Hollywood legend Mar-lon Brando has left an estate valued at $21.6 million (11.6 million pounds), according to court papers, contrary to widespread speculation that he had died virtually penniless.

The petition for probate – process by which a court distributes assets of the deceased – was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on Friday and bequeaths his estate to a living trust, the terms of which were not disclosed.

The will lists 10 surviving children, ages 46 to 10, one of whom, Petra Brando-Corval, 32, the daughter of his former assistant, Caroline Barrett, was adopted. The will says he does not provide for her or for Tuki Brando, the son of his deceased daughter, Cheyenne.

The will does provide monthly payments, not specified, to two friends of Brando's, Alice Marchak and Blanche Hall.

Brando named Maria Christina Ruiz, his former maid, the mother of his three youngest children, as their guardian. It also lists as Tuki's guardian his former wife, Tarita Teriipala.

Brando died July 1 at his Beverly Hills home at the age of 80 and was cremated days later in a private funeral attended only by family and cloaked in the kind of secrecy that the two-time Oscar winner craved toward the end of his life.

The low-key aftermath of Brando’s death was in keeping with his intensely private nature late in life after a celebrated, half-century career in such memorable films as A Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, and The Godfather.

The probate petition lists private property worth $3 million and real estate valued at $18.6 million which includes his Mulholland Drive home and a Tahitian atoll he purchased in 1966 for about $200,000.

The $21.6 million in assets listed in the petition painted a different picture of Brando’s wealth than recent reports which claimed he was facing deep debts and living off a meager Screen Actors Guild pension. In the document, Brando threatened to cut off any heir who challenged the distribution of his assets.

Brando, who was not married when he died, named film producer, Mike Medavoy, business manager Larry Dressler and friend Avra Douglas as executors of his will, which he made in August 2002 and updated in June, 13 days before his death.

Brando’s later years were filled with personal turmoil. Christian Brando, his son by his first wife, Welsh actress Anna Kashfi, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the 1990 murder of his half-sister Cheyenne’s boyfriend. Cheyenne committed suicide in 1995 at the age of 25.

<B>Steve Gorman Gina Keating</B>