Ownership rights of very old photos

[Moorstuff etc 0]

I have some family photos from the Victorian era and slightly younger. say 1900 through to 1950s.  Many of these were taken in studios, now long defunct, of my family members or their homes.  Some are simply family "snapshots"

 

Do I have any right to sell scanned versions of these on Alamy, or are they the Intellectual property of the original photographer?

[spacecadet 3,139]

Notwithstanding copyright expiring 70 years after the death of the photographer, before 1988 copyright in photographs belonged to the commissioner, not the photographer.

In theory you would need the permission of the descendants, but in practice, assuming no-one in the family objects now, you are in the clear.

[Moorstuff etc 0]

Thank you for this excellent reply. Therefore as the sole descendant, by any measure I can consider this mini archive for publication

[Abiyoyo 899]

What about this case?

 

I bought my house in Madrid 25 years ago with all the content of the previous occupant, the owner's mother, including some nice furniture and some boxes of vintage negatives, prints etc  like:

 

 

 

I assume that are mine when I bought my house.

[spacecadet 3,139]

The photographs belong to you. As above, as they appear to date from before 1900 the copyright has most likely expired.

As you probably know they are stereograms. Do you have the viewer?

Edited January 24, 2016 by spacecadet

[Abiyoyo 899]

The photographs belong to you. As above, as they appear to date from before 1900 the copyright has most likely expired.

As you probably know they are stereograms. Do you have the viewer?

No, but in any case they are glass negatives. I scanned them with a cheap flat scan. Some times ago I was thinking to buy one viewer in an antique shop. One day I will do it.

 

The images should be around from 1913 to 1950, were some part of Morocco was under Spanish protectorate.

Edited January 24, 2016 by Abiyoyo

[dustydingo 872]

Just me, but if I owned those negs I would (initially at least) be trying to do a tad more with them than just scanning them and placing on a non-specialist agency . . .

 

dd