Royalty is an incident of the subsurface mineral estate. Where the mineral estate is reserved by law to the sovereign, royalty share is due to that owner alone, as with oil and gas leases on State or Federal lands in the United StatesAny payment to a surface owner(s). by the operator would be a gratuity, or in some cases payment for use of some part of the surfaceestate in operation as, for eg. Water, roads, pipeline rights of way, etc