Book Review: Shipping law and admiralty jurisdiction in South Africa

JurisdictionSouth Africa
AuthorSD Girvin
Citation(2000) 12 SA Merc LJ 352
Published date25 May 2019
Pages352-357
Date25 May 2019
Book
Review/Boekresensie
Shipping Law and Admiralty Jurisdiction in South Africa.
By John Hare.
Juta & Co Ltd, Cape Town. 1999. lxviii & 1060 pp. Price R995 (hard
cover); R795 (soft cover).
The appearance of a major new text on maritime law in South Africa is an event
of signal importance for all South African maritime lawyers and indeed also
foreign maritime lawyers wishing to have an informed knowledge of shipping law
as practised in South Africa. Although intended as the successor to BR Bamford's
The Law of Shipping and Carriage in South Africa,
the third edition of which
appeared in 1984, Professor Hare's aim has been to write a text which bridges the
divide between English maritime law and the Roman-Dutch common law of
South Africa. He has sought to present a thoroughly modernized and
comprehensive analysis of the application of the principles of maritime law in
South Africa and joins a handful of writers of such one-volume texts written
in other jurisdictions throughout the English-speaking world. (For the United
Kingdom, see Christopher Hill
Maritime Law 5
ed (1998); for Australia, Martin
Davies & Anthony Dickey
Shipping Law
2 ed (1995); for the United States of
Americs, Thomas J Schoenbaum
Admiralty and Maritime Law
2 ed (1994).)
An important feature of this book is the extremely attractive way in which the
material is presented. Indeed, this feature is a major (and welcome) innovation.
The hardcover edition contains a gold-embossed fouled anchor on the front
cover, while the softcover edition contains two fine sketches, on the front and
back covers, of the
Areti L
(see
Ex parte Terminus Compania Naviera SA and
Grinrod Marine (Pty) Ltd: In re the
Areti L 1986 (2) SA 446 (C)) and the
Alwyn
Vincent.
(These are taken from oil paintings by the author's artist wife.) Each part
of the book begins with, and contains throughout, a sketch appropriate to the
section and also some appropriate words, sometimes from decided cases or older
authorities (for example, at 663), sometimes from the author himself, and
sometimes both (see, for example, at 171, 369, 379, and 573). The chapter on
salvage, for example, contains a sketch representing the salvage tugs,
John Ross
and
Wolraad Woltemade.
The chapter on 'The Jurisprudence of Carriage by Sea'
contains a sketch of a container vessel — one of Safmarine's 'great whites',
perhaps — being loaded. The opening facing-page on 'salvage' contains a
quotation from Dr Lushington in
The Albion
(1861) Lush 282, 167 ER 121. A
further feature of this book, marking it out from traditional law books, is the
anecdotal accounts by the author, often hidden away in footnotes (see, for
example, at 313n163, 330n3, 358n32, and 406n100). This, perhaps, reflects the
concern by the author that 'shipping law is far too interesting a subject to allow it
to dry out altogether' (at 10).
First impressions of the book, superficially daunting at over 1 000 printed
pages, are very favourable. The purchaser will acquire a text that analyses all the
main areas of maritime law. There are, in addition to the main text,
comprehensive appendices of nearly 240 pages. These contain all the relevant
352
(2000) 12 SA Merc LJ 352
© Juta and Company (Pty) Ltd

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