Editing Public Land Survey System (section)

===Origins===
The original colonies (including their derivatives [[Maine]], [[Vermont]], [[Tennessee]], [[Kentucky]] and [[West Virginia]]) continued the [[Great Britain|British]] system of [[metes and bounds]]. This system describes property lines based on local markers and bounds drawn by humans, often based on topography. A typical, yet simple, description under this system might read "From the point on the north bank of Muddy Creek one mile above the junction of Muddy and Indian Creeks, north for 400 yards, then northwest to the large standing rock, west to the large oak tree, south to Muddy Creek, then down the center of the creek to the starting point."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Murphy |first=Connor |title=City Planning: How Citizens Can Take Control |publisher=WheatMark |year=2021 |isbn=978-1-62787-881-4 |location=Arizona}}</ref>

Particularly in [[New England]], this system was supplemented by drawing [[plat|town plats]]. The metes and bounds system was used to describe a town of a generally rectangular shape, {{convert|4|to|6|mi}} on a side. Within this boundary, a map or plat was maintained that showed all the individual lots or properties.

There are some difficulties with this system:
*Irregular shapes for properties make for much more complex descriptions.
*Over time, these descriptions become problematic as trees die or streams move by erosion.
*It was not useful for the large, newly surveyed tracts of land being opened in the west, which were being sold sight unseen to investors.

In the 1783 Treaty of Paris recognizing the United States, Britain also recognized American rights to the land south of the [[Great Lakes]] and west to the [[Mississippi River]]. The Continental Congress passed the Land Ordinance of 1785 and then the Northwest Ordinance in 1787 to control the survey, sale, and settling of the new lands. The original 13 colonies donated their western lands to the new union, for the purpose of giving land for new states. These include the lands that formed the Northwest Territory, Kentucky, Tennessee, [[Alabama]], and [[Mississippi]]. The state that gave up the most was [[Virginia]], whose original claim included most of the Northwest Territory and Kentucky. Some of the western land was claimed by more than one state, especially in the northwest, where parts were claimed by Virginia, Pennsylvania, and [[Connecticut]], all three of which had claimed lands all the way to the Pacific Ocean.