Law, from the series Bookscapes, by Max Steven Grossman, 2016. Digital photograph, 48 x 100 inches. © Max Steven Grossman, courtesy of the artist.
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Miscellany
A British law dictates that any whale, porpoise, or sturgeon caught near the coast or cast ashore is a “royal fish” and belongs to the Crown. Specifics were refined in a 1610 parliamentary debate over the ownership of the salmon population in the Irish River Bann. “Though they are great fish,” said Lord Robert Hale, who argued these salmon should be considered part of the commons, “they are not royal fish.”
In a court of fowls, the cockroach never wins its case.
—Rwandan proverb
