A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18: Historical Sketch of the Progress of Discovery, Navigation, and; Commerce, from the Earliest Records to the Beginning of the Nineteenth; Century, By William StevensonKerr, Robert
History
A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18: Historical Sketch of the Progress of Discovery, Navigation, and; Commerce, from the Earliest Records to the Beginning of the Nineteenth; Century, By William Stevenson
Kerr, Robert
Voyages and travels
We have contented ourselves with this short abstract of the Periplus of the
Euxine, because we have already given all the important information it
contains on the subject of the commerce of this sea. It is very inferior in
merit to the Periplus of the Euxine, which has also been attributed to this
Arrian, though Dr. Vincent, we think, has proved that it is the work of an
earlier writer, and of a merchant.
As the Roman conquests extended, their geographical knowledge of course
increased. In the reign of Antoninus Pius, their armies had forced a
passage much further north in Britain than they had ever ventured before.
One of the results of this success was a maritime survey, or rather two
partial surveys of the north part of Britain, from which the geography of
that part of the island was compiled by Ptolemy.
The maritime laws of the Rhodians, or those which passed under their name,
seem to have been the basis and authority of the Roman maritime laws at
this period; for we are told, that when a merchant complained to the
emperor that he had been plundered by the imperial officers at the
Cyclades, where he had been shipwrecked, the latter replied, that he indeed
was lord of the earth, but that the sea was governed by the Rhodian laws,
and that from them he would obtain redress. This part of the Rhodian law,
however, had been but lately adopted by the Romans; for Antoninus is
expressly mentioned as having enacted, among other laws, that shipwrecked
merchandize should be the entire property of the lawful owners, without any
interference or participation of the officers of the exchequer, and that
those who were guilty of plundering wrecks should be severely punished.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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