John Of Utynam's Argument Of Monopolies

As early as 500 BCE, human has already had the consciousness of patent protection. Historian found some interesting words in the Sybaris, an Ancient Greece city, “encouragement was held out to all who should discover any new refinement in luxury, the profits arising from which were secured to the inventor by patent for the space of a year.” (Anthon，1841) That means if you create something in luxury, you could get profit from the sale in one year. With the development of society, people began to use paper to record patent. In 1449, John of Utynam got a letter patent. This patent gave him a twenty-years monopoly which helped him to protect his new glass-making process. At that time in England, this glass-making process was unknown (Science Thomsonreuters). The first patent law was established in Venice in 1474. In this patent law, they mentioned in a limited period of time the creator owned certain rights. If someone infringes creators’ rights, they would be accountable for creators’ damages (The Business of Patents).
According to this law, King is the only one who can issue the letter patents to those inventors. In this law, it also created a duration of patent right protection, 14 years (Pila, 2001). The authentication from King could keep the patents’ formality. The duration of patent right protection ensured inventors’ interests.
Before the War for Independence, many colonies had their own patent laws. Those patent laws indirectly influenced the U.S. Constitutions. In the U.S. Constitutions, we could find “To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries” (History and Sources of Intellectual Property Law). It described inventors’ rights, and it also mentioned the patents had a duration. Those words became the basis of the first U.S. Patent