MOVABLE

movable,n. (usu. pl.) 1. Property that can be moved or displaced, such as personal goods; a tangible or intangible thing in which an interest constitutes personal property; specif., anything that is not so attached to land as to be regarded as a part of it as determined by local law. — Also termed movable property; movable thing. [Cases: Property 4. C.J.S. Property §§ 14–21, 23.]

“Movables and immovables. The main distinction drawn in later Roman law and modern systems based thereon between kinds of things subject to ownership and possession. While basically the distinction corresponds to everyday conceptions, assigning animals and vehicles to the former and land and buildings to the latter category, particular things may be assigned to one category rather than the other for reasons of convenience. Thus, in French law, farm implements and animals are immovables. The distinction is also important in international private law, more so than that between real and personal …. Thus, land held on lease is personal property by English law for historical reason, but in international private law it is a right in immovable property.” David M. Walker, The Oxford Companion to Law 858 (1980).

intangible movable.A physical thing that can be moved but that cannot be touched in the

usual sense. • Examples are light and electricity.

“ ‘Intangible movables’ is a term of art in the common law which has been applied more widely than its meaning literally justifies, which is merely to those things that have physical existence and can be moved, though cannot be touched in the normal sense, such as light, electricity and radioactive waves. In English law the term has been generally applied to interests created by law which have only a legal, not a physical existence, and are accordingly capable only of legal, not physical, movement. It is convenient, however, to retain a term which is generally accepted and understood in this special legal meaning.” R.H. Graveson, Conflict of Laws 470 (7th ed. 1974).

2.Scots law. A nonheritable right. — Also spelled (in BrE) moveable. Cf. IMMOVABLE. — movable,adj.“Moveables are, in the phraseology of the law of Scotland, opposed to heritage; so that every species of property, and every right a person can hold, is by that law either heritable or moveable. Hence, moveables are not merely corporeal subjects capable of being moved, but every species of property, corporeal or incorporeal, which does not descend to the heir in heritage.” William Bell, Bell’s Dictionary and Digest of the Law of Scotland 662 (George Watson ed., 1882).

[Blacks Law 8th]