It is therefore necessary to explain that in the earliest stages of human existence both sovereignty and common possession had meanings other than those which they bear at the present time.1 For nowadays sovereignty means a particular kind of proprietorship, such in fact that it abso- lutely excludes like possession by any one else. On the other hand, we call a thing ' common ' when its ownership 'Paul de Castro on Digest I, 1,5; Dist. I, C. VII.
23 MARE LIBERVM quodam aut consensu collata est exclusis aliis. Linguarum paupertas coegit voces easdem in re non eadem usurpare. Et sic ista nostri moris nomina ad ius illud pristinum similitudine quadam et imagine referuntur. Commune igitur tune non aliud fuit quam quod simpliciter proprio opponitur; doininium autem facultas non iniusta utendi re communi, quern usum Scholasticis 1 visum est facti non iuris vocare, quia qui nunc in iure usus vocatur, proprium est quiddam, aut ut illorum more loquar, privative ad alios dicitur.
lure primo Gentium, quod et Naturale interdum dicitur, et quod poetae alibi aetate aurea, alibi Saturni aut lustitiae regno depingunt, nihil proprium fuit; quod Cicero dixit: ' Sunt autem privata nulla natura '. Et Horatius: 2 Nam PROPRIAE telluris ERVM NATVRA neque Mum Nee me nee quemquam statuit.
Neque enim potuit natura dominos distinguere. Hoc igitur significatu res omnes eo tempore communes fuisse dicimus, idem innuentes quod poetae cum primos homines in medium quaesivisse, et lustitiam casto foedere res medias tenuisse dicunt; quod ut clarius explicent, negant ea tempore campos limite partitos, aut commercia fuisse ulla...promiscua rura per agros Praestiterant cunctis COMMFNIA cuncta FIDERI.3 'Vasquius, Controversiae illustres, c. I, n. 10; Lib. VI, V, 12, 3 (De verborum significatione, c. Exiit, qui seminat); Clem. V, 11 (De verborum sig- nificatione, c. Exivi de paradiso).
1 Avienus, Aratus 302-303.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 23 V or possession is held by several persons jointly according to a kind of partnership or mutual agreement from which all other persons are excluded. Poverty of language com- pels the use of the same words for things that are not the same. And so because of a certain similarity and likeness, our modern nomenclature is applied to that state of primi- tive law. Now, in ancient times, ' common ' meant simply the opposite of ' particular '; and ' sovereignty ' or ' owner- ship ', meant the privilege of lawfully using common prop- erty. This seemed to the Scholastics r to be a use in fact but not in law, because what now in law is called use, is a particular right, or if I may use their phraseology, is, in respect to other persons, a privative right.
In the primitive law of nations, which is sometimes called Natural Law, and which the poets sometimes por- tray as having existed in a Golden Age, and some- times in the reign of Saturn or of Justice, there was no particular right. As Cicero says: ' But nothing is by nature private property '. And Horace: 2 ' For nature has decreed to be the master of private soil neither him, nor me, nor any- one else '. For nature knows no sovereigns. Therefore in this sense we say that in those ancient times all things were held in common, meaning what the poets do when they say that primitive men acquired everything in common, and that Justice maintained a community of goods by means of an inviolable compact. And to make this clearer, they say that in those primitive times the fields were not delimited by boundary lines, and that there was no commercial inter- course. Avienus says: 3 ' It seemed that all lands without distinction were common to all '.
The word ' seemed ' is rightly added, owing to the changed meaning of the words, as we have noted above.
24 MARE LIBERVM Recte additum est ' videri ' propter translationem ut diximus vocabuli. Communio autem ista ad usum ref erebatur: 1 ...pervium cunctis iter, COMMFNIS FSF.S omnium rerum fuit.
Cuius ratione dominium quoddam erat, sed universale, et indefinitum; Deus enim res omnes non huic aut illi dederat, sed humano generi, atque eo modo plures in solidum eiusdem rei domini esse non prohibebantur; quod si hodierna significa- tione sumamus dominium, contra omnem est rationem. Hoc enim proprietatem includit, quae tune erat penes neminem. Aptissime autem illud dictum est: 2 omnia rerum Vsurpantis erant, Ad earn vero, quae nunc est, dominiorum distinctionem non impetu quodam, sed paulatim vehtum videtur, initium eius monstrante natura. Cum enim res sint nonnullae, quarum usus in abusu consistit, aut quia conversae in sub- stantiam utentis nullum postea usum admittunt, aut quia utendo fiunt ad usum deteriores, in rebus prioris generis, ut cibo et potu, proprietas statim quaedam ab usu non seiuncta emicuit.3 Hoc enim est proprium esse, ita esse cuiusquam ut et alterius esse non possit; quod deinde ad res posterioris generis, vestes puta, et res mobiles alias aut se moventes ratione quadam productum est.
