Justinian and the Freedom of the Sea

Abstract

The text of the jurist Marcianus, preserved in the Digest of Justinian, is the first formal pronouncement in recorded legal theory on the legal status of the sea and on the right of men to use the sea and its products. It is stated that the sea and its coasts are common to all men. Since Marcianus lived in the early years of the second century of the Christian era, it follows that this doctrine was known in a written form at least as early as the beginning of the second century. Since, further, Marcianus belonged to that class of jurists the official pronouncements of which were recognized as being statements of the law, it follows that the doctrine of the common right of all men to a free use of the sea was a law of the Roman Empire at the beginning of the second century, although this law was not put in a codified form until the sixth century.