Comment by toyg

> weird to describe a custom of commons as colonial

When you point at a resource under my control and force me to share it (or else), it's not "a custom of commons" - it's a classic colonial appropriation.

Which is also how Rome and (initially) the Islamic kingdoms saw the sea when they were upstarters - Rome was very much not a naval power to begin with (or ever, really) and Islamic kings resorted to piracy to match Italian and Spanish powers.

Beyond lofty words, when they finally ended up controlling the straits, both empires definitely treated them like personal possession ("mare nostrum", Ottomans closing the Bosphorous...). Like everyone else, in practice.