Roman Law and things Things were divini vel humani juris (i.e., governed by divine or by human law). Things sacrœ were publicly consecrated to the gods; places of burial were things religiosœ things sanctœ were so called because protected by a penal sanction — thus the city walls, gates, ditch, etc. were sanctœ. None of these could be part of an individuals patrimony, because they were considered as not in commerce. Things humani juris were the things with which the private law concerned itself. Things are common when the ownership is in no one, and the enjoyment open to all. In an analogous way, things are public when the ownership is in the people, and the use in individuals. The air, flowing water, the sea, etc. were things common to all, and therefore the property of none. The seashore, rivers, gates, etc., were public. Private things were such as were capable of private ownership and could form part of the patrimony of individuals. Again, things were collective or singular. The once important distinction between res mancipi and nec mancipi was suppressed by Justinian. Res mancipi were those things which the Romans most highly prized: Italian soil, rural servitudes, slaves, etc. These required formal mancipation. Things were either corporeal or incorporeal: corporeal were those quœ tangi possunt (which can be touched — tangible). Detention or naked possession of a thing was the mere physical faculty of disposing of it. Possession was the detention of a corporeal thing coupled with the animus dominii, or intent of ownership. It might be in good faith or in bad: if there was a just title, the possession was just: if not, unjust. A true possession was possible of a corporeal thing only; quasi-possession was the term employed in reference to an incorporeal thing, as a right. The jus possessionis was the entirety of rights which accrued to the possession as such. The advantages of possession as independent of ownership were as follows: the possessor had not the burden of producing and proving title; sometimes he enjoyed the fruits of the thing; he retained the thing until the claimant made proof; he stood in a better position in law than the claimant, and received the decision where the claim was not fully established; the possessor might retain the thing by virtue of the jus retertionis, until reimbursed for charges and outlays; the possessor in good faith was not liable for culpa (fault). One might not recover possession by violence or self-help. A right in re was a real right, valid against all the world; a right ad rem was an obligation or personal right against a particular person or persons. Rights in re were ownership, inheritance, servitudes, pledge, etc. Ownership was quiritarian or bonitarian: quiritarian, when acquired by the jus civile only available to Roman citizens; bonitarian, when acquired by any natural, as distinguished from civil, means. This distinction was removed by Justinian. There could be co-ownership or sole ownership. The modes of acquiring ownership were of two genera, arising from natural law and from civil law. One acquired, by natural law, in occupation, accession, perception of fruits, and by tradition (delivery). Occupation occurred in acquisition by hunting, fishing, capture in war, etc. The right of post-liminium was the recovery of rights lost through capture in war, and in proper cases applied to immoveables, moveables, and to the status of persons. Finding was also a means of occupation, since a thing completely lost or abandoned was res nullius, and therefore belonged to the first taker. Accession was natural, industrial, or mixed. The birth of a child to a slave woman was an instance of natural accession; so also, was the formation of an island in a stream. This accrued to the riparian owners proportionately to their frontage along the side of the river towards which the island was formed. Alluvion was the slow increment added to ones riparian property by the current. Industrial accession required human intervention and occurred by adjunctio, specificatio, or commixtio, or by a species of the latter, confusio. Mixed accession took place by reason of the maxim: Whatever is planted on the soil, or connected with it, belongs to the soil. In perception of fruits the severance or taking of revenue might be by the owner or by another, as by the usufructuary, the lessee (in locatio-conductio), by the creditor (in antichresis), and by the possessor in good faith. Tradition was the transfer of possession and was a corporeal act, where the nature of the object permitted. Corporeal things were moveables or immoveables. In modern civil law, incorporeal things are moveables or immoveables, depending upon the nature of the property to which the rights or obligations attach. In Roman law obligations, rights, and actions were not embraced in the terms moveables and immoveables. The vindicatory action (rei vindicatio) went to the direct question of ownership, and ownership was required to be conclusively proved. Complete proof of ownership was often extremely difficult, or impossible, and the Prætor Publicius devised the actio publiciana available to an acquirer by just title and in good faith, but who could not establish the ownership of his author. It was available to such an acquirer against a claimant who possessed infirmiore jure. Ownership (dominium) is an absolute right in re. A servitude (sometimes called a dismemberment of ownership) was a constituted right in the property of another, whereby the owner was bound to suffer something, or abstain from doing something, with respect to his property, for the utility of some other person or thing. A servitude was not a service of a person, but of a thing, and to adjoining land or to a person. Servitudes due to land were real (predial), while