History of insurance: Medieval era | Insurance Guides
History of insurance. Medieval era. Sea loans or foenus nauticum were common before the traditional marine insurance in the medieval times, in which investor lend his money to a travelling merchant, and merchant will be liable to pay back if the ship returns safely, providing credit and sea insurance at the same time. The rate of interest for sea loans was high to compensate higher risk involved. Hence, in sea loans merchants have to pay the interest charges to the lenders for bearing the sea risk rather than profit sharing, as it was the case in sedentary-travelling merchant relationship. Therefore, due the usury involvement in the transaction, in 1236 the Pope Gregory IX condemned this practice in his decretal Naviganti (Roover, 1945, p. 175; See also Kingston, 2011). The commenda contracts were introduced when Pope Gregory IX condemned the sea loans because of usury. Capitalist provide funds to entrepreneur to carry out trade on partnership, sharing the profit but both sea and