_Hustings._--This court is mentioned in the charter of Henry I., and in a passage in the so-called Laws of the Confessor the Hustings Court is said to have been founded of old in imitation of and to continue the royal customs of Great Troy. FitzStephen also repeats the legend that the laws of the city were derived from the Trojans, and the passage from the Laws of the Confessor was copied into the _Liber Albus_. It was suggested nearly three centuries since by Munday, that "Troy weight" is the ancient standard weight of London, and carries on the legend of Brutus to this day; but this is not borne out by the facts, although it is frequently reasserted, as in Brewer's _Phrase and Fable_. Munday says, "The weight used for gold and silver called Troy weight was in the time of the Saxons called 'the Hustings weight of London,' and kept there in the Hustings. So an ancient record in the Book of Ramsey (sect. 32, 127): 'I Æthelgiva Countess, etc., bequeath two silver cups of twelve marks of the Hustings weight of London.'"[211] This is interesting as an early notice of the Hustings Court, which is thought by some to have originated under the Danish rule; but the word "Thing" occurs in one of the earliest English laws. It was a Court of Record; the best account of it is given by Dr. Sharpe in his _Calendar of Wills_. The Court of Hustings was not, it appears, necessarily associated with the Guildhall. A Ramsey Charter of 1114-30 speaks of a purchase of a house being completed "in the presence of the whole Court of Hustings of London in the house of Alfwine, son of Leofstan."[212] CHAPTER X LONDINIUM "London was built on the first spot going up the river where any considerable tract of dry land touches the stream. It is a tract of good gravel, well supplied with water, not liable to flooding, and not commanded by neighbouring higher ground."--LORD AVEBURY, _Scenery of England_.