Quod cum esset, ne res quidem immobiles omnes, agri 1 Seneca, Octavia 413-414.
* Digest VII, 5 (De usu fructu earum rerum, quae usu consumuntur vel nrinuuntur); Extravag. XIV, 3 et 5 (De verborum significatione, c. Ad conditorem, et c. Quia quorundam); Thomas Aquinas, Summa II. II, q. 78.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 24 But that kind of common possession relates to use, as is seen from a quotation from Seneca: 1 "Every path was free, All things were used in common."
According to his reasoning there was a kind of sovereignty, but it was universal and unlimited. For God had not given all things to this individual or to that, but to the entire human race, and thus a number of persons, as it were en masse, were not debarred from being substantially sover- eigns or owners of the same thing, which is quite contra- dictory to our modern meaning of sovereignty. For it now implies particular or private ownership, a thing which no one then had. Avienus has said very pertinently: 2 ' All things belonged to him who had possession of them '.
It seems certain that the transition to the present dis- tinction of ownerships did not come violently, but grad- ually, nature herself pointing out the way. For since there are some things, the use of which consists in their being used up, either because having become part of the very substance of the user they can never be used again, or be- cause by use they become less fit for future use, it has be- come apparent, especially in dealing with the first category, such things as food and drink for example, that a certain kind of ownership is inseparable from use.3 For ' own ' implies that a thing belongs to some one person, in such a way that it cannot belong to any other person. By the process of reasoning this was next extended to things of the second category, such as clothes and movables and some living things.
When that had come about, not even immovables, such, 1Octavia 413-414 [Translation by E. I. Harris (Act II, Scene 1)]. 'Aratus 302.
•Digest VII, 5; Extravagantes of Pope John XXII, XIV, 3 and 5; Thomas Aquinas, Summa II. II, q. 78.
25 MARE LIBERVM puta, indivisae manere potuerunt; quamquam enim horum usus non simpliciter in abusu consistat, eorum tamen usus abusus cuiusdam causa comparatus est, ut arva et arbusta cibi causa, pascua etiam vestium; omnium autem usibus promiscue sufficere non possunt. Repertae proprietati lex posita est, quae naturam imitaretur. Sicut enim initio per applicationem corporalem usus ille habebatur, unde pro- prietatem primum ortam diximus, ita simili applicatione res proprias cuiusque fieri placuit. Haec est quae dicitur occupatio, voce accommodatissima ad eas res quae ante in medio positae fuerant; quo Seneca Tragicus alludit: 1 IN MEDIO est scelus POSITVM OCCVPANTI.
Et Philosophus: 2 ' Equestria OMNIVM equitum Romano- rum sunt. In illis tamen locus meus fit PROPRIVS, quern OCCVPAVI '. Hinc Quintilianus dicit,3 quod omni- bus nascitur, industriae esse praemium; et Tullius,* factas esse veteri occupatione res eorum qui quondam in vacua venerant.
Occupatio autem haec in his rebus quae possession! renituntur, ut sunt ferae bestiae, perpetua esse debet, in aliis sufficit, corpore coeptam possessionem animo retineri. Occupatio in mobilibus est apprehensio, in immobilibus 'Thyestes 203-204 (F. CXXII).
• De beneficiis VII, 12, 3.
' Ps. Quintilianus, Declamatio XIII (Pro paupere).
•Cicero, De officiis I.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 25 for instance, as fields, could remain unapportioned. For although their use does not consist merely in consumption, nevertheless it is bound up with subsequent consumption, as fields and plants are used to get food, and pastures to get clothing. There is, however, not enough fixed property to satisfy the use of everybody indiscriminately.
When property or ownership was invented, the law of property was established to imitate nature. For as that use began in connection with bodily needs, from which as we have said property first arose, so by a similar connection it was decided that things were the property of individuals. This is called ' occupation ', a word most appropriate to those things which in former times had been held in com- mon. It is this to which Seneca alludes in his tragedy Thyestes, " Crime is between us to be seized by one" 1 And in one of his philosophical writings he also says: 2 ' The equestrian rows of seats belong to all the equites; neverthe- less, the seat of which I have taken possession is my own private place '. Further, Quintilian remarks 3 that a thing which is created for all is the reward of industry, and Cicero says 4 that things which have been occupied for a long time become the property of those who originally found them unoccupied.
