If this may be assumed, then the wergelds of the Scanian law accord well with the Norse wergelds. For in that case the wergeld of the bonde is 15 marks of silver in both laws. And further the wergeld of the libertus of the Scanian law and that of the Norse leysing after he had made his freedom’s ale also correspond, being half that of the bonde.
It may further be noted that as in the Norse law so also in the Scanian law the payment for an eye or hand or foot was half a manbot, while the full manbot was payable if both eyes or hands or feet were destroyed.[194]
VI. SCANIAN AND LOMBARDIC CUSTOM COMPARED.
Lombardic custom.
Before closing this very imperfect chapter on the Scandinavian laws it may be well to compare with them clauses from the Lombardic laws relating to the family holding of land and property ‘in communione.’
The laws of the tribes still remaining on the Baltic were five or six centuries later in date than the laws of the Lombardic emigrants who had left their old home and settled in the South upon Roman ground. And yet in this matter we find traces of the same ancient custom of family holdings underlying them both, notwithstanding wide separation, and what is more, of the same process of change going on notwithstanding the difference in date. Roman and Christian influences had not reached the Scanian district on the Baltic till the twelfth century, and were only then effecting changes which in the seventh century had already been accomplished in Transylvania and Italy.
Edict of Rothar. A.D. 643. Kindred of seven generations.
The first clause to which reference may be made is s. 153 of the ‘Edict of Rothar’ (A.D. 643). It is entitled ‘De gradibus cognationum.’ It is interesting as showing that seven generations were necessary to the complete kindred.
Omnis parentilla usque in septimum geniculum nomeretur, ut parens parenti per gradum et parentillam heres succedat: sic tamen ut ille qui succedere vult, nominatim unicuique nomina parentum antecessorum suorum dicat.
Let every parentilla up to the seventh knee be named, so that parent to parent by grade and parentilla the heir may succeed; so moreover that he who wishes to succeed must tell name by name the names of his antecedent parentes.