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This chapter dissects the role of heroes in forging a popular memory that co-existed with the existing political order. It explores the historical renderings of peasant movements and their leaders, specifically what happens when those renderings evolve into a collective enterprise to make a hero. The example of Rubén Jaramillo–seen by many in Morelos and Puebla as the heir to Emiliano Zapata–shows how collective memories construct a popular hero and how peasant resistance is transmitted across generations. The chapter considers how the theme of betrayal resonates through local, regional, and national historical memories of Mexican revolutionary heroes who, thwarted by treachery, are turned into counter-hegemonic symbols. The study of this particular popular hero locates the moment when state-sponsored violence, so endemic in the countryside during the 1950s, entered national consciousness to reveal the state’s true authoritarian code.

In German Law, possession is generally regarded as a question of fact, whereas property is a legally undefined bundle of rights and privileges combined with the right to exclude others. Nonetheless, the clear line between right and fact gets blurred if possession is grounded on fiction as in case of possessio civilissima. This chapter focuses on this special form of possession, comparing German with Spanish law. Possessing civilissime means to possess without corpus and animus. So once a testator dies, his heir becomes possessor independently from being in control of the testator’s tangible items. Possessio civilissima, it is argued, calls into question the strict distinction between property and possession.

The next heir had an absolute right to inherit an undiminished ancestral estate, the sons, the brothers and the paternal male cousins were normally seen as heirs, sometimes the wife or the mother were also heirs as their livelihood depended on the land after the husband or son died. The heir had a right to redeem the sale of land, if he or she wasn’t involved in the transaction. Therefore, to make the sale absolute, most deeds state clearly that the next heirs had consented to the transaction and include a clause which states that the vendor cannot re-open discussions or try to raise the price paid to him or reduce the area of land transferred or try to redeem the sale. Despite what was stated on the deeds, sometimes redemption was achieved by the heirs by giving back the original purchase price, causing the original purchaser to lose out.