Essays on a Comparative History of Fire Insurance
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Hellwege, P. (Ed.) (2021). Essays on a Comparative History of Fire Insurance. Duncker & Humblot. https://doi.org/10.3790/978-3-428-58372-0
Hellwege, Phillip. Essays on a Comparative History of Fire Insurance. Duncker & Humblot, 2021. Book. https://doi.org/10.3790/978-3-428-58372-0
Hellwege, P (ed.) (2021): Essays on a Comparative History of Fire Insurance, Duncker & Humblot, [online] https://doi.org/10.3790/978-3-428-58372-0
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Essays on a Comparative History of Fire Insurance
Editors: Hellwege, Phillip
(2021)
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Abstract
The aim of the present volume is to reassess the history of fire insurance and fire insurance law in selected European countries from comparative perspectives. Its point of departure is the observation that today’s state of research is unsatisfactory. Foremost, the history of fire insurance and fire insurance law presents itself differently in the various European historiographies. German authors usually assert that modern fire insurance is rooted in medieval and early modern guild support, and German literature further claims that state-run fire insurance schemes as first established towards the end of the seventeenth century were of particular importance for the development of modern fire insurance. By contrast, English literature often treats fire insurance and fire insurance law as being the offspring of marine insurance. Research in many other European countries follows English literature in treating fire insurance as being firmly rooted in marine insurance. The present volume revisits these different narratives.
Table of Contents
| Section Title | Page | Action | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Preface | 5 | ||
| Inhaltsverzeichnis | 7 | ||
| Phillip Hellwege: Chapter 1: Introduction | 9 | ||
| Delphine Sirks: Chapter 2: The Netherlands | 13 | ||
| A. Introduction | 13 | ||
| I. Local fire prevention and firefighting measures | 14 | ||
| II. From water bucket to fire hose | 14 | ||
| III. Living in a world without insurance | 16 | ||
| IV. Early traces of Dutch fire insurance initiatives elsewhere | 17 | ||
| B. Instances of fire insurance in practice | 18 | ||
| I. Traces of premium fire insurance contracts in mid-seventeenth-century Rotterdam | 18 | ||
| II. Mutual fire insurance contracts throughout the Dutch Republic during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries | 19 | ||
| III. Insurance companies established in the Dutch Bubble of 1720 | 21 | ||
| IV. From the 1770s: (mutual) fire insurance companies | 22 | ||
| C. Fire insurance in legislation | 24 | ||
| D. Conclusion | 26 | ||
| Matthias Bogner: Chapter 3: Germany | 29 | ||
| A. The origins of state-run fire offices and German Kameralismus (cameralism) | 31 | ||
| I. The Hamburg Feuerkontrakte: the first spark? | 31 | ||
| II. The state taking the initiative: the creation of public fire offices | 34 | ||
| III. German cameralism and fire insurance | 36 | ||
| IV. The public fire offices' legal framework | 37 | ||
| 1. Effectively insuring ˋthe masses' versus preventing fraud | 37 | ||
| 2. The ˋprinciple of mutual support' and its legal implementation | 39 | ||
| 3. Rebuilding the burnt-down houses | 41 | ||
| B. The rise of private fire insurance companies | 42 | ||
| I. The General Prussian Territorial Law of 1794 – a law anticipating practice? | 42 | ||
| II. A short account on the genesis and content of the General Prussian Territorial Law of 1794 | 43 | ||
| III. The foundation years of private fire insurance companies after 1812 | 46 | ||
| IV. Two examples testing the impact of English influences and the importance of the General Prussian Territorial Law of 1794 | 49 | ||
| 1. Premium default: a clause imported from England | 49 | ||
| 2. Increase of risk: a subtle impact of the General Prussian Territorial Law | 51 | ||
| V. Conclusion | 55 | ||
| C. Public and private fire insurance schemes in the mid-nineteenth century: two monolithic systems? | 56 | ||
| I. Fire insurance developing into an unregulated ˋbulk business' | 56 | ||
| II. Opening the markets: competition between the two systems | 59 | ||
| III. Exchange of ideas | 60 | ||
| D. Conclusion | 64 | ||
| Chapter 4: England | 65 | ||
| Sinem Ogis: A. Fire assistance, prevention, and insurance before 1666 | 65 | ||
| I. General overview | 65 | ||
| II. Guilds and fire guilds | 66 | ||
| III. Fire briefs | 67 | ||
| IV. Fire prevention | 68 | ||
