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This article aims to rehabilitate the “old” concepts of French rural geography, namely “finages” and “terroirs.” Although quite old, they are not obsolete and are still useful for understanding the place of common land in contemporary agrarian dynamics. By their technical and socio-economic dimension, these terms allow for a more nuanced approach beyond the simplistic opposition between collective and private land rights. These concepts have been used during field research projects carried out over the past twenty years in various contexts: south-western Burkina Faso, the Northern Andes of Ecuador, and western and southern India. Despite their specificities, these regions have at least one common feature: At some point during recent history, their agricultural territories have combined common land (saltus and silva) and private land (ager). The analysis of these tropical situations provides new insights into the origins and the disappearance of common land. Above all, this comparative research invites us to rethink the role of common land in agrarian dynamics. Far from having an ancillary function, commons proved essential to the advent of “private” land. Moreover, contrary to the redistributive role often attributed to them, they were at the heart of social processes of domination, differentiation, and exclusion. Since the green revolution, commons have become refuge areas for those marginalized by agricultural intensification, or excluded from ecological reserves where all agricultural activity is prohibited.