chattel

[ chat-l ]

noun

1. Law. Often chattels. a movable article of personal property.
2. Often chattels. any article of tangible property other than land, buildings, and other things annexed to land.
3. a human being considered to be property; an enslaved person.

chattel

/ ˈtʃætəl /

noun

1. often plural property law
   1. an item of movable personal property, such as furniture, domestic animals, etc
   2. an interest in land less than a freehold, such as a lease
2. goods and chattels
   personal property

Word History and Origins

Origin of chattel¹

First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English chatel, from Old French; cattle

Word History and Origins

Origin of chattel¹

C13: from Old French chatel personal property, from Medieval Latin capitāle wealth; see capital ¹

Synonym Study

See property.

Example Sentences

Cornyn interjected the same interpretation led to the Dred Scott decision, citing “treating slaves as chattel property” as an another outcome of the expansive intrepretation of the due process clause.

From Washington Blade

Maybe no one will be the “husband” (as in, animal husbandry) and no one the chattel.

From The Daily Beast

Until 1865—less than 150 years ago—it was legal under the United States Constitution to own black people as chattel.

From The Daily Beast

Likely because of his own faith, Carter tries—and fails—to excuse the biblical mandate for reducing women to chattel.

From The Daily Beast

Within a century, chattel slavery ceased to exist in virtually every modern nation.

From The Daily Beast

Men, women, and children are stripped naked and inspected like chattel, and later, lynched with impunity.

From The Daily Beast

The statutes require that chattel mortgages should be acknowledged and recorded.

From Project Gutenberg

The discharge and foreclosure of mortgages on vessels are governed for the most part by the rules that apply to chattel mortgages.

From Project Gutenberg

Their form remains just what it was when woman was esteemed a pretty, desirable, and incidentally a child-producing, chattel.

From Project Gutenberg

He was in th' chattel morgedge business on week days an' he was a Spiritulist on Sunday.

From Project Gutenberg

I should say the same of a slave; he is a chattel owned by me; he is saved for my advantage, therefore I am indebted for him.

From Project Gutenberg