SAVIGNY, FRIEDRICH KARL VON German jurist, was born at Frankfort-on-Main on Feb. 21, 1779. Left an orphan at the age of 13, he was brought up by his guar dian until, in 1795, he entered the university of Marburg. After the fashion of German students, Savigny visited several universi ties, notably Jena, Leipzig and Halle ; and returning to Marburg, took his doctor's degree in 1800. In 1803 he published his famous treatise, Das Recht des Besitzes (the rights of possession). In 1804 Savigny married Kunigunde Brentano, the sister of Bettina von Arnim and Clemens Brentano the poet, and the same year started on an extensive tour through France and south Germany in search of fresh sources of Roman law.
In 1810 he was called, chiefly at the instance of Wilhelm von Humboldt, to fill the chair of Roman law at the new university of Berlin. Here one of his services was to create, in connection with the faculty of law, a "Sprach-Collegium," an extraordinary tribunal competent to deliver opinions on cases remitted to it by the ordinary courts ; and he took an active part in its labours. This was the busiest time of his life. He was engaged in lectur ing, in the government of the university, and as tutor to the crown prince in Roman, criminal and Prussian law. In 1814 appeared his pamphlet V om Beruf unserer Zeit fur Gesetzgebung and Rechts-wissenschaft (new edition, 1892), a protest against the demand for codification.
In 1815 he founded, with Karl Friedrich Eichhorn, and Johann Friedrich Ludwig Goschen (1778-1837), the Zeitschrift fur ge schichtliche Rechtswissenschaft, as the organ of the new historical school. In 1815 appeared the first volume of his Geschichte des romischen Rechts im Mittelalter, the last of which was not published until 1831. This work was originally intended to be a literary history of Roman law from Irnerius to the present time. As eventually completed, it left the narrative at the 16th century and the separation of Europe into national States.
In 1835 Savigny began his elaborate work on contemporary Roman law, System des heutigen romischen Rechts (8 vols.,
184o-1849). In March 1842, he was appointed "Grosskanzler" (High Chancellor), the title given by Frederick II. in 1746 to the official at the head of the juridical system in Prussia, and he carried out several important law reforms in regard to bills of exchange and divorce. In 1848 he resigned and returned to jurisprudence. In 185o appeared his V ermischte Schriften, con sisting of a collection of his minor works published between 1800 and 1844. In 1853 he published his treatise on Contracts (Das Obligationenrecht), a supplement to his work on modern Roman law, in which he clearly demonstrates the necessity for the his torical treatment of law. Savigny died at Berlin on Oct. 25, 1861.
Savigny belongs to the so-called historical school of jurists, though he cannot claim to be regarded as its founder, an honour which belongs to Gustav Hugo. In the history of jurisprudence Savigny's great works are the Recht, des Besitzes and the V om Beruf above referred to. The former marks an epoch in juris prudence. Professor Jhering says : "With the Recht des Besitzes the juridical method of the Romans was regained, and modern jurisprudence horn." Savigny sought to prove that in Roman law possession had always reference to "usucaption" or to "inter dicts"; that there is not a right to continuance in possession but only to immunity from interference ; possession being based on the consciousness of unlimited power.