The ores of this law, as we shall see, were evidently ores of 16 pence, or 512 wheat-grains (16 × 32), for fifteen of such ores made the Saxon and Anglo-Norman pound of 240 pence, or 7680 wheat-grains.
Danish ratio of 1:8.
The fact that the ore of the document describing the customs of the Bretts and Scots was the same ore as that in use with both Danes and English in Danish England and probably Northumbria about A.D. 1000 is an important one. For in this document the value of the cow of the Bretts and Scots is stated to be three ores, i.e. 1536 wheat-grains of silver, and at the Scandinavian ratio of 1:8 the gold value of the cow would therefore be once more 192 wheat-grains or two gold solidi of Imperial standard. That the Danish ratio was 1:8 as in the Scandinavian laws we shall find to be involved in the Anglo-Danish compacts making Danes and English ‘equally dear,’ while as late as A.D. 1192 the Abbey of Kelso compounded for payments to the Pope at the same ratio, two solidi of sterlings (24d. of 32 wheat-grains), or 768 wheat-grains of silver being paid for the gold solidus of 96 wheat-grains.[205]
Laws of the Bretts and Scots belong to time of Danish influence.
We may therefore consider that the document relating to the Bretts and Scots belongs to the period of Danish influence, and is of much earlier date than the work to which it was appended by the Scotch editor of Glanville.
III. LEGES INTER BRETTOS ET SCOTOS.
Norman French version thirteenth century.
The remarkable document printed separately in Appendix III. of the ‘Ancient Laws of Scotland’ under the above title is given in three languages—Latin, Norman French, and Scottish English.
The oldest version of it is that of the ‘Berne Manuscript,’ now in the ‘Register House’ at Edinburgh, which is considered to be of the thirteenth century. It appears in this manuscript as a separate document in Norman French, and therefore it would seem that we owe this statement of ancient custom to a Norman scribe. The Latin version added to the ‘Regiam Majestatem’ is of later date. The earliest manuscript is of the fourteenth century.[206]
As given in the ‘Regiam Majestatem’ it consists of four clauses, LV. to LVIII.