Learning Objective: Students will be acquainted with principles relating to modes of acquisition of property during the Roman Era

1. Principles
Relating to
Roman Laws of
Property
Preeti Kana Sikder
Lecturer
Department of Law & Justice
Jahangirnagar University

2. ‘Res’
Things or property which are not
merely physical but also includes
abstract rights

3. William Warwick Buckland,
Scholar of Roman law,
University of Cambridge
• Economic interest
guaranteed by law,
• Right or rights
having a money
value,
• Interest expressible
in terms of money
which the law will
protect

4. Classification of Res
The classification adopted by the Roman lawyers are
the result of historical development of practical
convenience which display little inclination towards
scientific analysis

5. According to Justinian’s Second
book, Things are either -
In our
patrimony Outside our
patrimony

6. According to Justinian’s
Second book
• Res communes – the air, running water, the
sea and sea-shore
• Res publicae – rivers and harbours
• Res universitatis – Things belonging to a
corporate body, such as theatres, race-
courses and the like in cities
• Res nullius – Things belonging to no one
 Res sacrae – churches or other dedicated res to
service of God
 Res religiosae – graveyards
 Res sanctae – city walls and gates

7. Classification of Res
RES CORPORALES
• Things which can be
touched
• Land, slaves,
garments, gold, silver
and other things
RES INCORPORALES
• Things which cannot
be touched.
• Things which consist
in a right
• Inheritance, usufruct,
obligations in
whatever way
contracted

8. Classification of Res
RES IMMOBILES
• Land and the things
attached to it
• These can not be taken
away or stolen.
• Of greater value and
importance.
• Takes longer time to
acquire ownership by
possession without title
RES MOBILES
• All other properties
• These are not
stationery and as
such can be
appropriated and
taken away and so
these can be owned
absolutely

9. Basis of Acquisition
JUS GENTIUM
• The law of nations as
being the law which
all nations use.
• That law which
natural reason has
established among all
men is equally
observed among all
nations.
JUS CIVILE
• Civil law means the
system of law
peculiar to one state
or people.
• Particularly, In
Roman law, the civil
law of the Roman
people.

10. Acquisition by -
• Manicipatio
• In jure cessio (cession in
court)
• Usucapio
• Donation
Civil
law
• Occuption
• Accession
• Specification
• Perception and separation
of fruits
• Tradition or delivery
Natural
law

11. Acquisition by Civil law
USUCAPIO:
• It may happen that a person is in
possession of property as owner but without
legal title. In such a case, if he continues to
possess for the period defined by law and
satisfies other necessary conditions, he
acquires such property legally (acquisitive
prescription)

12. The conditions to be satisfied –
• res habilis: a thing susceptible to ownership
• Justa titulus/justa causa: an antecedent or
contemporaneous event which, in normal circumstances,
makes acquisition of possession take effect as
acquisition of ownership
• good faith: To constitute good faith, the acquirer must
honestly believe that the transaction has made him
owner at least by praetorian title. (error of fact, not of law)
• Possession: There must be physical control and the
intention to possess as an owner
• lapse of time: The possession must continue
uninterrupted for two years (immovable) or one year
(movable)

13. Acquisition by Civil law
DONATIO:
• Justinian described donation as a
mode of acquisition but in general, a
gift may more properly be described
as a cause or title of acquisition.
• Donation or gift is an act of liberality
which enriches the donee at the
expense of the donor.

14. Donatio…
Mortis
Causa
Propter
Nupitas
Inter
Vivos

15. Which falls under which
category?
• Gift made in contemplation of death. It
failed to take effect if the donor survived
the done (if they died simultaneously the
gift held good)
• Special case of gift made by the husband
for the benefit of the wife to take effect in
the event of her surviving him, or being
divorced without fault of her own.
• A merely gratuitous conveyance made by
the donor to the donee

16. Acquisition by Natural law
OCCUPATIO:
• This mode involved taking possession
of a res nullius (things without an
owner) with the intention of becoming
owner
• a) wild animals, b) enemy property, c)
precious stones found from sea
shore, d) things abandoned by former
owner (res derelictae) and e )
unoccupied islands in the sea

17. Acquisition by Natural law
ACCESSIO:
• Process by which a principal thing
attracts to itself an accessory, so that
the owner of the first becomes the
owner of the second
• a) natural increment, b) alluvion, c)
islands in rivers, d) building, e)
planting and sowing, f) mixing of
solids and liquids

18. That increase of the earth on a shore or bank of a river, or to the
shore of the sea, by the force of the water, as by a current or by
waves, which is so gradual that no one can judge how much is
added at each moment of time.

19. Acquisition by natural law
SPECIFICATIO:
• Process of bringing into existence a thing
of a new kind out of existing material
• If the creator of the new species was not
the owner of the material, a question
arose to the ownership
• Justinian opined, if the product could be
reduced to its original state, there was no
change of ownership; in the contrary case
the specificator became the owner.

20. Acquisition by natural law
PERCEPTION AND SEPARATION OF
FRUITS
• The term ‘fruits’ included –
 The natural and periodic increment of the
animal and vegetable kingdoms
 The produce of cultivated fields and
gardens
 Rents and similar profits derived from
property

21. Acquisition by natural law
TRADITION:
• Transfer of possession with the
consequence that the ownership of the thing
transferred vests in the transferee.
• Being a mode of acquisition juris gentium, it
was in effect available to peregrines though
technically they could not become owner by
quiritary title.

22. Essential Conditions for Tradition
• The thing must admit of delivery, and of acquisition
by delivery
• The transferor must be competent to give and the
transferee to acquire ownership by this method
• The transferor must intend to convey, the transferee
must intend to acquire the ownership of the thing
transferred. Such intention exists only when there is
a just cause.
• The transferor can not give what he has not got.
• There must be a physical transfer of possession or
something which in law is an equivalent.

23. Principles of
Roman Law
Relating to
Obligations
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