[IDEM libro nono epistularum. ] §41.3.23.prEum, qui aedes mercatus est, non puto aliud quam ipsas aedes possidere: nam si singulas res possidere intellegetur, ipsas non possidebit: separatis enim corporibus, ex quibus aedes constant, uniuersitas aedium intellegi non poterit.
[THE SAME, Letters, book 9] I do not think that he who has bought a house possesses anything other than the house itself; for if he is understood to possess individual things, he will not possess the house itself; for if the individual bodies of which the house consists are separated, the whole of the house cannot be understood.
accedit eo, quod, si quis singulas res possidere dixerit, necesse erit dicat possessione superficiei tempori de mobilibus statuto locum esse, solum se capturum esse ampliori: quod absurdum et minime iuri ciuili conueniens est, ut una res diuersis temporibus capiatur, ut puta cum aedes ex duabus rebus constant, ex solo et superficie, et uniuersitas earum possessionem temporis immobilium rerum omnium mutet.
To this is added that, if anyone should say that he possesses individual things, he must necessarily say that there is room for the time established for movables in the possession of the superstructure, and that he will acquire the ground itself in a longer period; which is absurd and by no means agreeable to the civil law, namely, that one thing should be acquired in different times—as for instance when a house consists of two things, the ground and the superstructure—and that the whole of them should alter the time of possession of all immovable things.
§41.3.23.1Si autem columna euicta fuerit, puto te ex empto cum uenditore recte acturum et eo genere rem saluam habiturum.
If, however, a column is evicted, I think that you will rightly sue the seller on the action of purchase and by this means keep yourself harmless.
§41.3.23.2Si autem demolita domus est, ex integro res mobiles possidendae sunt, ut tempore, quod in usucapione rerum mobilium constitutum est, usucapiantur.
If, however, the house is demolished, the movable things must be possessed anew, so that they may be acquired by usucapion in the time established for the usucapion of movable things.
et non potes recte uti eo tempore, quo in aedificio fuerunt: nam quemadmodum eas solas et separatas ab aedificio non possedisti, sic nec penes te singulae aut separatae fuerunt et cohaerentibus his in aedificio, depositis aedibus, quae hoc quoque ipsum continent.
And you cannot rightly avail yourself of that time during which they were in the building; for just as you did not possess them single and separated from the building, so they were not in your possession individually or separately; and while they were joined together in the building, the building having been pulled down—which itself also contains this very thing—[they were not possessed separately].
neque enim recipi potest, ut eadem res et ut res soli et tamquam mobilis sit possessa.
For it cannot be accepted that the same thing should be possessed both as a portion of the soil and as a movable.