In 2021 the Bulgarian legal community celebrates an anniversary of great importance – 70 years since the Law of obligations and contracts came into force. A great number of papers, publications and discussions on this occasion focus on the important infl uence Roman law has exerted upon the Law of obligations in the modern time codifi cations and hence – in modern law. The Law of obligations and contracts itself even in its very title places emphasis on the two basic concepts, construed by the Roman iurisprudentes – obligatio and contractus, around which the whole legal regulation related to the dynamics of civil turnover develops. Nowadays, it is not only a signifi cant part of the Roman legal terminology that is used but also basic notions, legal permissions, concepts and even discussions as to the nature of the basic legal constructs in the law of obligations. According to the ancient Romans annum agere septuagesimum is an age particularly worthy of honour and respect due to seniores. According to the ideas of the modern hurried and changing legislation, however, 70 years of preservation of a legal act in its basic construction and principles is also a special accomplishment which deserves to be respected as such. Conferences, colloquiums and publications consider the Law of obligations and contracts, in the fi rst place, as a legal act which to the greatest extent determines the domestic development of civil law.

Historically, its connection with the Romanesque legal system is highlighted, traditionally adopted as early as the law by the same title of 1893, and standing further away from the Napoleonic Code Civil des Français до 1804 and its subsequent amendments and standing rather closer to the newer and more accommodated for the purposes of the unifi cation of Italy Codice civile of 1865. The applicable Law of obligations and contracts of 1951, although it repeals the one of 1893, actually adopts a signifi cant part of the principles and the laws regulating the basic legal relations of obligation by getting closer to the regulation in Book IV of the new Civil Code (Codice civile) of Italy of 1942 still effective at the moment. This continuity is not a matter of chance. It is the means through which the Bulgarian legal community accedes to the European legal community based upon Roman law. However, a particular achievement of the Bulgarian jurists – law-makers is the preservation of this genetic connection in a complex political situation after the Second World War with a strong ideological infl uence of the Russian socialist law and direct pressure for a relevant legal regulation aimed to foster the building of socialism in Bulgaria.