ANGLO-SAXON LAWS AND

GOVERNMENT.

THIS, the closing period of the Anglo-Saxon rule, appears the proper place for a brief sketch of the social and political state of their commonwealth, such as may be deduced from what remains to us of its laws and institutes. These laws are manifestly only a very small portion of the jurisprudence of our forefathers, but their provisions establish the fact that their state was one in which the ranks of society were accurately defined, and the rights of property strictly guarded.

The earliest of these documents is a code issued (circa 600) by Ethelbert of Kent, which, though commencing with a provision for the protection of the property of God and the Church, gives no other evidence of proceeding from a Christian ruler, being probably little else than a summary of the laws prevailing in heathen times; it imposes penalties for slaying, for housebreaking, for highway robbery, and for personal injuries, which are minutely detailed, and defines the portions. of widows and orphans. Lothaire and Edric of Kent (circa 680) add directions for conducting lawsuits, make

a See p. 60.

b The term used is "God's fee," but whether tithes are included has been disputed. It is, however, quite certain that tithes existed in England in the time of Archbishop Theodore (A.D. 669 to 690); and the laws ascribed to Edward the Confessor speak of them as claimed by Augustine and conceded by the king, with the approbation of the chiefs and people, which is probably true, though no direct evidence of the fact has come down to us. See p. 68.

ANGLO-SAXON LAWS AND GOVERNMENT.

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hosts responsible for the conduct of strangers who had resided three days with them, and forbid quarrels and slander.

The laws of Wihtred of Kent (circa 696 d), present the first distinct picture of a Christian state in our island. They grant to the Church freedom from imposts, forbid immorality and Sunday working, regulate fasting at certain times, and prohibit idolatry; they also contain severe enactments against thieves.

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The "dooms" of the great Alfred were, as he him› self informs us, a selection made by him and his witan from those which their forefathers held he commences them with the decalogue and other portions of the Mosaic law, but he modifies their strictness, as synods had ordained that secular lords, with their leave, might, without sin, take for almost every misdeed, for the first offence, the money-bote (compensation) which they then ordained, except in cases of treason against a lord, to which they dared not assign any mercy." Ina of Wessex and Offa of Mercia had issued laws, which were published with his own by Alfred, and through the whole runs one great distinction from the Mosaic law; for although avowedly basing all legislation on the Bible, "blood for blood" is not the rule, but every homicide can be atoned for by a money payment (termed were) varying according to the rank of the parties.

Alfred is commonly spoken of as the great lawgiver of the Anglo-Saxon period, but he informs us that the laws which he promulgated contained but little of his

• See p. 70.

• See p. 163.

Those of Offa are now lost.

own, "for it was unknown to him what of it would please those who should come after him;" he therefore merely made a selection from existing laws, and it is certain that the division of England into shires did not originate with him, the "shire-man or other judge' being mentioned by Ina; the division into hundreds may probably be his.

The laws of succeeding monarchs are chiefly remarkable as proving that the Danes settled in England lived under their own laws; Edward the Elder (901-924) says that penalties which among the Saxons are estimated in shillings, are by the Danes reckoned by ores, twelve of the latter being equivalent to forty of the former; and Edgar (circa 970) expressly allows them to make "such good laws as they best may choose." Ethelred, indeed, issued an ordinance from Woodstock for the whole nation, according to the law of the English," but there seems no reason for supposing that so feeble a ruler could effect any alteration in their state. Under Canute, of course they preserved their own institutions, but they do not seem to have imposed them upon the rest of the nation; for he expressly and separately mentions the king's rights under the Wessex, and the Mercian, and the Danish laws. Canute's "secular ordinance" (which embodies many of the provisions of an ordinance of Ethelred dated 1008) commences, "That is then the first that I will; that just laws be established, and every unjust law carefully suppressed, and that every injustice be weeded out and rooted up with

See note, p. 166

all possible diligence from this country. And let God's justice be exalted, and henceforth let every man, both poor and rich, be esteemed worthy of folk right, and let just dooms be doomed to him." Such, indeed, seems its intention, and it strongly impresses the duty of mercy on the judge. "We command that Christian men be not, on any account, for altogether too little condemned to death: but rather let gentle punishments be decreed for the benefit of the people, and let not be destroyed for little God's handy-work, and His own purchase which he dearly bought." He then proceeds to prohibit selling slaves to heathens, and the piactice of any kind of witchcraft, and decrees that manslayers and perjurers and others who will not reform, shall "with their sins retire from the country."

What follows differs little from the laws of preceding kings, but Canute also ordains that councils shall be held in the towns twice, in the shires thrice in the year, at which the bishop and the ealdorman are to be present, to expound both the law of God and the secular law; protects women from forced marriages, regulates the term of widowhood, also wills and successions, relieves from the payment of heriot the property of those who fall in battle, decrees the forfeiture of life and land to cowards, alleviates public burdens, and concedes the

h❝This then is the alleviation which it is my will to secure to all the people, of that which they before this were too much oppressed. with. That then is first; that I command all my reeves that they justly provide on my own, and maintain me therewith; and that no man need give them anything unless he himself be willing." Thus we see that the custom of aids or benevolences has an origin at least as old as Anglo-Saxon times.

liberty of huntingi; and though this liberty is somewhat limited by his Constitutions of the Forest, these are reasonable ordinances compared with the forest laws of the Norman kings.

Edward the Confessor is often said to have remodelled the laws of Canute, but no mention is made of the circumstance in the Saxon Chronicle, and what have come down to us as the "laws of Saint Edward” are merely a compilation, made, as stated in the document itself, four years after the Norman invasion, of the laws and customs of the land, which had been approved by Canute, and, it is alleged, derived their origin from Edgar, though many of their provisions are the same as those of the Jaws of Alfred and Ina.

It is apparent from these various codes that the people were the source of power, and that the kings were only their ministers, not their masters; all the land was considered originally theirs, and hence termed folkland, being ordinarily granted out on lease for brief periods to the freemen of each district; but power was conceded to rulers to assign permanently portions by charter in certain cases (often to the Church, but more frequently for military service), which then became bookland, and was devisable by will.

The possession of land, indeed, was essential to dignity and freedom, and the various classes of freemen were mainly distinguished by the amount of their landed pro

i" And I will that every man be entitled to his hunting, in wood and in field, on his own possession. And let every one forego my hunting; take notice where I will have it untrespassed on, under penalty of the full wite,"

* See p. 135.