Brief Consideration on the Concept of Testament in Romanian Civil Law

• Author: Craciun, N.
• Position: Law Faculty, Transilvania University of Brasov
• Pages: 49-52

Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Braşov

Series VII: Social Sciences • Law • Vol. 5 (54) No. 2 - 2012

BRIEF CONSIDERATION ON THE

CONCEPT OF TESTAMENT

IN ROMANIAN CIVIL LAW

Nicuşor CRCIUN1

Abstract: The New Civil Code meets the requirements of legal

professionals and improves the legal definition from the previous regulation.

Although the New Civil Code retains the general background legalized by the

old Civil Code, a welcome, pertinent, necessary and important evolution is to

be noticed. There are certainly novelty elements in the content of the New

Civil Code and a clear differentiation is drawn between testament and

legacy, the two of them benefitting from dedicated texts within the New Civil

Code. It is to be noticed that this new definition, filtering judiciously the

criticisms and the previous doctrinary construction, succeeds in saving itself

of criticism or necessary doctrinary addenda as it manages to comprise the

essential.

Key words: testament, definition, legal characters, doctrine, legacy,

differences.

1 Law Faculty, Transilvania University of Braşov.

1. Introduction

In accordance with article 1034 of the

Romanian Civil Code starting 1st October

2011, „The will is the unilateral, personal

and reversible act through which a person,

called testator rules in one of the forms

required by the law, for the time when

he/she is no longer alive.”

In general, the new Civil Code keeps

the previously framework set up by the

1864 Civil Code when it comes to

matters concerning the will. The

alterations made to it can be qualified

without exaggeration as being relevant,

necessary and important.

An evolution compared to the legal

definition in the Civil Code which came

into force at 1st December 1865 can be

easily traced, as the mentioned code

defined the will as being a „...reversible act

through which the testator rules for the

time when he/she is no longer alive

concerning his/her whole fortune or only

part of it.”

Doctrinary opinions were constructed

around this last legal definition, which had

to be and was associated with other legal

provisions, which, as a rule, converged

towards the same conclusion, as a matter

of fact a natural one, that the will is a

unilateral, solemn legal document,

essentially personal and reversible.

These legal provisions which were

missing (with the exception of

reversibility) from the legal definition in

the old Civil Code have been judiciously

and correctly taken over from the doctrine