Monday, February 10, 2014
The Earliest Patent-Law Known?
Phylarchus, quoted by Athenaeus 12.521 c-d (discussing a law supposedly passed by the citizens of Sybaris; tr. Charles Burton Gulick, with his footnote):
The Greek:
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Again, if any caterer or cook invented a dish of his own which was especially choice, it was his privilege that no one else but the inventor himself should adopt the use of it before the lapse of a year, in order that the first man to invent a dish might possess the right of manufacture during that period, so as to encourage others to excel in eager competition with similar inventions.cJourn. in the footnote is incorrect. The full, correct citation is C. Cichorius, "Ein Patentgesetz aus dem griechischen Altertum," Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik 118 (1922) 46-48.
c The earliest patent-law known, Cichorius in Journ. f. Nationalökon., 1922, 46-48.
The Greek:
εἰ δέ τις τῶν ὀψοποιῶν ἢ μαγείρων ἴδιον εὕροι βρῶμα καὶ περιττόν, ἐξουσίαν μὴ εἶναι χρήσασθαι τούτῳ ἕτερον πρὸ ἐνιαυτοῦ ἀλλ᾽ αὐτῷ τῷ εὑρόντι, τὸν χρόνον τοῦτον ὅπως ὁ πρῶτος εὑρὼν καὶ τὴν ἐργασίαν ἔχῃ, πρὸς τὸ τοὺς ἄλλους φιλοπονοῦντας αὑτοὺς ὑπερβάλλεσθαι τοῖς τοιούτοις.
