indian title
Indian title. A right of occupancy that the federal government grants to an American Indian tribe based on the tribe’s immemorial possession of the area. • Congress does not recognize tribal ownership of the land, only possession. A tribe or nation must actually, exclusively, and continuously use the property to establish that it is the ancestral home. An individual may claim Indian title by showing that the individual or his or her lineal ancestors continuously occupied a parcel of land, as individuals, before the land was closed to settlers. — Also termed aboriginal title; right of occupancy. Cf. aboriginal title (1) under TITLE(2).