Forthcoming Book: Ancient Maritime Loan Contracts

Readers of this blog will be interested in receiving advance notice of the publication of Ancient Maritime Loan Contracts by Peter Candy. This will be published in January 2025 by University of Michigan Press in its series, Law and Society in the Ancient World. Drawing on epigraphic, papyrological and legal sources, this work addresses the issue of how maritime trade was financed in the ancient economy. Maritime loan contracts recorded the terms of agreement on which a creditor lent a sum of money to a merchant or carrier to finance the purchase of a cargo for a trading expedition overseas. They were the lifeblood of the long-distance trade in bulk commodities that flourished in the Mediterranean and Black Seas and were also among the first private agreements to be fully committed to writing. The book can be ordered in advance.

The work originated in Dr Candy’s Edinburgh Ph.D. thesis.