Roman law Roman law is the law, legal system of ancient Rome, including the legal developments spanning over a thousand years of jurisprudence, from the Twelve Tables (), to the (AD 529) ordered by Eastern Roman emperor Justinian I. Roman law also den ...

, ''mancipatio'' (f. Latin ''manus'', "hand"; and ''capere'', "to take hold of") was a solemn verbal contract by which the ownership of certain types of goods ('' res mancipi'') was transferred. ''Mancipatio'' was also the legal procedure for drawing up wills, emancipating children from their parents, and adoption. ''Res mancipi'' were forms of property important in an early

agrarian society An agrarian society, or agricultural society, is any community whose economy is based on producing and maintaining crops and farmland. Another way to define an agrarian society is by seeing how much of a nation's total production is in agricultur ...

: land,

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, bovid ungulates widely kept as livestock. They are prominent modern members of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Mature female cattle are calle ...

, and

slave Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...

s. The jurist Gaius excludes urban easements, lands located outside of Italy, intangible assets, and harness animals and pack animals apart from oxen, horses, mules, and donkeys from ''res mancipi''. The right of ownership (''

dominium means "dominion; control; ownership". Use in legal Latin is used in some phrases and maxims in legal Latin: *Dominium directum – Direct ownership, that is control of the property, but not necessarily with right to its utilization or alienati ...

'') for such goods was reserved to Roman citizens, the original term for which was '' Quirites'', and therefore called a "quiritian" or a "quiritary" right. The procedure of acquisition of a slave as property "by scales and bronze" (''per aes et libram'') is described by Gaius as follows: "''Mancipatio'' is effected in the presence of not less than five witnesses, who must be Roman citizens and of the age of puberty, and also in the presence of another person of the same condition, who holds a pair of brazen scales and hence is called ''libripens''. The purchaser, taking hold of the thing, says: ''Hunc ego hominem ex iure Quiritium meum esse aio isque mihi emptus esto hoc aere aeneaque libra'' ('I affirm that this slave is mine according to quiritary right, and he is purchased by me with this piece of bronze and scales'). He then strikes the scales with the piece of bronze, and gives it to the seller as a symbol of the price" (''

Institutes An institute is an organizational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations ( research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes ...

'', I.119). ''Mancipatio'' existed even before the

Twelve Tables The Laws of the Twelve Tables () was the legislation that stood at the foundation of Roman law. Formally promulgated in 449 BC, the Tables consolidated earlier traditions into an enduring set of laws.Crawford, M.H. 'Twelve Tables' in Simon Hornbl ...

. It fell into disuse during the Empire and was finally abolished by the

code In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communicati ...

Justinian Justinian I (, ; 48214 November 565), also known as Justinian the Great, was Roman emperor from 527 to 565. His reign was marked by the ambitious but only partly realized ''renovatio imperii'', or "restoration of the Empire". This ambition was ...

References

Roman law Economy of ancient Rome {{Latin-legal-phrase-stub