The History of Avaria

The word avaria, referring to damages in connection with trade by sea, appears in other latin documents in the european cities of marseilles and barcelona. Languages ranging from german to russian to portuguese to greek at one point all possessed derivatives of this latin root,. Avaria retained that original maritime meaning, in addition to being a generic word for damage. And english was one of those languages. In the late fifteenth century, the written record attests the archaic form avere with the modern form average appearing shortly afterwards.