Rhodian law

S6e Maritime Law. The Rhodians were the earliest people that created, digested, and promulgated a system of marine law. Their laws concerning navigation were received at Athens, in the islands of the i Egean sea, and throughout the coastof the Mediterranean, as partof the law of nations. One title in the Pandects of the Roman law contains all the fragments extant of the code of the Rhodians; their laws, by recognition of Augustus and Antoninus, becoming rules of decision among the Romans in all maritime cases in which they were not contrary to their own laws.'* In these fragments is stated the modern law of jettison, average, and contribution, as distinctly as in any recent tex^book.. The Rhodians possessed a flourishing commerce at least one thousand years before the Christian era. Their laws were probably founded upon usages which were themselves of long standing.*

The oldest collection of maritime law. Also, a name given to a more modem code, of later and spurious origin.

Vide Law Rhodian. RIAL OF PLATE and RIAL