Abstract

The sharp distinction between right of private ownership and right of occupation as formulated by Barthold Niebuhr in 1810-1811 has ever since been the center of discussion, interpretation, and doubt in any comparison between Roman property law and other legal systems. Fearful of the establishment of a modern agrarian law by contemporary radicals, he tried to prove that the Romans had never used agrarian laws to undermine the private ownership of land. Niebuhr hoped to separate what he considered the just claims of agrarian reforms from the unjust attacks against private property. Niebuhr's acquaintance with the Indian agrarian situation enabled him to understand the real nature of the ager publicus Jin Rome. A conservative, Niebuhr hoped to save the aristocracy from itself; an outsider in aristocratic society by virtue of his peasant ancestry, he was sympathetic to the peasantry as well