with defined powers, defined limits, and defined jurisdiction. They are not there as a man or woman. They are there as a constable, a magistrate, an administrator, a representative. They are playing a part.

Philosophy

Shakespeare wrote it plainly enough — all the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. In the legal world this is almost literally true. Every participant has a role, a capacity. The stage has rules. Different stages have different rules. A courtroom operates differently from a police station, which operates differently from a hospital, which operates differently from a bank. Each is its own matrix — with its own language, its own hierarchy, its own expectations of the players within it.

When you walk into any of these spaces — in what capacity are you entering? As the man or woman? Or as the person? And does anyone in the room know the difference?

The creation of the person

Fact

When a birth is registered in England and Wales, a legal record is created. The parents — described in the registration process as the informants — provide the information from which that record is made. A birth certificate is issued. On that certificate, a name appears. That name is the name of a legal entity. The person.

Black's Law Dictionary defines person as including not just a human being but a corporation. A legal entity. A construct that exists within the legal world, that can own property, enter contracts, incur debts, be sued, and be governed by statute. The person is not the man. The person is not the woman. The person is a legal creation — brought into existence by the act of registration.

Fact

Every Act, statute, and piece of legislation in England and Wales applies to persons. Not to men. Not to women. Not ever. This is not a theory — it is the language of the law itself. Open any piece of legislation and you will find it addressed to persons, or to classes of persons. The Interpretation Act 1978 confirms that person includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate. The man or woman and the legal person are, in law, different things — even if in everyday life they appear to be the same.

Consider this: a police officer arrests someone for carrying something on their person. Their person. Not on their body — on their person. The language of the law treats the person as something you carry, or something you inhabit, or something you are identified as. Which is it?

The second body

Fact

When a child is born, two bodies enter the world. The first is the child — recognised, named, registered, documented. At least, that is what many of us believe. The second arrives shortly after — the placenta, sometimes called the afterbirth. It is a separate organ, developed entirely during pregnancy, attached to the uterine wall, connected to the child by the umbilical cord. It has its own distinct tissue. Its own blood supply. In the case of non-identical twins, its own genetic profile — distinct from both mother and child. It is, in a very literal sense, a separate body. Born into the world. No longer attached to anyone.

Fact

The placenta is one of the most remarkable biological structures in existence. During pregnancy it functions as the child's lungs, kidneys, digestive system, and immune defence — providing oxygen, removing waste, delivering nutrients, and protecting the developing foetus from the mother's immune system. It produces hormones that sustain the pregnancy. It develops from the same fertilised egg as the child — yet it is not the child. It exists entirely to support the child. And when the child no longer needs it, it is born separately, its purpose complete.

Fact

The placenta is extraordinarily rich in biological value. It contains stem cells — the foundational cells from which all other cells develop, with significant potential in regenerative medicine. The umbilical cord blood is now a commercial industry in its own right. Private cord blood banking companies charge thousands of pounds to collect and store these stem cells. Beyond stem cells, placental tissue contains growth factors, hormones, collagen, and bioactive compounds used in the pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries. The global market for placenta-derived products runs into billions of pounds annually.

Fact

Across cultures and throughout history, the placenta has been regarded as far more than medical waste. In Chinese medicine, dried placenta — ziheche — has been used for centuries as a tonic. In many indigenous traditions it is buried — returned to the earth — as a way of grounding the child's connection to the land. The Māori call the placenta whenua — the same word they use for land. In some traditions it is regarded as the child's spiritual companion. Placentophagy — the consumption of the placenta — is practised by most mammals immediately after birth and has seen a revival in human practice in recent decades.

The inheritance

Fact

The word placenta comes from the Latin placenta — meaning flat cake. The Romans named the organ after a type of flat cake made with flour and cheese. The Greek word it derived from — plakous — also means flat cake. The organ born alongside the child is, etymologically, a cake. Born on the same day as the child. Present, in a very literal sense, at the birthday.

Whether the tradition of the birthday cake carries any folk memory of this is disputed. What is not disputed is the linguistic connection — the organ present at birth shares its name, across two ancient languages, with a cake. Draw from that what you will.

