Depositum

Lat In the civil law. One of the forms of the contract of bailment, being a naked bailment of goods to be kept for the use of the bailor without reward.

Foster v. Essex Bank, 17 Mass. 498, 9 Ain. Dec. 168; Coggs v. Bernard, 2 Ld. Raym. 912.

See Deposit. One of the four real contracts specified by Justinian, and having the following characteristics: (1) The depositary or depositee is not liable for negligence, however extreme, but only for fraud, dolus; (2) the property remains in the depositor, the depositary having only the possession. Precarium and sequestre were two varieties of the depositum.