All that one can say is that the Archbishop in claiming that the Northumbrian priest’s oath should be regarded as one of ‘120 tributarii’ seems to have had in his mind what was afterwards generally conceded, _i.e._ that the priest should be put, in social position, on a par with the thane or twelve-hynde man. Moreover, the Archbishop’s use in this connection of the phrase ‘so many _tributarii_’ or ‘_manentes_,’ instead of so many ‘hides,’ is interesting. It helps us to understand that the hide as used in the Laws of Ine was probably the same fiscal or gafol paying unit as the _familia_ of Bede. Another clause in this interesting document bears more directly upon the question of homicide, and it is valuable as giving information quite independent of the Laws. It is the answer of the Archbishop to the question, ‘What if a layman shall kill a cleric or a monk, whether the _precium sanguinis_ according to the law _natalium parentum_ shall be paid to his near relations or whether his _seniores_ are to be satisfied by a larger amount--which does your Unanimity sanction?’ The reply is as follows:-- [Sidenote: The wergelds of the clergy to be paid to the church.] Quicunque vero ex laicis occiderit episcopum, presbiterum, vel diaconum, aut monachum, agat pœnitentiam secundum gradus pœnitentiæ constitutos, et reddat precium æcclesiæ suæ; pro episcopo secundum [placitum] universalis consilii, pro presbitero octingentos siclos, pro diacono sexingentos, pro monacho vero quadringentos argenteos; nisi aut dignitas natalium vel nobilitas generis majus reposcat precium. Non enim justum est, ut servitium sanctæ professionis in meliori gradu perdat quod exterior vita sub laico habitu habuisse jure parentum dinoscitur. Whoever indeed of laymen shall have killed a bishop, priest, or deacon or monk shall do penance according to the constituted scale of penitentials, and let him pay the price to his church--for a bishop according to [the decision] of a general Council: For a priest 800 sicli For a deacon 600 sicli But for a monk 400 argentei[247] unless dignity of birth or nobility of kindred demand a greater _precium_. For it is not just that service in a holy profession in a higher grade should lose what secular life in lay dress may be recognised to have by right of parentage. The wergelds here stated for the clergy are stated in _sicli_ and _argentei_. The Roman argenteus, as we have seen (after Nero’s time), was the drachma of silver, and the siclus was a didrachma or quarter of an ounce. The Archbishop, therefore, was claiming 200 ounces of silver as the wergeld of his Northumbrian priest. [Sidenote: Stated in Roman silver currency.]