Fact

In some historical and legal contexts, the placenta and foetal membranes have been referred to as the child's inheritance — the birthright present at the moment of arrival. The caul — the foetal membrane that sometimes covers a baby's face at birth — was considered extraordinarily significant in medieval Europe. It was believed to protect the bearer from drowning. It was sold to sailors as a good luck charm. In some traditions it was preserved and returned to the child when they came of age — their inheritance, literally handed to them on reaching adulthood.

The inner membrane surrounding the foetus — the amnion — takes its name from the Greek amnion, meaning little lamb. The outer membrane is the chorion. Together with the placenta, these form the complete set of foetal organs — the full inheritance, if you will — born alongside the child, surrounding and supporting the child throughout gestation, and available to whoever claims them in the moments after birth.

What happens to it

Fact

In the United Kingdom, the default position is this: the placenta is treated as clinical waste. Unless the mother explicitly requests to keep it, it is taken by the hospital and disposed of — or used for medical research, pharmaceutical production, or other purposes — without further consultation. The mother has the right to request it. But she must ask. The default assumption is that it will be surrendered.

What the placenta contains:

Stem cells — the foundation of regenerative medicine

Growth factors — used in wound healing and tissue repair

Hormones — including oestrogen, progesterone, and human placental lactogen

Collagen — used extensively in cosmetic and pharmaceutical products

Immune factors — studied for their role in preventing rejection

Bioactive compounds — researched for applications in anti-ageing, fertility, and disease treatment

Cord blood stem cells — stored commercially for thousands of pounds per collection

A biological structure of extraordinary value — scientifically, medically, commercially, culturally — is taken, by default, without a conversation. Not stolen. Not illegally acquired. Simply taken, under standard hospital policy, from people who in most cases have no idea of its value or what becomes of it.

Whose property is it? The mother's — whose body it grew within? The father's — whose child it sustained? The child's — the individual it existed to support? Or whoever claims it first?

Salvage

Fact

In maritime law — the body of law that governs ships, the sea, and international commerce — salvage is the legal right to claim property that has been abandoned, or that is found without an owner asserting a claim to it. The salvor — the one who takes possession — acquires rights over the property. The law of salvage is ancient. It exists because property is regularly lost, abandoned, or left without a clear owner — and the law needs a mechanism for dealing with what is found.

Observation

The placenta arrives in the world as a separate body/vessel. It is no longer attached to the mother. It is no longer attached to the child. It is, in that moment, a separate entity — born, detached, extraordinarily valuable, and claimed by no one in the room unless someone specifically speaks up. The hospital takes it. By default. Without asking. Is that salvage? Is that simply administrative practice? This guide does not offer a conclusion. But the question is worth asking.

The trust at birth

Theory — clearly labelled as such

Some legal researchers and theorists have observed that the structure created by birth registration bears a resemblance to a trust arrangement. A trust in English law requires three certainties to be valid — and it is worth looking at each one in turn, and asking how it might apply here.

1. Certainty of intention — there must be a clear intention to create a trust. The intention does not need to be expressed in any particular form of words. It simply needs to be demonstrable. When a birth is registered, a legal record is created deliberately — by the informants, through a formal process, producing a formal document. Whether that constitutes an intention to create a trust is a question. But the intention to create something — a legal record, a legal entity — is not in doubt.

2. Certainty of subject matter — the property held in trust must be clearly identified. If the person — the legal entity created at registration — has value, can be traded, can be insured, and can be administered, then the subject matter exists. The birth certificate itself is a document of title of sorts. The name on it identifies the entity. The number in the corner identifies the record. Whether the subject matter includes the placenta — the separate body born alongside the child, of significant biological and commercial value, taken by default — is a question worth sitting with.

3. Certainty of objects — the beneficiaries must be identifiable. Every trust requires someone to benefit from it. If a trust was created at registration — who is the beneficiary? The person named on the certificate? The man or woman behind it? Someone else entirely? Who benefits from the use of the legal entity throughout its lifetime? Who benefits from the assets taken at birth? These are not questions this guide can answer. They are questions worth asking.

