Our Legal Heritage, King AEthelbert, 596 to King George III, 1775Reilly, S. A.
History
Our Legal Heritage, King AEthelbert, 596 to King George III, 1775
Reilly, S. A.
Law -- England -- History
Bachelors at Oxford studied the arts of grammar, rhetoric, and
logic, and then music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy, until
they mastered their discipline and therefore were authorized to
teach it. Teaching would then provide an income sufficient to
support a wife. The master of arts was analogous to the master
craftsman of a guild. From 1190, the civil law was studied, and
shortly thereafter, canon law. Later came the study of medicine.
The use of paper supplemented the use of parchment for writing.
Irregular edged paper was made from linen, cotton, straw, and/or
wood beaten to a pulp and then spread out over a wire mesh to dry.
Theologicians taught that the universe was made for the sake and
service of man, so man was placed at the center of the universe.
Man was made for the sake and service of God.
Every freeman holding land of a lord gave homage and fealty to
him, swearing to bear him faith of the tenement held and to
preserve his earthly honor in all things, saving the faith owed to
the king. Homage was done for lands, for free tenements, for
services, and for rents precisely fixed in money or in kind.
Homage could be done to any free person, male or female, adult or
minor, cleric or layman. A man could do several homages to
different lords for different fees, but there had to be a chief
homage to that lord of whom he held his chief tenement. Homage was
not due for dower, from the husband of a woman to whom a tenement
was given as a marriage portion, for a fee given in free alms, or
until the third heir, either for free maritagium [a marriage
portion which is given with a daughter in marriage, that is not
bound to service] or for the fee of younger sisters holding of the
eldest. All fiefs to be inherited by the eldest son had to be
intact. Every lord could exact fealty from his servants.
In this era, the English national race and character was formed.
Only a few barons still had lands in Normandy. Stories of good
King Arthur were popular and set ideals for behavior and justice
in an otherwise barbaric age where force was supreme. His last
battle in which he lay wounded and told a kinsman to rule in his
place and uphold his laws was written in poem ("Layamon's Brut").
Romantic stories were written and read in English. The custom of
"bundling" was started by ladies with their knights, who would lie
together in bed without undressing and with one in a sack the top
of which was tied around his neck, as part of a romantic
courtship. Wealthy men often gave their daughters dowries in case
they were widowed. This might be matched by a marriage settlement
by a prospective husband.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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