Translation
The early modern English legal system was not the exclusive domain of the English common law. Several important courts – principally the ecclesiastical courts and the High Court of the Admiralty – used civil law procedures. There is therefore an existing vocabulary of technical terms available to translate much of the terminology employed by the court of the
Consoli del Mare.
1 See also the glossary for the High Court of the Admiralty on the website of The National Archives: ‘Research Guide: The High Court of the Admiralty’, <www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/high-court-admiralty-records/> [2 Feburary 2024]. However, I have used the common law term ‘attorney’ instead of ‘proctor’ to translate
procuratore,
as this term is far better known.
One recurring term is
consolato: this was the report submitted by a shipmaster after an accident to a recognised authority – often a consul, hence the name – which could then be presented as evidence in a court of law. In Pisan GA cases there also existed the
testimoniale e domanda, which was the original complaint (libel) lodged before the
Consoli del Mare di Pisa by a master who wished to declare GA. These documents integrate the report in the
consolato (occasionally with some modification)
with an official request for the declaration of Average, and the name reflects this dual function. In English, the
consolati were known as ‘sea protests’, and I have sometimes used this term to refer to these narrative documents generally. This is explained more fully in the main text.
2 p. 80. Finally, since ‘sentence’ in English means the punishment assigned to a defendant who is found guilty of a crime, I have rendered the
sentenza pronounced by the
Consoli as ‘judgement’ throughout.
I have kept the names of magistracies in their original Tuscan. This is to avoid a proliferation of different translations being adopted in Anglophone scholarship on Tuscany. I have referred to the Consoli del Mare di Pisa (Consuls of the Sea in Pisa) as Consoli rather than consuls, both to distinguish them from the many ‘national’ consuls resident in port cities (representatives of national states and/or foreign merchant communities, depending on the place and time) and to avoid confusion with the Catalan collection of maritime customs known as the Llibre del Consolat de Mar (Libro del Consolato del Mare in Italian) and the aforementioned ‘consolati’. I have capitalised the adjective ‘Consular’ when referring to the Consoli del Mare.
Livorno was home to a significant number of foreign merchants who were often members of officially recognised ethno-religious communities which had been given special status by the Tuscan authorities: the nazioni or ‘nations’. A not dissimilar practice was employed in other port cities, as well as in universities. In a university context, the Latin term nationes was used. For maximum clarity, I will adopt the Latin term natio when referring to these formally recognised communities. The English word ‘nation’ is admittedly unlikely to trouble a specialist, but the use of a separate term avoids any hint of confusion with the modern sense of the term.
All translations are my own unless otherwise stated.