The smaller matters of import in an old English kingdom were settled at the shire-moot, or meeting of all the freemen of a shire. There, once a month, the aldermen and reeve of the district called up the freeholders who dwelt in it, and by their aid settled disputes and lawsuits. Each freeman had his vote, so the shire-court was a much more democratic body than the Witan, where only great lords and officials could speak and give their suffrages.
Matters too small for the shire-moot were settled by the meeting of the villagers in their own petty tun-moot, which every freeman would attend. Here would be decided disputes between neighbours, as to their fields and cattle. Such cases would be numerous because, in the early settlements of the English, the ploughed fields and the pasture grounds of the village were both great unenclosed tracts with no permanent boundaries. Every man owned his house and yard, but the pasture and the waste land and woods around belonged to the community, and not to the individual.
Gradual growth of towns.
The early English were essentially dwellers in the open country. They did not at first know how to deal with the old Roman towns, but simply plundered and burnt them, and allowed them to crumble away. They thought the deserted ruins were the homes of ghosts and evil spirits, and were not easily induced to settle near them. Even great towns like Canterbury and London and Bath seem to have lain waste for a space, between their destruction by the first invaders and their being again peopled. But ere long the advantages of the sites, and the abundance of building material which the old Roman buildings supplied, tempted the English back to the earlier centres of population. We can trace the ancient origin of many of our towns by their names: the English added the word -chester or -caster to the name of the places which were built on Roman sites—a word derived, of course, from the Latin castra. So Winchester and Rochester and Dorchester and Lancaster are shown to be old Roman towns rebuilt, but not founded by the new-comers.
Religion.
In religion the old English were pure polytheists, worshipping the ancient gods of their German ancestors, Woden, the wise father of heaven, and Thunder (Thor), the god of storm and strength, and Balder, the god of youth and spring, and many more. But they were not an especially religious people; they had few temples and priests, and did not allow their superstition to influence their life or their politics to any great extent. We shall see that in a later age most of them deserted their pagan worship without much regret and after but a short struggle. It was more a matter of ancestral custom to them than a very fervent belief. It is noticeable that very few places in England get their names from the old gods; but we find a few, such as Wednesbury (Woden's-burh) or Thundersfield, or Balderston, scattered over the face of the country.