The subject matter of this thesis are major maritime accidents and their impact on the development of maritime law. These major maritime accidents entail series of accidents caused by oil tankers from the mid-twentieth century onward, ultimately causing huge environmental disasters. The paper analyses the determinants of the most important conventions adopted after such major maritime accidents, primarily from the aspect of liability for damage caused by oil pollution of the sea, as well as the exclusion of this same liability. In that regard, it is particularly important to emphasize the importance of the adoption of the International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage of 1969, and its successor, the International Convention on the Establishment of an International Fund for Compensation for Oil Pollution Damage of 1971, that together paved the way for further international regulation of marine oil pollution from ships. This was best outlined by the international community's response to the major tankers accidents and their consequences through the work of the International Maritime Organization and its other intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations. Moreover, all the elaborate conventions in the thesis are viewed through similarities and contrasts with regard to the institute of ship-owner and seafarer liability, but also of third parties responsible for damage due to oil pollution of the sea, and the institute of the privilege of their limitation of liability. Finally, in the light of all processed convention solutions considered in connection with the subject-matter in question, the provisions of the Maritime Code of the Republic of Croatia, which closely follow the provisions of those Conventions, are also taken into account.