Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/257

 7. SCRUTTON: ROMAN LAW INFLUENCE 243 that, though there is ahnost an entire lack of evidence con- cerning it till the publication of the Guidon (circa 1560), it probably originated about 1200 a. d. with the Italians, and was introduced into England by Lombard merchants.^ Under Queen Elizabeth a special Court was constituted to try Lon- don Policies of Insurance, and it is noteworthy that it was to consist of the Judge of the Admiralty, the Recorder of Lon- don, two Doctors of the Civil Law, two common lawyers, and eight merchants. ^ The Court fell into disuse, but its compo- sition shows the view that Insurance was part of the subject- matter of the Law Merchant, which in its turn was connected with the Civil law. Apart from this, there is no trace of Roman influence in the English law of Insurance. The Roman pecunia trajectitia ^ was a loan of money with which merchandise was bought and shipped, being at the risk of the lender till the goods reached their destination. The interest on the loan was originally unlimited but was re- stricted by Justinian to 12 per cent.* And though the Roman law fell into oblivion, the institution appears to have survived in the Bottomry and Respondentia of the Law Mer- chant. By a Bottomry Bond,^ the master under stress of necessity borrows money for the prosecution of his voyage on the security of the ship, to be repaid with maritime interest if the ship arrives in safety ; Respondentia is a similar loan on the security of the cargo, its repayment being also dependent on safe arrival. Neither of these is quite the same as Pecunia Trajectitia, which was rather an original venture by a mer- chant dependent on the safe arrival of the ship, than a loan to the master, made under necessity, to enable a voyage already begun to be prosecuted. But Malynes expressly calls Bottomry, pecunia trajectitia, while he also alludes to a transaction precisely similar to the Roman one, as " a deliver- ance of money of the nature of Usura Maritima." ^ The 1881, Int. pp. 19-21. •Park, Int. p. 40. 43 Eliz. c. 12. •Dig. 23, 2, 1-5. •McLachlan, Merchant Shipping, 3rd ed. pp. 51-65. •p. 122. 'McLachlan, p. 65.
 * darkness of an earlier age " ^ prevents us from tracing
 * Park on Insurance, Int. pp. 10-19. Lowndes on Inturance, Lond.
 * Cod. 4, 32, 26.