servitudes due to a person as such were personal. There were servitudes which might be considered as either real or personal, and others, again, which could only be personal, such as usufruct, use, habitation, and the labour of slaves. A real servitude existed when land was servient to land. Such a servitude was either urban or rural, depending not so much on whether the servitude was exercised in the city or country as upon its relation to buildings. Servitudes consisted in something essentially passive, in patiendo vel in non faciendo; never in faciendo. Servitudes which consisted in patiendo were affirmative and those in non faciendo were negative. Servitudes could arise by agreement, last will, or prescription. There were numerous urban predial servitudes: as onus ferendi, by which ones construction was bound to sustain the columns of another or the weight of his wall; tigni immittendi, the right to seat ones timbers in his neighbours wall; projiciendi, the right to overhang ones timbers over the land of another, although in no way resting on the others soil; protegendi, a similar right of projecting ones roof over anothers soil. The servitudes stillicidii and fluminis recipiendi, were similar: stillicidium was the right to drip; and fluminis recipiendi, the right to discharge rainwater collected in canals or gutters. The servitude altius non tollendi was a restriction on the height of a neighbours construction while altius tollendi was an affirmative right to carry ones construction higher than otherwise permitted. Servitudes of light and prospect were of similar nature. Rural predial servitudes were iter, actus, via, aquœductus, and the like. The servitude of iter (way) was an eight-foot roadway in the stretches, with accommodation at the turns. It included the right of driving vehicles and cattle, and the lesser right of foot-passage. Actus was a right of trail of four feet in which cattle or suitable narrow vehicles might be driven. Iter was a mere right of path. In these servitudes the lesser was included in the greater. The nature of the right of aquœductus is obvious, as well as the various servitudes of drawing water, of driving cattle to water, of pasturage, of burning lime, of digging sand or gravel, and the like. Servitudes of this character could be extinguished by the consolidation of ownership of both servient and dominant estate in the same owner, and by remission or release; by nonuser for the prescriptive period, and by the destruction of the dominant or servient estate. Usufruct was the greatest of personal servitudes; yet, as its measure was not the strict personal needs of its subject, it exceeded a personal servitude. During the period of enjoyment it was almost ownership, and was described as a personal servitude consisting in the use and enjoyment of the corporeal things of another without change in their substance. Ususfructus was the right utendi, fruendi, salva substantia. In a strict sense it applied only to corporeal things which were neither consumed nor diminished by such use. After Tiberius a quasi-usufruct (as of money) was recognized. 1Ioney, although not consumable naturaliter, was consumable civiliter. Usufruct could arise by operation of law, by judicial decision (as in partition), by convention, by last will, and even by prescription. The natural or civil death of the usufructuary extinguished the right, as did non-user and the complete loss of the thing. Use and habitation were lesser rights of the same general nature. Usus was the right to use the things of another, but only to the extent of the usees necessities, and always salva substantia. Habitation was the right of dwelling in anothers building in those apartments which were intended for habitation, salva substantia (i.e., without substantial modification). The personal servitude operœ servorum embraced every utility from the labour of anothers slave or slaves. The actions from servitudes were confessoria or negatoria, in assertion of the servitude or in denial of it. Ownership might further be acquired by usucaption (usucapio) and prescription for a long period. Prescription (a slight modification of the older usucaption) is the dispensing with evidence of title, and is acquisitive when it is the means of acquiring Ownership and extinctive (divestitive) when it bars a right of action. Acquisitive prescription required • (1) a thing subject to prescription, • (2) good faith, • (3) continuous possession, and • (4) the lapse of the prescribed time. Again, ownership could be acquired by donation, the gratuitous transfer of a thing to another person. Donations were mortis causa or inter vivos, and the former was in reality a conditional testamentary disposition and very similar to a legacy, while the latter did not require the death of the donor for its perfection. A species of donation inter vivos was the donatio propter nuptias from the husband. The juridical consequence of ownership is the power of alienation, and yet the law limited certain owners in this respect. The husband owned the dowry, but was subject to restrictions; the pupil under tutorship was owner, but without power to alienate, except probably in the single case of a sisters dowry. Even where one was owner without these specific limitations, if he had conceded rights in re to another, he could not alienate prejudicially to such other: thus, the pledge debtor could not prejudice the rights in re of the pledge creditor. Acquisition could be made, not only personally, but through children and slaves; and, in the later law, through a mandatory or procurator. Acquisition could be made of possession, of ownership, and of the right of pledge.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:14:20 +0000
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