Definition
One who holds, detains, or enjoys a thing — either personally or through an agent — and claims it as their own. The term describes a legal status defined by the fact and exercise of possession, independent of whether the possessor holds valid title.
Two distinct possessory statuses carry legal consequence:
1. Possessor in good faith (bona fide possessor): One who holds property under color of a transaction sufficient in form to transfer ownership, without knowledge of its defects. The bona fide possessor has rights to profits and improvements during the period of good-faith holding. Good faith ends the moment the defect is made known — including by the filing of a suit to recover the property.
2. Possessor in bad faith (mala fide possessor): One who holds with knowledge that their claim is defective or that another holds superior title. The mala fide possessor enjoys no presumption of right and is liable for mesne profits — the value of use and occupation to which the true owner was entitled during the period of wrongful holding.
In personal property, the possessor is generally presumed to be the owner. In real property, the possessor has the right to receive profits from the land until an adverse title is established by judgment, subject to subsequent liability for mesne profits.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): One who possesses; agent noun of possess.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): One who occupies, holds, owns, or controls; one who has actual participation or enjoyment of something desirable; a proprietor.
The common usage treats possessor and owner as near-synonyms. The legal usage separates them sharply. A possessor may hold no ownership interest at all — and legal consequences, including presumptions, liabilities, and rights to profits, turn on that distinction. The bona fide / mala fide division, invisible in ordinary English, is among the most consequential distinctions in property law.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Bona fide possessor: Holds under a transaction sufficient to transfer title, without knowledge of its defect. Entitled to profits received before notice of adverse claim.
Mala fide possessor: Holds with knowledge of defect or adverse superior claim. Accountable for all profits, including those already received.
Possessor by agent: A possessor need not hold personally — possession through an agent or representative counts for legal purposes, and the principal is treated as the possessor.
Why It Matters in Research
The term possessor is a legal status term, not merely a descriptive one. Researchers working with property disputes in historical sources must track which type of possessor is at issue — the rights and liabilities differ substantially, and historical sources often assume the distinction without stating it.
Adverse possession research requires careful attention to the chain of possessors. The Law Mind encyclopedia entry on tacking directly implicates this term: tacking allows successive possessors to combine their periods of possession to satisfy the statutory period, but only when there is privity between them. Identifying who qualifies as a possessor for tacking purposes — versus a mere trespasser or licensee — is a threshold question the cases turn on.
In older sources, particularly those drawing on civil law traditions (Louisiana, Quebec, and mixed-jurisdiction materials), bona fide possessor carries technical civil-law freight that common law courts may handle differently. Bouvier's definition reflects this civil-law influence. Black's 2nd edition explicitly references a Civil Code, pointing toward Louisiana jurisprudence. Researchers using these sources in a common-law context should note the potential mismatch.
The Latin possessor also carries a procedural meaning absent from English usage: in Roman law, the possessor was the defendant in a property action (as opposed to the petitor, or claimant). This procedural sense does not survive into modern American or English doctrine, but it surfaces in sources drawing on civil law or Roman law foundations and can confuse reading of historical materials.
Mesne profits — the liability attached to mala fide possession — appear under their own term in legal dictionaries and are a frequent subject of historical litigation. Researchers tracing possessory disputes should check mesne profits as a companion entry.
Historical Dictionary Support
The four source dictionaries converge on the basic definition — one who has possession — but diverge in what they build on it.
Black's (1st ed.) offers the bare minimum: a one-line definition with no elaboration. Black's (2nd ed.) adds substantive doctrine, including the bona fide possessor rule drawn explicitly from a Civil Code, making it more useful for jurisdictions with civil-law influence but potentially misleading as a general common-law statement.
Bouvier's is the most practically useful of the historical sources. It articulates both the presumption of ownership for personal property and the profits rule for real property, and it signals the mesne profits consequence directly — giving researchers a cleaner doctrinal framework than either Black's edition.
Burrill treats the term as a Latin and English entry simultaneously, cross-referencing Possessio and Possession, which reflects the term's dual footing in Roman law vocabulary and English legal practice.
None of the historical dictionaries fully addresses the procedural Roman-law sense of possessor as defendant, though Burrill's Latin framing gestures toward it. Researchers using Latin legal sources from civil-law traditions should not rely on any of these entries for that usage.
Jurisdictional Note
The bona fide / mala fide possessor distinction is more formally developed in civil-law jurisdictions (Louisiana, Quebec, and systems derived from Roman law) than in most common-law states, where the underlying concepts exist but are distributed across doctrines of adverse possession, good-faith purchaser, and mesne profits rather than consolidated under the possessor label.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Adverse Possession — Tacking of Successive Possessors (The Law Mind Property Law Encyclopedia)