It is a category of property that includes the intangible creations of the human mind. Some countries recognize many more types of intellectual property than others. The most well-known types are copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets. Early precursors to some types of intellectual property were found in some societies such as ancient Rome, but the modern concept of intellectual property developed in England in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The term “intellectual property” began to be used in the nineteenth century, although intellectual property did not become common in the majority of legal systems in the world until the end of the twentieth century.
