Lost or not lost

A phrase sometimes inserted in policies of marine insurance to signify that the contract is meant to relate back to the beginning of a voyage now in progress, or to some other antecedent time, and to be valid and effectual even if, at the moment of executing the policy, the vessel should have already perished by some of the perils insured against, provided that neither party has knowledge of that fact or any advantage over the other in the way of superior means of information.

See Hooper v. Robinson, 98 U. S. 537, 25 L. Ed. 2l9; Insurance Co. v. Folsom, 18 Wall. 251, 21 L. Ed. 827.