The Sovereignty of the Sea / An Historical Account of the Claims of England to the Dominion of the British Seas, and of the Evolution of the Territorial Waters

by Thomas Wemyss Fulton

[641] “Quod ad mare attinet, licet adhuc ita omnium commune sit, ut in eo navigari possit. Proprietas tamen ejus ad eos pertinere hodie creditur, ad quos proximus continens adeo ut mare Gallicum id dicatur quod littus Galliæ alluit, aut ei propius est, quam ulli alii continenti. Sic Anglicum, Scoticum, et Hybernicum, quod propius Angliæ, Scotiæ, et Hyberniæ est. Ita ut reges inter se, quasi maria omnia diviserint, et quasi ex mutua partitione alterius id mare censeatur, quod alteri propinquius et commodius est; in quo si delictum aliquod commisum fuerit, ejus sit, jurisdictio qui proximum continentem possideat. Isque suum illud mare vocat.... Piscationes vero quæ in proximo mari fiunt, proculdubio eorum sunt qui proximum continentem possident. Itaque non sine summa injuria nostra Belgæ circa nostras insulas piscantur. Nam licet piscationes in mari non prohibeantur, tamen et hæ præscribuntur, et traduntur permissæ aut prohibitæ secundum consuetudinem.”

[642] The Maintenance of Free Trade, p. 42 et seq. Consuetudo vel Lex Mercatoria. The latter contains chapters on Navigation and Community of Seas, and The Distinct Dominions of the Seas. Many editions were published.

[643] Wheaton, Hist., 51, 153; Phillimore, Commentaries, I. xxxix.

[644] Alberici Gentilis Juriscons. Hispanicæ Advocationis, Libri Duo, Hanoviæ, 1613. Gentilis was born in 1551 and died, like Craig, in 1608. His most important works were De Jure Belli (1588) and De Legationibus. Professor Holland has given an account of his life and works in An Inaugural Lecture on Albericus Gentilis, delivered at All Souls College, 1874. See also Alessandro de Giorgi, Della Vita e delle opere di Alberico Gentili, Parma, 1876.

[645] In a letter from the Earl of Salisbury to Sir Thomas Lake in 1606, referring to a dispute between the Dutch and Spanish ambassadors about prizes taken in the Narrow Sea, it is said that the king, in putting in force his proclamation about the recall of subjects in foreign service ([p. 119]), dealt as follows: if a prize had been taken and brought into the English limits (chambers), and Englishmen were aboard the taker, he dealt with them as having offended against his proclamation, and also released the ship as not being good prize. Even more, proceeds the Earl, “although there be no English but all Flemings, the king takes all from them and restores it [the ship] wherein, tho’ in effect it undoes the end of the States warr by sea, because they have no way to come home but by the narrow seas, where the least wind that can blow them can hardly keepe themself from the English coasts, and so a partiall jugement of ½ a mile more or less in a wyde sea looseth or winneth their right.” State Papers, Dom., xviii. 22.

[646] In 1604, between King James and Philip III. and the Archdukes. Dumont Corps Diplomatique, V. ii. 34.

[647] “Etiam non nocet, quod objicitur et longe antehac longo usu servatos in hujusmodi quæstionibus hos esse fines qui expressi nunc sunt Edicto,” p. 30.

[648] Gryphiander, De Insulis Tractatus, Frankfort, 1623, cap. 14, s. 46.

[649] Moore, A History of the Foreshore and the Law relating thereto, 1888.

[650] “Arguments prooving the Queenes Ma^ties propertye in the Sea Landes, and salt shores thereof, and that no subiect cann lawfully hould eny parte thereof but by the Kinges especiall graunte.” It is printed by Moore (op. cit., 185) from Lansdowne MSS., No. 100. Various copies exist; one in Lansd. MSS., No. 105, belonged to Lord Burghley, and is endorsed by him “Mr Digges. The Case of Lands left by ye Seas.” A copy is in State Papers, Dom., cccxxxix. 1.