THE owner of Freud bar in Jericho has finally agreed with his sister on how to bury their mother following a costly High Court battle.

David Freud wanted his mother Iris to be buried in line with his father’s Jewish heritage, but his sister Susanna Levrant argued for a Church of England ceremony with music.

The judge said he would need to call upon the “judgement of Solomon” to decide the “biblical” dispute between the siblings.

Now Mr Freud, who lives in Oxford, has allowed his sister to play the 1916 pop song If You Were the Only Girl in the World at the church service.

Iris Freud died on October 12 in West Middlesex University Hospital aged 92, but her body was kept in storage for weeks because of the brother/sister dispute.

Mrs Levrant, 66, wanted a traditional Church of England funeral for her mother with a rendition of the song which her father used to sing to her.

Mr Freud was insisting on an “austere” funeral following Jewish mourning rites with no music.

He had insisted his mother must be interred in a consecrated graveyard where “her burial will not be disturbed for hundreds of years”.

At a two-day hearing at London’s High Court last week, Mr Freud urged Mr Justice Arnold to decide quickly, saying his mother’s body was “decaying”.

The judge, in turn, urged the siblings to settle their difference out of court rather than leave it until he makes his ruling this week.

Yesterday, the brother and sister told the court they had settled on a compromise.

Mrs Levrant said outside court that the ceremony will take place in two parts, separated by Mrs Freud’s interment.

The first portion of the service will be solemnly traditional and Mr Freud and his family can leave after the burial if they wish.

However, Mrs Levrant and her supporters will then return to the chapel to sing If You Were the Only Girl in the World.

The funeral, eulogy and burial will be conducted under the neutral auspices of the Master of the Inner Temple Church, the church at the heart of legal London.

Mrs Freud will find her final resting place on consecrated ground at Mortlake Cemetery, close to Putney, in West London, where she lived for 66 years.

It is not the first time Mr Freud has been to the High Court – in 2013 he challenged Oxford City Council there over its planning permission for the new Blavatnik School of Government next to his bar in Walton Street, but a judge rejected his challenge.

During last week’s High Court hearings, the judge said the “wider family dispute” was “pretty bad already” even before the siblings fell out over their mother’s remains.

He said: “Harsh words have been said on both sides in these proceedings. That is regrettable but not uncommon in families.

“I’m sure Iris would find it distressing if the two branches of the family were to become permanently estranged.”