Nullius in verba and cited elsewhere. Nullius in verba The Royal Society website explains the motto thus: It is an expression of the determination of Fellows to withstand the domination of authority and to verify all statements by an appeal to facts determined by experiment. The phrase came from Horace's "Epistle" to his benefactor Maecenas, where he claims not to be devoted to any particular sect but is rather an eclectic by nature. These are the words, forming two hexameters in the original context: The minor planet known as 11059 Nulliusinverba in the asteroid belt is named after the expression. The phrase is
Terra nullius Spitzbergen, as it was then known, as "terra nullius": The territorial dispute was eventually resolved by the Svalbard Treaty of 9 February 1920 which recognized Norwegian sovereignty over the islands. Norway occupied and claimed parts of (then uninhabited) Eastern Greenland in 1931, claiming that it constituted "terra nullius" and calling the territory Erik the Red's Land. The Permanent Court of International Justice ruled against the Norwegian claim. The Norwegians accepted the ruling and withdrew their claim. The Philippines and the People's Republic of China both claim the Scarborough Shoal or Panatag Shoal or Huangyan Island (黄岩岛), nearest to the island