The New International Encyclopædia/Wisby, Laws of

WISBY, Laws of. A collection of mercantile customs and regulations, dating from the last years of the thirteenth century and taking its name from the celebrated trading town in Gotland, Sweden. The laws of Wisby were in force throughout the Baltic Sea and were made the basis of the ordinances of the Hanseatic League. They were an important factor in the development of the modern system of maritime law. Scandinavian legists claim for the Wisby code an antiquity antedating that of the celebrated laws of Oleron, but the evidence is greatly against so early an origin.