This occupation or possession, however, in the case of things which resist seizure, like wild animals for example, must be uninterrupted or perpetually maintained, but in the case of other things it is sufficient if after physical posses- sion is once taken the intention to possess is maintained. Possession of movables implies seizure, and possession of '203-204 [E. I. Harris' translation (Act II, Scene 1)].
• Speech XIII, In behalf of the poor man.
4 De officiis I.
26 MAKE LIBERVM instructio aut limitatio; unde Hermogenianus cum dominia distincta dicit, addit, agris terminos positos, aedificia col- locata.1 Hie rerum status a poetis indicatur: Turn laqueis captare feras, et fallere visco Inventum.
Turn primum subiere domos.2 COMMVNEMQVE PEIVS, ceu lumina soils et auras Cautus humum longo signavit LIMITE mensor.3 Celebratur post haec; ut Hermogenianus indicat, commer- cium cuius gratia Fluctibus ignotis insultavere carinae* Eodem autem tempore et respublicae institui coeperunt. Atque ita earum quae a prima communione divulsa erant duo facta sunt genera. Alia enim sunt publica, hoc est, populi propria (quae est genuina istius vocis significatio) alia mere privata, hoc est, singulorum. Occupatio autem publica eodem modo sit, quo privata. Seneca: 5 ' Fines Atheniensium, aut Campanorum vocamus, quos deinde inter se vicini privata terminatione distinguunt '. Gens enim unaquaeque 1 Digest I, 1, S (De iustitia et iure, L. Ex hoc iure).
* Vergil, Georgics I, 139-140 [Turn primum etc. is probably meant to explain, the following lines 140-159], 4 Ovid, Metamorphoses I, 134 (exsultavere, Magnus).
« De beneflciis VII, 4, 3.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 26 immovables either the erection of buildings or some de- termination of boundaries, such as fencing in. Hence Hermogenianus, in speaking of separate ownerships, adds the boundaries set to the fields and the buildings thereon constructed.1 This state of things is described thus by the poets Vergil and Ovid: " Then toils for beasts, and lime for birds, were found," * Then first men made homes.
" Then landmarks limited to each his right, For all before was common as the light." 3 In still another place, as Hermogenianus points out, Ovid praises commerce, for the sake of which: * ' Ships in triumph sail the unknown seas '.
At the same time, however, states began to be established, and so two categories were made of the things which had been wrested away from early ownership in common. For some things were public, that is, were the property of the people (which is the real meaning of that expression), while other things were private, that is, were the property of in- dividuals. Ownership, however, both public and private, arises in the same way. On this point Seneca says: 5 ' We speak in general of the land of the Athenians or the Cam- panians. It is the same land which again by means of private boundaries is divided among individual owners '.
3 Ovid, Metamorphoses I, 135-136 [Dryden's translation I (English Poets 27 MARE LIBERVM PARTITA FINES regna constitute, novas Ecctruxit FREES.1 Hoc modo dicit Cicero agrum Arpinatem Arpinatum dici, Tusculanum Tusculanorum: ' similisque est ', inquit, ' priva- tarum possessionum descriptio. Ex quo quia suum cuiusque fit eorum, quae naturae fuerant COMMVNIA, quod cuique obtigit, id quisque teneat '.2 Contra autem Thucydides3 earn terrain quae in divisione populo nulli obvenit, aopisrov, hoc est, indefinitam, et limitibus nullis circumscriptam vocat.4 Ex his quae hactenus dicta sunt duo intelligi possunt. Prius est, eas res quae occupari non possunt, aut occu- patae numquam sunt, nullius proprias esse posse; quia omnis proprietas ab occupatione coeperit. Alterum vero, eas res omnes, quae ita a natura comparatae sunt, ut aliquo utente nihilominus aliis quibusvis ad usum promiscue suffi- ciant, eius hodieque condicionis esse, et perpetuo esse debere cuius fuerant cum primum a natura proditae sunt. Hoc Cicero voluit: B ' Ac latissime quidem patens hominibus inter omnibus ipsos, inter omnes societas haec est; in qua omnium rerum, quas ad communem hominum usum natura genuit, est servanda communitas '. Sunt autem omnes res huius generis, in quibus sine detrimento alterius alteri commodari potest. Hinc illud esse dicit Cicero: * ' Non prohibere aqua profluente '. Nam aqua profluens qua talis non qua flumen Octavia 431-433.
