its real significance. The obscurity has been deepened by the
frequency with which the term has been confounded with the old
phrase, 'Sovereignty of the sea,' and the still current expression,
'Command of the sea.' A discussion--etymological, or even
archæological in character--of the term must be undertaken as
an introduction to the explanation of its now generally accepted
meaning. It is one of those compound words in which a Teutonic
and a Latin (or Romance) element are combined, and which are
easily formed and become widely current when the sea is concerned.
Of such are 'sea-coast,' 'sea-forces' (the 'land- and sea-forces'
used to be a common designation of what we now call the 'Army
and Navy'), 'sea-service,' 'sea-serpent,' and 'sea-officer' (now
superseded by 'naval officer'). The term in one form is as old
as the fifteenth century. Edward III, in commemoration of the
naval victory of Sluys, coined gold 'nobles' which bore on one
side his effigy 'crowned, standing in a large ship, holding in
one hand a sword and in the other a shield.' An anonymous poet,
who wrote in the reign of Henry VI, says of this coin:

For four things our noble showeth to me,
King, ship, and sword, and _power_of_the_sea_.

Even in its present form the term is not of very recent date.
Grote [2] speaks of 'the conversion of Athens from a land-power
into a sea-power.' In a lecture published in 1883, but probably
delivered earlier, the late Sir J. R. Seeley says that 'commerce
was swept out of the Mediterranean by the besom of the Turkish
sea-power.'[3] The term also occurs in vol. xviii. of the
'Encyclopædia Britannica,' published in 1885. At p. 574 of that
volume (art. Persia) we are told that Themistocles was 'the founder