Short answer. Article 1120 itself names only two categories: possession for purposes of prescription can be interrupted naturally or civilly. It does not, in this provision, list the specific events that fall under each category — it establishes the two-fold division that the rest of the code's rules on interruption build on.
What the law says
Possession is interrupted for the purposes of prescription, naturally or civilly.
Civil Code, Article 1120 — Two Ways Possession Is Interrupted. Read the full provision →
The article sets a category, not a list
Article 1120 states the rule in a single, compact sentence: possession is interrupted for the purposes of prescription, naturally or civilly. Read on its own, this provision does not itemize what specific events count as a natural interruption or a civil one. What it does is establish, as a matter of law, that interruption of possession comes in exactly two recognized kinds — and that any interruption relevant to prescription has to fall into one or the other.
Why the two-fold division matters even without the detail
Setting up naturally and civilly as the two categories is still meaningful on its own. It tells anyone assessing a possible interruption that the inquiry has a structure: was there something that happened to the possession itself, in fact, or was there some other kind of event recognized by law as breaking the continuity of possession. Article 1120 frames the question that has to be asked, even though it leaves the content of each category to be filled in elsewhere in the code.
What this article does not tell you
Because Article 1120 only names the two categories, it cannot by itself answer what specific facts amount to a natural interruption or a civil one. Anyone trying to determine whether a particular event — losing physical control of property, a demand, a legal proceeding, or anything else — actually interrupted a prescriptive period needs to look at the more detailed rules the code provides for each category, since this article does not spell those out.
A rule scoped to prescription specifically
Notice also that Article 1120 frames interruption for the purposes of prescription specifically, rather than as a general rule about possession disputes at large. That framing matters: this article is defining what breaks the continuity a person needs for a prescriptive period to run and eventually mature into ownership, not settling every question about who currently has possession of a piece of property. The two-fold division it sets up operates inside that narrower, prescription-focused purpose.
Cases citing this provision
These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.
- Jaime Abalos and Spouses Felix Salazar and Consuelo Salazar, et al. vs. Heirs of Vicente Torio, namely: Publio Torio, et al, G.R. No. 175444, December 14, 2011 — read the decision on LawPhil →