De officiis I, 21, Duarenus on Digest I, 8 (De divisione rerum).
De officiis I, 61.
De officiis I, 52.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 27 ' For each nation ', Seneca says in another place, ' made its territories into separate kingdoms and built new cities V Thus Cicero says: " On this principle the lands of Arpinum are said to belong to the Arpinates, the Tusculan lands to the Tusculans; and similar is the assignment of private property. Therefore, inasmuch as in each case some of those things which by nature had been common property became the property of individuals, each one should retain possession of that which has fallen to his lot." 2 On the other hand Thucydides 3 calls the land which in the division falls to no nation, aoptffro?, that is, undefined, and unde- termined by boundaries.* Two conclusions may be drawn from what has thus far been said. The first is, that that which cannot be occupied, or which never has been occupied, cannot be the property of any one, because all property has arisen from occupation. The second is, that all that which has been so constituted by nature that although serving some one person it still suffices for the common use of all other persons, is today and ought in perpetuity to remain in the same condition as when it was first created by nature. This is what Cicero meant when he wrote: " This then is the most comprehen- sive bond that unites together men as men and all to all; and under it the common right to all things that nature has produced for the common use of man is to be maintained." All things which can be used without loss to any one else come under this category. Hence, says Cicero, comes the well known prohibition: 6 ' Deny no one the water that flows by '. For running water considered as such and not as a Octavia 431-432 [Grotius here takes a slight liberty with the context].
De officiis I, 21 [Walter Miller's (Loeb) translation, page 23].
Duaren [a French humanist (1509-1559)], on Digest I, 8.
De officiis I, 51 [Walter Miller's (Loeb) translation, page 55].
De officiis I, 52.
28 MARE LIBERVM est, inter communia omnium a lurisconsultis refertur: et a Poeta:1 Quid prohibetis AQFAS? VSVS COMMFNIS aquarum est. Nee solem PROPRIVM NATFRA nee AERA fecit, Nee tenues FNDAS: in PFBLICA munera vent.
Dicit haec non esse natura propria, sicut Vlpianus! natura omnibus patere, turn quia primum a natura prodita sunt, et in nullius adhuc dominium pervenerunt (ut loquitur Neratius 8); turn quia ut Cicero dicit, a natura ad usum communem genita videntur. Publica autem vocat tralatitia significatione, non quae ad populum aliquem, sed quae ad societatem humanam pertinent, quae publica luris gentium in Legibus vocantur, hoc est, communia omnium, propria nullius.
Huius generis est Aer, duplici ratione, turn quia occupari non potest, turn quia usum promiscuum hominibus debet. Et eisdem de causis commune est omnium Maris Elemen- tum, infinitum scilicet ita, ut possideri non queat, et omnium usibus accommodatum: sive navigationem respicimus, sive etiam piscaturam. Cuius autem iuris est mare, eiusdem sunt si qua mare aliis usibus eripiendo sua fecit, ut arenae maris, quarum pars terris continua litus dicitur.* Recte igitur Cicero:6 'quid tarn COMMVNE quam Mare fluc- 1Ovid, Metamorphoses VI, 349-351 (aquis, 349, and ad publica, 351, Merkel). 'Digest VIII, 4, 13 (Communia praediorum, L. Venditor). 1 Digest XLI, 1, 14 (De adquirendo rerum dominio, L. Quod in litore); Comines, Memoirs III, 2; Donellus IV, 2; Digest XLI, 3, 49 (De usucapionibus). •Digest I, 8, 10 (De divisione rerum, L. Aristo). •Cicero, De officiis I, 52.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 28 stream, is classed by the jurists among the things common to all mankind; as is done also by Ovid: * ' Why do you deny me water? Its use is free to all. Nature has made neither sun nor air nor waves private property; they are public gifts '.
He says that these things are not by nature private possession, but that, as Ulpian claims,2 they are by nature things open to the use of all, both because in the first place they were produced by nature, and have never yet come under the sovereignty of any one, as Neratius says; 3 and in the second place because, as Cicero says, they seem to have been created by nature for common use. But the poet uses ' public ', in its usual meaning, not of those things which belong to any one people, but to human society as a whole; that is to say, things which are called ' public ' are, accord- ing to the Laws of the law of nations, the common property of all, and the private property of none.
