II. FRAGMENT ‘OF “GRITH” AND OF “MUND.”’
Having gained from the ‘De Institutis Lundonie’ some sense of the greatness of the change to England consequent upon the accession of Cnut and also of the importance of England to Cnut’s Scandinavian kingdom, we may now turn to the consideration of certain documents which seem to be attempts made during this period of change to realise and record what had been Anglo-Saxon custom.
Mund-bryce of the king and of the Church five pounds.
The first clauses of Cnut’s Church laws refer to the maintenance of the rights of the Church as to ‘grith and frith.’[222] ‘Because God’s grith is of all griths the best, and next thereto the king’s, it is very right that God’s church-grith within walls and a Christian king’s hand-grith stand equally inviolate,’ so that anyone infringing either ‘shall forfeit land and life unless the king be merciful to him.’[223] A homicide within church walls was to be ‘botless,’ unless the king ‘granted life against full bot.’ In this case the homicide must pay his full wer to Christ or the king, as the case might be, and so ‘inlaw himself to bot.’ Then the bot was to be the same as the king’s ‘mund-bryce’ of five pounds.
These clauses seem to be taken from another document of this period,[224] headed ‘Of Church grith,’ which is printed by Thorpe among the Laws of Ethelred.
Again, the laws decreed by Ethelred and his witan at Wantage[225] respecting ‘frith-bot’ commence with the decree that ‘grith should stand henceforth as it originally stood in the days of his [the king’s] forefathers.’ So that again ancient custom is confirmed rather than new law enacted.
The grith of various moots.
This decree of Wantage relates, not, like Cnut’s law, to the grith of the Church, but to the grith of various assemblies or courts. Crimes committed within the grith or peace given by the king’s own hand (that is, the king’s ‘hand-grith’ of the other documents) is again botless. The grith which the ealdorman and the king’s reeve give in the assembly of the ‘five-burgs’ if broken involves a bot of 1200 (scillings?), that given by a burh-assembly 600, that by a wapentake 100, that in an alehouse ‘for a dead man vi half-marks and for a living one xii ores.’
In a further clause (s. 12) it is stated that in a king’s suit the deposit or ‘wed’ was to be of vi half-marks, in an eorl’s and a bishop’s of xii ores, and in a thane’s of vi ores. Here both English and Danish currencies are used. The law is common to both peoples.
The principle of the ‘grith’ or ‘frith’ is alike for both English and Danes, and it does not seem that Cnut had any intention of altering what had been law in this respect under his English predecessor.
Grith-bryce and mund-bryce the same thing.
In s. 3 of Cnut’s Church laws, dealing with crimes less than homicide, he seems to treat the ‘grith’ of his new law and the ‘mund-bryce’ of old law as practically the same thing, and this clause according to the text of MS. G.[226] contains an interesting allusion to Kentish as well as other English law.
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.
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]
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.
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.’
Borh-bryce.
In s. 59 of the secular laws of Cnut under the heading ‘Of Borh-bryce’ is a statement that if any one break the king’s ‘borh’ the bot is five pounds; an archbishop’s or ætheling’s ‘borh’ three pounds; a leod-bishop’s or ealdorman’s ‘borh’ two pounds. This is a re-enactment of clause 3 of King Alfred’s dooms. In the latter the words ‘borh-bryce’ and ‘mund-byrd’ appear to be interchangeable. Both mean the breach of protection or mund.
Extent of the area of the grith.
There is finally a fragment[230] which fixes the extent of the king’s ‘grith’ to be ‘three miles and three furlongs and three acre breadths and nine feet and nine hand breadths and nine barleycorns from the “burhgeat” where the king is.’
Within this area the ‘grith’ or protection of the king extends, and the use of the word ‘grith’ seems to place this fragment among those belonging to the Danish group.
In this ‘grith’ or area of protection, taken together with the grith of various persons in regard to the duration of the protection, and the grith of the various assemblies or courts, and, finally, in the mund of various persons marked by the amount of the mund-bryce, there is surely a foundation in ancient custom for the jurisdiction involved in the sac and soc of the later period.
The soc and sac of later laws.
We have seen in the clauses of the so-called Laws of Henry I. allusion to the ‘sac and soc’ of the lord on whose land a homicide has been perpetrated and under whose jurisdiction the wed or pledge has been given for the payment of wergeld. According to earlier phraseology, the lord’s grith or peace has been broken. He has a territorial jurisdiction over the giving of the wed by which it is to be restored, and he is entitled to fightwite accordingly. If his own man has been slain, whether on his own land or not, his mund has been broken and the manbot of his man is payable to him. The phrase ‘soc and sac’ is probably of Scandinavian origin. It does not seem to go back earlier than the time of Cnut.[231] It is not found in his laws. But the principle at the root of the ‘grith’ and the ‘mund’ was not one newly introduced at this period. We shall find it again in the earliest laws, and we have already found it at work under Irish custom. The Irish chieftain’s ‘precinct’ or area of protection extended on his ‘green’ as far as he could throw his hammer, and the value of his protection varied, as we have seen, with his ‘honour price.’