Definition
A Latin term from Roman law referring to a special legal enactment or imperial constitution directed at a single named individual rather than the public generally. The term carries two distinct, sometimes opposite, applications:
1. Favorable privilegium: A grant by the Roman emperor conferring on a specific person some anomalous or irregular right — a benefit, exemption, or advantage outside the ordinary operation of law.
2. Odious privilegium: An imperial act imposing on a specific person some anomalous or irregular obligation, or inflicting some anomalous or irregular punishment — a legal burden or penalty applied individually rather than through general legislation.
In old English law, the term was used more narrowly to denote personal privilege generally, carrying the principle that such privilege belongs to the person and is extinguished at their death.
Common Confusion
The English term PRIVILEGE and the Latin PRIVILEGIUM share a root and are closely related, but researchers should not treat them as interchangeable. In modern Anglo-American law, "privilege" refers to a broad class of legal protections, immunities, and evidentiary rules applicable across categories of persons or relationships. PRIVILEGIUM, by contrast, retains the Roman-law precision of a legal act targeted at one specific individual — it is singular and personal in a structural sense, not merely a general protection that happens to apply to a person. Additionally, a privilegium could be either a benefit or a burden, while modern "privilege" almost universally connotes a benefit or protection.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Favorable privilegium: Conferred an anomalous right or benefit on a named individual; treated as valid and enforceable for that person's benefit.
Odious privilegium: Imposed an irregular obligation or punishment on a named individual; viewed with hostility by later jurists because it bypassed general legislative process to single out one person for disadvantage.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers encounter PRIVILEGIUM primarily in two contexts: Roman law scholarship and its reception in continental European legal systems, and in older English common law sources where the Latin term appears in maxims and case discussions about the nature and limits of personal privilege.
The key navigational point is the term's dual character. When a historical source uses PRIVILEGIUM, the researcher must determine from context whether the author is describing a favorable grant or an odious imposition. Failing to make that distinction can invert the meaning of a passage entirely.
The maxims preserved in Burrill carry substantive legal content still referenced in historical sources. "Privilegium est beneficium personale, et extinguitur cum persona" — privilege is a personal benefit and is extinguished with the person — appears in early English case law and treatise literature as a statement of the non-transferable, non-heritable nature of personal privileges. "Privilegium non valet contra rempublicam" — privilege avails not against the commonwealth — is a limiting principle appearing in Bacon's Maxims and signals an important constraint: even a formally granted personal privilege yields to public necessity or the public interest. Researchers tracing the historical limits of privilege in English law will find this maxim a useful thread.
Because PRIVILEGIUM belongs primarily to the Roman law tradition, researchers working in civil law jurisdictions or in comparative law contexts will find it more densely treated in continental sources than in English-language dictionaries. Anglo-American dictionaries define the term but do not develop its doctrinal content at length; for fuller treatment, civilian authorities and Roman law commentaries are the appropriate sources.
Historical Dictionary Support
The historical dictionaries converge on the core definition: a special enactment directed at a single individual, capable of being either a benefit or a burden. Black's (both editions) and Anderson's track closely, all emphasizing the "anomalous or irregular" character of the right, obligation, or punishment — language signaling that a privilegium operated outside the ordinary course of law.
Burrill's treatment is the most practically useful for common law research because it preserves the Latin maxims with source references (Bulstrode's Reports, Bacon's Maxims), giving researchers a path into the English case and treatise literature. Burrill's framing also emphasizes that the privilege is personal — it does not survive the holder — which is the aspect of PRIVILEGIUM most directly absorbed into English legal thinking.
What the historical dictionaries collectively underemphasize is the constitutional dimension of the odious privilegium in Roman law: the use of imperial fiat to punish or burden a specific individual without general legislation was criticized even in Roman jurisprudence as a form of irregular or potentially tyrannical action. That doctrinal tension — between sovereign power to grant individual exemptions and the principle that law should be general — is present in the sources but not fully developed in any of the dictionary entries.
Jurisdictional Note
PRIVILEGIUM as a technical term is primarily relevant to Roman law, civil law systems, and historical English common law research. In modern Anglo-American legal practice the term is rarely used; its concepts have been absorbed into the general vocabulary of privilege, immunity, and special legislation. Civil law jurisdictions with Roman law foundations may retain the term or its functional equivalents in doctrinal literature.