The company that owns the rights to the works of C S Lewis has hired a top New York legal firm to claw back the narnia.mobi domain from an Edinburgh father.

Richard Saville-Smith paid £70 for the domain name so that his 10 year-old son could use it as his email address.

Saville-Smith bought the domain after the expiration of the three-month 'sunrise period' which allows companies to protect their online trademarks before the domains are made available to the general public.

But C S Lewis Ltd now wants narnia.mobi for itself, and has instructed New York law firm Baker & McKenzie to deliver a 128-page dossier urging the family to hand over the domain name.

"We were saving it as a surprise for our little boy's birthday to coincide with the release of the new Narnia film so that he could have one of the coolest email addresses in the world," said Saville-Smith's wife Gillian.

"Our whole family are great admirers of C S Lewis, and he must be turning in his grave about all this."

Industry experts believe that the case could now go before a hearing at the World Intellectual Property Organisation headquarters in Geneva.

In addition to the Narnia domain name the Saville-Smith family acquired 'thequeen.mobi' and 'uspresident.mobi' "just for fun".

The .mobi domains were made available two years ago for use on mobile phone browsers.