Quote:
Originally Posted by Luke Bunyip
Mining rights and depth are a tricky issue. Here in Australia, land ownership titles exist only, with one exception* for the surface. subsurface exploration and extraction leases are issued by the state. Given Australia's economic reliance upon mining, you can guess who gets to push, and who gets shoved.
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In Colorado, a property owner can sell the surface rights and the mineral rights separately, which can lead to a really tangled mess after a few generations. Professional "land men" make a good amount of money by going through the various records and determining who owns what mineral royalties. I can see Dwarves having a similar archivist, especially if they've engaged in multiple dealings with humans or gnomes on the surface.
(Exploitation of those mineral rights, I'll add, is regulated by the state here -- in fact, it's very jealous of that right and steps on attempts by local communities to do any regulation of their own. Which also seems very Dwarvish now that I think about it. :) )