Inheritance by cause of death is a complex legal mechanism that activates upon a person’s demise, allowing one or more individuals, known as beneficiaries, to step into the patrimonial rights of the deceased. This process can occur through inheritance, involving the entirety of transmissible goods, rights, and obligations, or through a bequest, which is limited to the transmission of specified individual rights.

Inheritance is characterized by its universality, including all the active and passive rights belonging to the deceased at the time of death. Unlike bequests that transfer specific rights, inheritance must be accepted or rejected in its entirety; partial acceptance or renunciation is not permitted.

Succession can be classified as legitimate, when the beneficiaries are designated by law, or testamentary, when appointed through a will. According to Article 457 of the Italian Civil Code, inheritance is transmitted by law or by will, with legitimate succession prevailing in the absence, total or partial, of testamentary succession. Our legal system excludes the possibility of “succession pacts.” In the absence of a will, the law determines who the heirs are based on their relationship to the deceased, extending the right of succession up to the sixth degree of kinship. If a potential heir does not accept the inheritance, the right passes to the next in line of kinship, designated by the will or by law.

Article 457, paragraph 3, of the Civil Code also protects the rights of so-called forced heirs, i.e., those relatives who, by law, cannot be completely excluded from the inheritance, even in the presence of contrary testamentary provisions. These individuals, if they find themselves omitted or harmed in their legitimate shares by the will, can undertake legal actions for the reduction or restitution of goods, in order to restore the rights reserved for them by law.

The necessary succession is not considered a separate category, but rather a strengthened form of legitimate succession. It is based on a balance between the freedom to dispose of one’s assets by will and the protection of the interests of the deceased’s family, aiming to safeguard the economic foundations of those who had a direct link with the decedent.