If the birth certificate creates a legal entity — a person, with a corpus of value, administered by others, for purposes that are not entirely clear — then a question follows naturally. What happens to a man or woman who has never asserted their existence as distinct from that person? Who has never stepped forward to claim their position within the arrangement? Who has simply — by default, by assumption, by the absence of any challenge — been treated as the person, and governed accordingly?

There is a piece of legislation from 1666 that is worth knowing about. It was passed during the Great Plague and the Great Fire of London. It deals, at its core, with exactly this question — what happens to an estate when the man or woman behind it cannot be found. When they are, in the language of the sea, lost.

The Cestui Que Vie Act 1666

Fact

In 1666 — the year of the Great Plague and the Great Fire of London — Parliament passed the Cestui Que Vie Act. It addressed a practical problem. People had disappeared. Bodies could not be found. Estates were in legal limbo — landlords could not reclaim property, heirs could not inherit, creditors could not recover debts. The Act provided a solution: if a person had been absent for seven years with no evidence of life, they could be presumed dead. Their estate could be administered. Their property could pass to others.

The phrase cestui que vie is old French legal terminology — meaning, roughly, the one for whose life. It refers to the person whose existence is the measuring point of a trust or estate. The Act is essentially a trust mechanism — creating a legal arrangement to manage the affairs of someone who cannot be shown to be alive.

The "lost at sea" language in the Act is maritime in origin. The law of the sea — admiralty law — had long dealt with the problem of ships that never returned, merchants who disappeared on trading voyages, and estates left without an owner. The CQV Act brought admiralty logic onto land — applying the same presumption of death, the same seven-year threshold, the same mechanism of estate administration — to anyone who could not be found.

Theory — clearly labelled as such

Some legal researchers draw a connection between the CQV Act and the arrangement created at birth registration. The argument runs like this. When a child is born and registered, the person is created — the legal entity, the name on the certificate. The man or woman behind it has never, within the legal system, formally proved their existence as distinct from that person. They have operated as the person — signed as the person, been taxed as the person, been governed as the person — without ever stepping forward to assert that they are something more than, or different from, the legal entity.

In the language of the CQV Act, a man or woman who has never proved they are alive — as distinct from the person — may be operating under a legal presumption. Not literally presumed dead. But operating within a framework that treats the person as the relevant entity, and the man or woman behind it as — for all practical purposes — absent. Lost at sea, so to speak. Beyond the jurisdiction. The estate administered on their behalf, by others, in their presumed absence.

Observation

The seven-year threshold in the CQV Act has an echo elsewhere in the legal world. Seven years is the period after which a gift becomes fully exempt from Inheritance Tax. Seven years is the period after which a missing person can be declared legally dead. Seven years appears in the CQV Act 1666, in trust law, in tax law, and in the presumption of death. Whether this is coincidence or something more deliberate is not for this guide to conclude.

Speculation — clearly labelled as such

The further argument — that the birth certificate itself creates a cestui que vie trust, with the state as trustee, the person as the legal entity, and the man or woman as a beneficiary who has never claimed — is a significant leap from the text of the Act itself. It is not a mainstream legal position. It is rejected by courts. But as a philosophical frame — as a way of asking who controls the legal entity, who benefits from its existence, and what it would mean for the man or woman behind it to step forward and assert themselves — it raises questions that are worth sitting with, regardless of their legal status.

If the legal system operates on the presumption that the person is the relevant entity — and the man or woman has never proved otherwise — what would it mean to prove it? And how would you go about doing so?

When did your life begin?

Fact

In the Western world, the birthday is the fixed point. The date recorded on the birth certificate. The date on the passport. The date on the driving licence. The date required by every institution, every form, every system that asks who you are and when you began. It is treated as the moment life started — the origin point of the legal person, the beginning of the record, the first entry in the file.

But is it really when your life began?

Fact

For more than two thousand years, across the Confucian cultural sphere — Korea, China, Japan, Vietnam, and Mongolia — the answer was no. In the traditional age-counting systems of these cultures, a child was considered one year old at birth. Not zero. One. The time spent in the womb counted. Life, in these traditions, began at conception — not at the moment of arrival into the world. The birthday was not the beginning. It was simply the point at which the child became visible.

