7. British Actuarial Thought in General Insurance (1851–1994)

General insurance—that is, the insurance of risks other than life contingencies—pre-dates life assurance in its development as an established business activity of critical importance to Britain’s economy. Marine insurance first emerged as a significant commercial activity in early thirteenth-century Italy in ports such as Genoa. The earliest historical records of British marine insurance date from sixteenth-century London. Over the following 200 years, the City of London and its insurance institutions such as Lloyds of London developed into a leading global centre of maritime insurance. These institutions delivered dependable insurance to the cargos and sailing ships whose perilous sea voyages drove Britain’s maritime trading economy and the expansion of its Empire.