PREFACE
Although the Rhodian Sea-law has been not infrequently edited, the learned continue to call for a new edition. Goldschmidt says of the Sea-law: 'Es bedarf noch gründlicher Untersuchung.' Zachariä von Lingenthal says of it: 'Sowohl Text als lateinische Uebersezung bedürfen noch wiederholter kritischer Bearbeitung.' It is to meet this demand that the present edition has been undertaken.
The fullness of the critical apparatus may excite surprise. The object of a critical apparatus, as I conceive it, is to enable the nearest student to form his own text. It is therefore an editor's duty to give all the material variants of all the independent manuscripts. It is particularly his duty in a case like the present where there are many passages of which he can give no satisfactory explanation.
The Appendices which follow the text contain, partly, matter which, though it is given in manuscripts as part of the Seal-law, does not, in my opinion, form part of its original composition, and, partly, matter relating substantially to maritime