The air belongs to this class of things for two reasons. First, it is not susceptible of occupation; and second its common use is destined for all men. For the same reasons the sea is common to all, because it is so limitless that it cannot become a possession of any one, and because it is adapted for the use of all, whether we consider it from the point of view of navigation or of fisheries. Now, the same right which applies to the sea applies also to the things which the sea has carried away from other uses and made its own, such for example as the sands of the sea, of which the portion adjoining the land is called the coast or shore.* Cicero therefore argues correctly: ° ' What is so common as 1 Metamorphoses VI, 349-351.
• Digest XLI, 1, 14; Comines, Memoirs III, 2; Donellus IV, 2; Digest XLI, 3, 49. [Philippe de Comines (1445-1509), a French historian, and one of the negotiators of the treaty of Senlis (1493).]
29 MARE LIBERVM tuantibus, LIT VS eiectis '? Etiam Vergilius auram, undam, litus cunctis patere dicit.
Haec igitur sunt ilia quae Roman! vocant communia omnium iure natural! 1 aut quod idem esse diximus, publica iurisgentium, sicut et usum eorum modo communem, modo pubb'cum vocant. Quamquam vero etiam ea nullius esse, quod ad proprietatem attinet, recte dicantur, multum tamen differunt ab his quae nullius sunt, et communi usui attributa non sunt, ut ferae, pisces, aves; nam ista si quis occupet, in ius proprium transire possunt, ilia vero totius humanitatis con- sensu proprietati in perpetuum excepta sunt propter usum, qui cum sit omnium, non magis omnibus ab uno eripi potest, quam a te mihi quod meum est. Hoc est quod Cicero dicit inter prima esse lustitiae munera, rebus communibus pro communibus uti. Scholastici dicerent esse communia alia affirmative, alia privative. Distinctio haec non modo lurisprudentibus usitata est, sed vulgi etiam confessionem exprimit; unde apud Athenaeum convivator mare commune esse dicit, at pisces capientium fieri. Et in Plautina Ru- dente servo dicenti,2 ' Mare quidem commune certost omni- bus', assentit piscator, addenti autem, ' In mari inventust communi ' recte occurrit: Meum quod rete atque hami nancti sunt, meum potissimumst.
1 Institutes II, 1, 1 et 5 (De rerum divisione, § Et quidem natural!; § Litorum); Digest I, 8, 1, 2, 10 (De rerum divisione); Digest XLI, 1, 14 et SO (De adquirendo rerum dominio, L. Quod in litore, et L. Quamvis); Digest XLVII, 10, 13 (De iniuriis, L. Iniuriarum § si quis me); Digest XLIII, 8, 3 (Ne quid in loco publico, L. Litora) et 4-7.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 29 the sea for those who are being tossed upon it, the shore for those who have been cast thereon '. Vergil also says that the air, the sea, and the shore are open to all men.
These things therefore are what the Romans call ' com- mon ' to all men by natural law,1 or as we have said, ' public ' according to the law of nations; and indeed they call their use sometimes common, sometimes public. Nevertheless, although those things are with reason said to be res nullius, so far as private ownership is concerned, still they differ very much from those things which, though also res nullius, have not been marked out for common use, such for example as wild animals, fish, and birds. For if any one seizes those things and assumes possession of them, they can become objects of private ownership, but the things in the former category by the consensus of opinion of all mankind are forever exempt from such private ownership on account of their susceptibility to universal use; and as they belong to all they cannot be taken away from all by any one person any more than what is mine can be taken away from me by you. And Cicero says that one of the first gifts of Justice is the use of common property for common benefit. The Scholastics would define one of these categories as common in an affirmative, the other in a privative sense. This dis- tinction is not only familiar to jurists, but it also expresses the popular belief. In Athenaeus for instance the host is made to say that the sea is the common property of all, but that fish are the private property of him who catches them. And in Plautus' Rudens when the slave says: 2 ' The sea is certainly common to all persons ', the fisherman agrees; but when the slave adds: ' Then what is found in the common sea is common property ', he rightly objects, saying: ' But what my net and hooks have taken, is absolutely my own '.
30 MARE LIBERVM Mare igitur proprium omnino alicuius fieri non potest, quia natura commune hoc esse non permittit, sed iubet, inimo ne litus quidem; 1 nisi quod haec addenda est inter- pretatio; ut si quid earum rerum per naturam occupari possit, id eatenus occupantis fiat, quatenus ea occupatione usus ille promiscuus non laeditur. Quod merito receptum est; nam cum ita se habet, cessat utraque exceptio per quam evenisse diximus, ne omnia in eius proprium trans- criberentur.
