Definition
Latin term meaning "being unwilling" or "against the will of." Used in legal texts to indicate that an act occurs without the consent of a specified party — typically against the will of the owner, debtor, or recipient. Invito does not appear as a standalone operative term in modern doctrine but survives in several fixed Latin phrases that retain independent legal significance:
1. Ab invito — "By or from an unwilling party." Describes a compulsory transfer, as opposed to a voluntary one. A transfer ab invito occurs by operation of law or under legal compulsion rather than by the party's free choice.
2. Invito domino — "The owner being unwilling; without the owner's consent." A technical element in the law of larceny: the taking of property must be invito domino — against the will of the owner — to constitute the offense. A taking with consent, however obtained, implicates different doctrines (such as fraud or false pretenses) rather than larceny in its traditional form.
3. Invito debitore — "Against the will of the debtor." Arises in contexts where an obligation is discharged or a benefit applied contrary to the debtor's expressed wish.
4. Invito beneficium non datur — "A benefit is not conferred on one who is unwilling to receive it." A maxim of equity and civil law: a person cannot be compelled to accept a benefit against their will. No obligation or grant takes effect upon an unwilling recipient.
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Common Language
Wiktionary: "Invito" does not appear as an English dictionary entry. In modern common usage, it is recognized primarily as an Italian or Spanish word meaning "invitation" or "I invite."
Webster's 1913: Not listed as an English entry. The dictionary does not treat it as an adopted term in ordinary English usage.
Editorial note: The common-language risk here runs in the opposite direction from most Latin legal terms. A researcher encountering "invito" in historical legal sources may be momentarily misled by the modern Romance-language meaning ("invitation"), which is nearly the antonym of the legal meaning ("unwilling; without consent"). The legal sense derives from the Latin invitus (unwilling, reluctant), not from invitare (to invite). This false cognate deserves attention when reading older case law or civil law materials.
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Common Confusion
Invito is sometimes confused with its apparent cognate "invite" or "invitation" by readers unfamiliar with the Latin source. The legal term signals absence of consent; the common English word signals its presence. In older treatises, invito domino may also be imprecisely conflated with related larceny concepts such as animo furandi (intent to steal) — but invito domino addresses the victim's lack of consent, while animo furandi addresses the actor's mental state. They are distinct elements.
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Why It Matters in Research
Invito appears with frequency in three research contexts, each requiring different care:
First, larceny doctrine. Pre-modern criminal law treatises and early American case law use invito domino as a formal element of the larceny definition. Researchers working in historical criminal law sources — particularly those predating the Model Penal Code consolidation of theft offenses — will encounter this phrase as a term of art. Understanding it as a consent requirement, not merely a physical-taking requirement, is essential to accurately reading those authorities.
Second, civil law and maxim literature. Invito beneficium non datur is cited in equity and civil law sources as a maxim limiting the court's power to impose beneficial arrangements on unwilling recipients. Broom's Legal Maxims addresses it. When tracing the historical development of doctrines involving third-party beneficiaries, unjust enrichment, or gift acceptance, this maxim appears in the background literature and shapes the reasoning even where it is not quoted directly.
Third, compulsory transfers. Ab invito surfaces in property and commercial law sources when distinguishing voluntary alienation from transfers by operation of law — forfeitures, executions, intestate succession, eminent domain proceedings. The phrase signals that the transferor's consent is absent or legally irrelevant to the transfer's validity.
One research trap: because invito most commonly appears embedded within longer Latin phrases rather than as a standalone headword, full-text searches for "invito" alone will surface the compound phrases alongside any isolated uses. Targeted searches for invito domino, ab invito, and invito beneficium non datur separately will yield more precise results across the corpus.
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Historical Dictionary Support
The three source dictionaries handle invito with characteristic differences in depth. Black's 1st Edition provides only the bare translation and the invito beneficium non datur maxim with its Digest citation. Black's 2nd Edition meaningfully expands the entry by enumerating the three primary compound phrases (ab invito, invito debitore, invito domino) and attaching substantive legal context to each — the 2nd Edition's treatment is the most practically useful of the three for understanding how the term functions in doctrine.
Bouvier's reduces the entry to a single line: "Against, or without the assent or consent; unwilling." This is accurate as far as it goes but provides no navigational help for the compound phrases.
None of the three sources addresses the false-cognate problem created by the Romance-language meaning of "invito," nor do they acknowledge that the term's practical significance had already begun to recede as codified theft statutes displaced the common law larceny elements framework. The Digest citation in Black's 1st Edition (Dig. 50, 17, 69) is to the Corpus Juris Civilis and reflects the civil law pedigree of the beneficium maxim — a connection the historical dictionaries note but do not develop.
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Jurisdictional Note
The invito domino requirement was a formal element of common law larceny across American and English jurisdictions. Most U.S. jurisdictions have absorbed or superseded this framework through consolidated theft statutes, often following Model Penal Code Article 223 structures. In civil law jurisdictions, invito beneficium non datur retains more active doctrinal life. Researchers working in Louisiana, Quebec, or comparative civil law materials should treat the maxim as carrying ongoing operational weight, not merely historical interest.
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