Tribal Custom in Anglo-Saxon Law: Being an Essay Supplemental to (1) 'The English Village Community', (2) 'The Tribal System in Wales'Seebohm, Frederic
History
Tribal Custom in Anglo-Saxon Law: Being an Essay Supplemental to (1) 'The English Village Community', (2) 'The Tribal System in Wales'
Seebohm, Frederic
Anglo-Saxons; Law, Anglo-Saxon; Law, Medieval; Tribes -- Great Britain
Heafod mynstres griðbryce is æt bot wyrþum þingū be cinges munde.
ꝥ is mid · v · pundum on Engla lage ⁊ on cent lande æt þā mund
bryce · v · pund þā cingce. ⁊ þreo þā arceƀ. ⁊ medemran mynstres
mid · cxx · scill. ꝥæ is be cingres wite. ⁊ þonne gyt læssan þær
lytel þeowdom sig ⁊ leger-stow þeah sig mid lx scill. and feald
cyricean þær leger-scow ne sig mid xxx scyll.
The grith-bryce of the chief minster in cases entitled to bot
is according to the King’s mund, that is v pounds by English
law _and in Kent for the mund-bryce v pounds to the King_, and
three to the archbishop, and of a minster of the middle class cxx
scillings, that is according to the King’s wite, and of one yet
less where there is little service, provided there be a burying
place, lx scillings and of a field church thirty scillings.
Further, there is a separate document belonging to this period entitled
‘Of _Grith_ and of _Mund_’[227] which seems to have been a careful
statement of what ‘formerly’ had been law among the English, the Kentish
people, the South Angles, and the North Angles respectively.
[Sidenote: Reference to Kentish law.]
It is too long to be quoted at length. It states again that ‘God’s
grith is of all griths’ of the first importance, and ‘next thereto the
king’s.’ ‘Formerly among the English,’ when a man fled for his life to
the king, the archbishop or the ætheling, he had nine days’ ‘grith.’ If
he sought a bishop or ealdorman he had seven days’ ‘grith.’[228] Then
it goes on to state that in the law of the _Kentish_ people ‘the king
and the archbishop had a like and equally dear _mund-bryce_,’ while
the archbishop’s property according to Kentish law was compensated for
elevenfold and the king’s ninefold, though ‘the mund-byrd of Christ’s
Church was the same as the king’s.’[229]
[Sidenote: Grith-law of South Angles.]
Next the ‘grith-law’ of the _South Angles_ is described. The king’s
mund-bryce is stated again to be five pounds by the law of the English;
an archbishop and an ætheling’s mund-bryce three pounds; other bishops’
and an ealdorman’s two pounds: and if any one fight in the presence of an
ætheling or archbishop the bot was cl scillings, if in that of another
bishop or ealdorman c scillings.
[Sidenote: Law of North Angles.]
Lastly, the document records that in the _North Angles’_ law ‘it stands
that he who slays any one within church walls shall be liable in his
life, and he who wounds shall be liable in his hand: and let him who
slays any one within church doors give to the church cxx scillings,
according to the North-Angles’ law. And let a freeman who harms a living
person in his “mund-byrd” pay xxx scillings.’
[Sidenote: Borh-bryce.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account