A British appeals court has ruled prenuptial agreements should be used to determine the division of marital assets when couples split up.

In its precedent-setting ruling, the court ruled in favor of Kristin Radmacher, a German paper heiress, The Daily Telegraph reported. Radmacher appealed a High Court ruling that her ex-husband, Nicolas Granatino, should receive 5.85 million pounds (almost $9 million).

Granatino signed a prenuptial agreement in 1998 before the couple married that would have denied him any share in Radmacher's fortune in the event of a divorce. He had been working for a substantial salary but in 2003 decided to become an academic biotechnology researcher in Oxford, which contributed to the end of the marriage.

The agreement was signed in Germany but Radmacher and Granatino, a French citizen, married in London.

Under the court ruling, Granatino will receive a 1 million pound ($1.5 million) lump sum.

The ruling described the British position on prenuptial agreements as an anachronism that fails to "sufficiently recognize the rights of autonomous adults to govern their future financial relationship by agreement in an age when marriage is not generally regarded as a sacrament and divorce is a statistical commonplace."