For a right to qualify as an easement, it is necessary that the right claimed satisfies all the essential characteristics of an easement. Included in this analysis, is the consideration of whether the right sought is compatible with the proprietorship or possession of the servient tenement. To reach this determination, the Courts evolved the perplexed ouster principle — a doctrine which asserts that a right sought cannot be so burdensome as to oust the servient owner from the practical possession or the beneficial enjoyment of their own land. Since easements are rights of one party over the land of another, there is a necessity to balance the rights of the dominant owner with the residual rights of the servient owner. Otherwise, the existence of broadly construed easements would become detrimental to the ownership of property — due to the value in the ownership of the servient tenement becoming obsolete. In the absence of such restrictions, the law would experience a rumpus of claims resulting in an avalanche of rights which would have the capacity to supersede the rights of the landowner himself. Therefore, the law has deemed it necessary to set a limit on the scope of rights which can lawfully exist as easements. Although the ouster principle endeavours to prevent landowners form being ousted from the reasonable enjoyment or the practical possession of their own land, the application of this doctrine has proved difficult, as the absence of a defined position adopted by the Courts has resulted in much confusion within this area of law. For the purpose of this dissertation, I hope to bring clarity to the parameters of the ouster principle and wish to outline a coherent structure that should be readily embraced by the Courts. As the ouster principle awaits a detailed consideration in Irelandi, my critical analysis of various case law hopes to determine that an easement claimed cannot be so burdensome as to become detrimental to the ownership of land. Therefore — as it is submitted — the ouster principle is good law and ought to be formally adopted by the Irish Courts.