The ''Ordinamenta et consuetudo maris'' (“Ordinances and Custom of the Sea”) was a convention governing maritime trade promulgated at

Trani Trani () is a seaport of Apulia, in southern Italy, on the Adriatic Sea, by railway west-northwest of Bari. It is one of the capital cities of the Province of Barletta-Andria-Trani. History Overview The city of ''Turenum'' appears for the fir ...

in 1063: "the oldest surviving maritime law code of the Latin West".Paul Oldfield, ''City and Community in Norman Italy'' (Oxford: 2009), 247. The ''Ordinamenta'' is preserved in a Venetian version appended to a copy of the ''Statuta Firmanorum'', the statutes of the commune of

Fermo Fermo (ancient: Firmum Picenum) is a town and ''comune'' of the Marche, Italy, in the Province of Fermo. Fermo is on a hill, the Sabulo, elevation , on a branch from Porto San Giorgio on the Adriatic coast railway. History The oldest hum ...

, printed in a single volume at

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...

“under the auspices and care, through the diligence, and at the expense of Marcus Marcellus, a citizen of Venice, and a native of

Petriolo Petriolo is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Macerata in the Italy, Italian region Marche, located about south of Ancona and about south of Macerata. As of 31 December 2004, it had a population of 2,063 and an area of .All demograph ...

, a small village in the circle of Fermo, at the press of Nicholaus de Brentis and Alexander de Badanis, the Lord

Leonardo Loredano Leonardo Loredan (; vec, Lunardo Loredan ; 16 November 1436 – 22 June 1521) was a Republic of Venice, Venetian nobleman and statesman who reigned as the 75th Doge of Venice from 1501 until his death in 1521. A wartime ruler, his dogeship was ...

being

Doge A doge ( , ; plural dogi or doges) was an elected lord and head of state in several Italian city-states, notably Venice and Genoa, during the medieval and renaissance periods. Such states are referred to as " crowned republics". Etymology The ...

, A.D. MDVII” (1507). Two copies of this work were preserved in the municipal archives of Fermo and another in the

Bibliothèque nationale de France The Bibliothèque nationale de France (, 'National Library of France'; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites known respectively as ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository ...

. Probably the Venetian version was a translation made from the original Latin after 1496, when Trani came under Venetian dominion (where it remained until 1509). The printed version appears under a Latin title, with a Latin subtitle (''edita per consules civitatis Trani''), possible both original. A few Latin phrases left untranslated also evidence a work of translation. The text in the archives of Fermo was supplied by their then keeper, Filippo Raffaelle, for a critical edition and English translation in the ''

Black Book of the Admiralty The ''Black Book of the Admiralty'' is a compilation of English admiralty law created over the course of several English monarchs' reigns, including the most important decisions of the High Court of Admiralty. Its starting point is the Rolls of ...

''. The text of the ''Ordinamenta'' contains the date ''

anno Domini The terms (AD) and before Christ (BC) are used to label or number years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The term is Medieval Latin and means 'in the year of the Lord', but is often presented using "our Lord" instead of "the Lord", ...

'' 1063 and specifies the first

indiction An indiction ( la, indictio, impost) was a periodic reassessment of taxation in the Roman Empire which took place every fifteen years. In Late Antiquity, this 15-year cycle began to be used to date documents and it continued to be used for this p ...

. This has been cited as “a strong argument in favour of the authenticity of the ordinances”, since the first indiction only coincides with the sixty-third year of a century every three hundred years, but it did with 1063. The text also refers to ‘‘electi consoli in arte de mare’’, which is translated “Consuls elect of the Guild of Navigators” in the ''Black Book''. Neither the translation “guild” nor that of “company” (typical for Latin ''societas'') for the presumed Latin original, ''ars'', is strictly accurate.Twiss, 525 n.1 Nevertheless, the term has been seen as evidence of the existence of a sailors' corporation at Trani in the mid-eleventh century.

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