| V. First proposition to introduce fire insurance schemes | 69 | ||
| VI. Fire insurance after the Great Fire and earlier initiatives compared | 72 | ||
| VII. Conclusion | 75 | ||
| Ervis Caja: B. The development of fire insurance after the Great Fire of London | 76 | ||
| I. Introduction | 76 | ||
| II. The factual and legal framework | 76 | ||
| III. The first fire insurance companies | 78 | ||
| IV. Standardization of policies | 79 | ||
| V. The development of policy conditions | 80 | ||
| 1. Classification systems | 80 | ||
| 2. Increase of risk and relocation | 85 | ||
| 3. Excluding certain risks | 86 | ||
| 4. Limiting the insured sum | 88 | ||
| 5. Insurable interest | 89 | ||
| VI. Conclusion | 89 | ||
| Martin Sunnqvist: Chapter 5: Fire help (brandstod) and other types of fire insurance in Scandinavia | 91 | ||
| A. Introduction | 91 | ||
| B. Locally arranged fire help (brandstod) | 92 | ||
| I. Fire-help arrangements in the countryside or in towns | 92 | ||
| 1. Origins and early examples | 92 | ||
| 2. Fire help in Swedish legislation from the mid-thirteenth century | 95 | ||
| II. Contractual fire help through guilds | 96 | ||
| 1. Guilds of St. Canute and St. Eric | 96 | ||
| 2. Craft guilds | 97 | ||
| 3. Guilds in the countryside | 98 | ||
| III. Begging and exemption from taxes | 98 | ||
| C. Fire insurance associations | 99 | ||
| I. Reasons for organizing fire insurance | 99 | ||
| II. Denmark-Norway, eighteenth century | 99 | ||
| III. Sweden-Finland, eighteenth century | 101 | ||
| IV. Freedom of trade in the mid-nineteenth century | 103 | ||
| D. Concluding comments | 105 | ||
| I. Insurance or poor relief? | 105 | ||
| II. Law or custom? | 106 | ||
| III. Public law or private law? | 107 | ||
| A. The development of fire insurance in Italy from the eighteenth to the twentieth century | 109 | ||
| Chapter 6: Italy | 109 | ||
| Maura Fortunati: A. The development of fire insurance in Italyrfrom the eighteenth to the twentieth century | 109 | ||
| I. The birth of the first fire insurance companies in Italy | 109 | ||
| II. Fire insurance in the first post-unification period: regulatory gaps and the strength of practice | 114 | ||
| III. The Codice di commercio of 1882: between innovation and tradition | 119 | ||
| IV. The 1882 Codice di commercio and insurance policies in the courtroom | 122 | ||
| V. A paradigm shift in 1942 | 124 | ||
| Federica Furfaro: B. The collaboration between fire insurance companiesron the Italian Peninsula before and after the national unification | 124 | ||
| I. The beginnings of fire insurance in pre-unification Italy | 124 | ||
| 1. A first Tyrolean initiative | 126 | ||
| 2. Obstacles, shortcomings, and mistrust | 126 | ||
| 3. The breakthrough | 130 | ||
| 4. Nineteenth-century fire disasters | 131 | ||
| II. The Concordato between Italian fire insurers | 132 | ||
| 1. Origins, aims, and sources of inspiration | 133 | ||
| 2. The original Concordato of 1842 | 135 | ||
| 3. Different stages of development | 137 | ||
| a) A constitutive phase (1842‒1844) | 137 | ||
| b) A test phase (1845–1872) | 137 | ||
| c) A phase of suspension (1873–1883) | 138 | ||
| d) A phase of consolidation (1884 to mid-twentieth century) | 139 | ||
| III. The Concordato and the development of fire insurance | 139 | ||
| 1. Achievements … | 140 | ||
| 2. … and presumed merits | 141 | ||
| IV. Concluding remarks | 142 | ||
| David Deroussin: Chapter 7: France | 143 | ||
| A. Fire insurance in the eighteenth century | 146 | ||
| I. Mutual fire offices | 146 | ||
| II. Insurance companies | 149 | ||
| III. Unfinished projects | 159 | ||
| B. From the French Revolution to the Napoleonic Empire | 159 | ||
| C. The Restauration: the establishment of the modern French insurance sector | 165 | ||
| I. Mutual insurance societies | 169 | ||
| II. Fixed-premium insurance companies | 173 | ||
| D. Fire insurance since the second half of the nineteenth century: between liberalism and state intervention | 178 | ||
| E. Conclusion | 181 | ||
| Jerònia Pons Pons: Chapter 8: Spain | 183 | ||
| A. Freedom in the creation of joint-stock companies and mutual fire insurance societies (1829–1848) | 184 | ||
| B. Restrictions on the creation of joint-stock companies (1848‒1868) | 190 | ||
| C. The modernization of insurance practice and regulation (1868–1908) | 192 | ||
| D. Conclusion | 203 | ||
| Phillip Hellwege: Chapter 9: Comparative Analysis | 205 | ||
| A. The history of fire insurance | 205 | ||
| B. The history of fire insurance law | 215 | ||
| List of Contributors | 221 | ||
| Index | 223 |