bottomry

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)An early form of maritime contract in which the owner of a ship could borrow money using the ship as collateral.

   “Section 10 states that, ‘The lender of money on bottomry and respondentia has an insurable interest in respect of the loan’. A lender on ‘bottomry’ is, as its name suggests, a person who advances money to a shipowner on the security of (the bottom [of]) the ship.”

   “25. The supercargo Colin Campbell, for example, mentioned in 1732 that the first Dutch supercargo Schultz was secretly investing in the bottomry market.”