1. A slave, esp. by virtue of being captured by an enemy in war.
2. A temporary quasi-servile status, necessarily occurring in an emancipation, and also when a father noxally surrendered a son to answer for a delict. See EMANCIPATION; NOXAL ACTION(1).
“But if the patria potestas could be created, it could also be terminated, by an artificial process …. The father could not by a simple act of his own will release the son from his control. For this purpose he must sell him out of his own hands into that state of mancipium or qualified slavery of which we have spoken. Even then the father’s power was not destroyed: it was suspended during the existence of the mancipium; but if the mancipium ceased, if the son was set free by the person who held him in that condition, the father’s right revived …. It was not until he had sold him three times over, that he used up his right of control beyond the possibility of a revival. This, then, was the form by which the son was liberated from the patria potestas.” James Hadley, Introduction to Roman Law 126–27 (1881).
3. MANCIPATION(1).