Quoniam igitur inaedificatio species est occupationis, in litore licet aedificare, si id fieri potest sine ceterorum incom- modo,2 ut Pomponius loquitur, quod ex Scaevola explica- bimus, nisi usus publicus, hoc est communis impediretur. Et qui aedificaverit, soli dominus fiet, quia id solum nee ullius proprium, nee ad usum communem necessarium fuit. Est igitur occupantis; sed non diutius quam durat occupatio, quia reluctari mare possessioni videtur, exemplo ferae, quae si in naturalem se libertatem receperit, non ultra captoris est, ita et litus postliminio mari cedit.
Quicquid autem privatum fieri occupando, idem et pub- licum, hoc est populi proprium posse ostendimus.3 Sic litus Imperi Romani finibus inclusum, populi Romani esse Celsus 1 Donellus IV, 3.
' Digest XXXIX, 2, 24, (De damno infecto, L. Fluminum); other references same as note 1, page 29.
* Donellus IV, 2 et 9; also references in note 1, page 29.
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 30 Therefore the sea can in no way become the private property of any one, because nature not only allows but enjoins its common use.1 Neither can the shore become the private property of any one. The following qualification, however, must be made. If any part of these things is by nature susceptible of occupation, it may become the prop- erty of the one who occupies it only so far as such occupa- tion does not affect its common use. This qualification is deservedly recognized. For in such a case both conditions vanish through which it might eventuate, as we have said, that all of it would pass into private ownership.
Since therefore, to cite Pomponius, building is one kind of occupation, it is permissible to build upon the shore, if this can be done without inconvenience to other people; 2 that is to say (I here follow Scaevola) if such building can be done without hindrance to public or common use of the shore. And whoever shall have constructed a building under the aforesaid circumstances will become the owner of the ground upon which said building is; because this ground is neither the property of any one else, nor is it necessary to common use. It becomes therefore the property of the occupier, but his ownership lasts no longer than his occupa- tion lasts, inasmuch as the sea seems by nature to resist ownership. For just as a wild animal, if it shall have escaped and thus recovered its natural liberty, is no longer the property of its captor, so also the sea may recover its possession of the shore.
We have now shown that whatever by occupation can become private property can also become public property, that is, the private property of a whole nation.8 And so Celsus considered the shore included within the limits of the Roman Empire to be the property of the Roman people.
1 Donellus IV, 3.
'Digest XXXIX, 2, 24; other references same as note I, page 29.
1 Donellus IV, 2 and 9; also references in note 1, page 29.
31 MARE LIBERVM existimat; quod si ita est, minime mirandum est, eundem Populum subditis suis occupandi litoris modum per Prin- cipem aut Praetorem potuisse concedere. Ceterum et haec occupatio non minus quam privata ita restringenda est, ne ulterius porrigatur, quam ut salvus sit usus lurisgentium. Nemo igitur potest a Populo Romano l ad litus maris accedere prohiberi, et retia siccare, et alia f acere, quae semel omnes homines in perpetuum sibi licere voluerunt.
Maris autem natura hoc differt a h'tore, quod mare nisi exigua sui parte nee inaedificari facile, nee includi potest j et ut posset, hoc ipsum tamen vix contingeret, sine usus promiscui impedimento. Si quid tamen exiguum ita occu- pari potest, id occupanti conceditur. Hyperbole est igitur 2 Contracta pisces aequora sentiunt lactis in altum molibus.
Nam Celsus iactas in mare pilas eius esse dicit qui iecerit.' Sed id non concedendum si deterior maris usus eo modo futurus sit. Et Vlpianus eum qui molem in mare iacit, ita tuendum dicit si nemo damnum sentiat. Nam si cui haec res nocitura sit, interdictum utique, ' Ne quid in loco publico fiat ' competiturum. Vt et Labeo, si quid tale in mare struatur, interdictum vult competere, ' Ne quid in mari, quo portus, static, iterve navigiis deterius sit, fiat '. * 1 Digest I, 8, 4 (De divisione rerum, L. Nemo igitur); XLIII, 8, 3 (Ne quid in loco publico, L. Litora).
* Horace, Odes III, i, 33-34.
•Digest XLIII, 8, 3 (as in note 1); 8, 2 (eod. tit, L. Praetor, § Adversus).
4 Digest XLIII, 12, 1 (De fluminibus, L. Ait praetor, § Si in mari).
FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 31