Our Legal Heritage: King AEthelbert - King George III, 600 A.D. - 1776: June 2011 (Sixth) EditionReilly, S. A.
History
Our Legal Heritage: King AEthelbert - King George III, 600 A.D. - 1776: June 2011 (Sixth) Edition
Reilly, S. A.
Law -- England -- History
Nuns and monks lived in segregated nunneries and monasteries on church
land and grew their own food. The local bishop usually was also an abbot
of a monastery. The priests and nuns wore long robes with loose belts
and did not carry weapons. Their life was ordered by the ringing of the
bell to start certain activities, such as prayer; meals; meetings; work
in the fields, gardens, or workshops; and copying and illuminating
books. They chanted to pay homage and to communicate with God or his
saints. They taught justice, piety, chastity, peace, and charity; and
cared for the sick. Caring for the sick entailed mostly praying to God
as it was thought that only God could cure. They bathed a few times a
year. They got their drinking water from upstream of where they had
located their latrines over running water. The large monasteries had
libraries, dormitories, guesthouses, kitchens, butteries to store wine,
bakehouses, breweries, dairies, granaries, barns, fishponds, orchards,
vineyards, gardens, workshops, laundries, lavatories with long stone or
marble washing troughs, and towels. Slavery was diminished by the church
by excommunication for the sale of a child over seven. The clergy taught
that manumission of slaves was good for the soul of the dead, so it
became frequent in wills. The clergy were to abstain from red meat and
wine and were to be celibate. But there were periods of laxity.
Punishment was by the cane or scourge.
The Archbishop of Canterbury began anointing new kings at the time of
coronation to emphasize that the king was ruler by the grace of God. As
God's minister, the king could only do right. From 973, the new king
swore to protect the Christian church, to prevent inequities to all
subjects, and to render good justice, which became a standard oath.
It was believed that there was a celestial hierarchy, with heavenly
hosts in specific places. The heavenly bodies revolved in circles around
the earthly world on crystal spheres of their own, which were serene,
harmonious, and eternal. This contrasted with the change, death, and
decay that occurred in the earthly world. Also in this world,
Aristotle's four elements of earth, air, fire, and water sought their
natural places, e.g. bubbles of air rising through water. The planets
were called wanderers because their motion did not fit the circular
scheme.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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