South Korea took this system furthest into the modern era. Until 28 June 2023, three separate age-counting methods coexisted in Korean law and daily life. A baby born on 31 December would be one year old at birth — and two years old the following morning on New Year's Day. South Korea was the last East Asian country to officially use this system. North Korea dropped it decades earlier. China dropped it during the Cultural Revolution. Japan abandoned it in the twentieth century. The Western system has now been adopted officially across the region — but the underlying philosophy has not disappeared. It has simply been overwritten, for administrative purposes, by a different one.

Observation

The birthday cake. The word placenta comes from the Latin for flat cake. The organ born alongside the child — the inheritance, the birthright — is named after a cake. And in the Western world, we celebrate the anniversary of the birthday with a cake. Whether this is coincidence, folk memory, or something else entirely is not for this guide to conclude. But it is, at the very least, an interesting thing to notice.

When did your life really begin? At birth — the moment the birth certificate records? During the nine months before it — when you were already developing, already present, already supported by the organ named after a cake? Before then? The Western legal world has chosen its answer. It chose it for administrative convenience. That does not make it the only answer — or the right one.

Who are you, really?

Philosophy

We live in a time when identity is more contested than perhaps it has ever been. People identify as many things — sometimes things that have no biological basis, sometimes things outside conventional categories entirely. The NHS gives other options for gender and gender identity — an acknowledgement, at an institutional level, that who you say you are and what your biology says you are may be different things. Whether you agree with that or not is beside the point here. The point is that identity — legal, social, biological, spiritual — is not as fixed as we were perhaps once told.

Philosophy

You may be a man. A woman. A mother. A father. A spouse. A partner. A soul inhabiting a body for reasons you may or may not have chosen. When did your life really begin? At birth? Before then? At conception? At the moment the zygote formed? Before then? These are not idle questions. They are questions that different legal systems, different religious traditions, and different philosophical frameworks answer differently — and the answer matters for how you are governed, what rights you have, and what obligations apply to you.

Do you have to know what you are — to know what you are not? Do you have to resolve the question of who you truly are — to notice that the legal person named on your birth certificate is a separate thing from whatever you actually are?

The person is the monopoly piece. It moves around the board. It lands on squares. It accumulates assets, incurs liabilities, enters into agreements, pays taxes. Every statute applies to it. Every Act of Parliament was written for it. The game is designed around it.

But you — whatever you are, whoever you are — are the one deciding how the piece moves. Or not deciding, which is also a choice, and one that others will make on your behalf.

Are you playing the game — or is the game playing you?

The language of birth and commerce

Observation — offered without conclusion

The following connections are offered as curiosities. Each one is a documented linguistic observation. What they mean — if anything — is for you to decide. Read through them in order. They tell a story of their own.

Born / Berth — you are born. A berth is the place assigned to a vessel in port.

Birth canal — the passage through which a child arrives. A canal is a man-made waterway — a passage for vessels.

Certificate — a birth certificate is a document of title. In maritime and financial contexts, a certificate is an instrument of ownership or entitlement.

Register / Manifest — the birth register records what has arrived. A ship's manifest is a document declaring the cargo on board — what the vessel carries, and who it belongs to.

Banks — a river has two banks, between which the current flows.

Currency — from the Latin currere, to run, to flow. Money flows like water.

Capital — from the Latin caput, head. Also the headwaters of a river — the source from which everything flows.

Liquid assets / Cash flow — assets described as liquid can move freely. Cash flow is the movement of money. Both are the language of water.

Draft — a bank draft is a financial instrument. The draft of a vessel is the depth to which it sits in water — how much is submerged, how much is visible above the surface, what does overdraft mean.

Float — to float a company on the stock exchange. To float a vessel on water. Both require the right conditions. Both can sink.

Note — a promissory note is a written promise to pay. The ship's log records every entry. Both are written records of obligation.

Bonds — financial instruments that bind. Also what holds cargo on a vessel.

Mortgage — from the French mort gage. A death pledge. A pledge that ends at death or when the debt is discharged.

Attorney — from the Old French atourné, one appointed to act for another. In maritime commerce, a factor was the agent who handled cargo on behalf of a merchant in a foreign port — acting for another, at a distance.

Counsel — from the Latin consilium, advice, deliberation. The ship's council — the officers who deliberate on course and direction.

Charter — a legal charter, a charter of rights. To charter a vessel is to hire it for a specific voyage under specific terms. Magna Carta — the Great Charter — was a document of terms between parties. A charterparty is the contract by which a vessel is chartered.

Passage — the right of passage. A passage through waters.

Salvage — the legal right to claim property that has been abandoned or found without an owner asserting a claim. At sea, what is found unclaimed belongs to whoever claims it first.

Jurisdiction — from the Latin juris dictio, the saying of the law. Also the territory within which a vessel operates — territorial waters, the extent of authority at sea.

Bar — the bar of a court, which only those with standing may cross. The sandbar at the entrance to a harbour, which only vessels with sufficient draft may pass. Not every vessel makes it through the bar.

Dock — where the accused stands in a court of law. Where a ship is held in port.

Bench — from the Latin bancus — the same root as bank. The judge's raised seat. The merchant's table. The earthen bank beside a river. One word. Three institutions. And bankruptcy — banca rotta, the broken bench — connects all three.

En banc — when all judges of a court sit together to hear a case. From the French — literally, on the bench. The full bank.

Chambers — a barrister's chambers, a judge's chambers. The chambers of a ship.

Bail — the security given for the release of a prisoner — to hand over, to deliver. In maritime terms, to bail is to remove water from a vessel. Both involve delivery. Both prevent sinking.

Verdict — from the Latin vere dictum, truly said. The spoken truth. The final word. In maritime terms, the final log entry.

Testament / Testimony — from the Latin testis, witness. A testament is a final declaration — a Will. Testimony is a witness statement under oath. Both are the spoken or written truth of a man or woman, given at a moment that matters.

Plaintiff — from the Old French plaintif, lamenting, grieving. One who raises a complaint. A vessel in distress raises a signal. Both are a call for remedy.

Indictment — from the Latin indicere, to proclaim, to declare formally. A manifest is a formal declaration of what a vessel carries. An indictment is a formal declaration of charge.

Appeal — from the Latin appellare, to call to. To call out to a higher authority. A vessel in distress appeals — calls out — for assistance.

Sentence — from the Latin sententia, opinion, meaning. A judge delivers a sentence — a course of action, a direction imposed. A navigator plots a course — a direction of travel.

Ward — a hospital ward. A ward of court. A ward of the sea — a protected area of water. The same word, three different institutions, each describing a space of care, control, or protection over something — or someone.

Fleet Street — named after the River Fleet, which ran through London, was built over, and now runs underground — heavily polluted, invisible, but still flowing beneath the surface. A fleet is a group of ships, sailing together under the same authority. Fleet Street sits at the heart of London's legal world — a row of courts, a fleet of tribunals, operating under the same jurisdiction. The river runs beneath them. The fleet sails above. Whether the name is coincidence is a question worth sitting with.

Bankruptcy — from the Italian banca rotta. The broken bench. The moneylender's bench, broken in the marketplace as a signal that he could no longer trade. The vessel cannot float. It goes under.

Liquidation — the process of converting what remains into liquid form, so it can flow to creditors. The vessel is taking on water.

The language of banking, law, birth, and maritime commerce shares a remarkable amount of vocabulary. Researchers including Jordan Maxwell have documented these connections in detail. Whether they reflect historical inheritance, deliberate design, or something else entirely is not for this guide to conclude. But it is worth noticing. And once you notice it, it is difficult to un-notice.

If the legal and financial world borrowed its language from maritime commerce — what does that suggest about the relationship between law, money, and the sea? Who wrote the rules of admiralty — and whose interests did they serve?

← Part 2 - The Written World | Part 3 - The Person | Part 4 - Public & Private →