We have no distinct mention of a Jutish solidus, but as the Jutes probably came from a district not far from that of the North Frisians and Saxons there would be nothing abnormal or surprising in their reckoning in the same solidus as their neighbours, viz. in the gold solidus of two tremisses, and in the Kentish immigrants continuing the same practice. But this as yet is only conjecture.
So far, then, as the facts of the prevalent coinage and currency are concerned, all that can be said is that the hypothesis that the Kentish scilling was that of two gold tremisses has a good deal of probability in its favour. But there is other and more direct evidence of the truth of the hypothesis.
In the first place, as already stated, in the preface to King Alfred’s Laws he expressly mentions his knowledge of the laws, not only of Ine and of Offa, but also of Ethelbert, the inference being that in his own laws he retained, inter alia, some of the enactments of Ethelbert which were in his own view worth retaining.[292]
Confirmation by other evidence. The King’s mund-byrd of five pounds common to Wessex and Kent.
Now, King Alfred fixed the king’s mund-byrd at five pounds of silver, i.e. 240 Wessex scillings, while he must have known that in the Kentish law the king’s mund-byrd was fifty Kentish scillings. The difference in scillings must have struck him, but he probably knew perfectly well what the Kentish scillings were. For when we compare these two mund-byrds we find that at a ratio between gold and silver of 1:12 (which, as we have seen, was the Frankish ratio of Charlemagne’s successors) fifty Kentish scillings of two gold tremisses did equal exactly five pounds. Fifty Kentish scillings or 100 Merovingian gold tremisses, at 1:12 were equal to 1200 silver tremisses or sceatts of the same weight, i.e. five pounds of 240 sceatts; or, in other words, 100 gold tremisses (nova moneta) were equal at the same ratio to five pounds of 240 of King Alfred’s pence of 32 wheat-grains. The equation was exact.
And further, we have seen that in the time of Cnut the Kentish king’s mund-byrd was well known and declared to be five pounds according to Kentish law, although in that law it was stated to be 50 scillings.
The passage has already been quoted from the MS. G of Cnut’s Church law, s. 3, in which, after stating that ‘the grith-bryce of the chief minster in cases entitled to “bot” is according to the king’s mund, that is five pounds by English law,’ the additional information is inserted,[293]
On cent lande æt þam mund bryce v pund þam cingce.
In Kent land for the mund-bryce v pounds to the King.
Further in the same MS. G of Cnut’s secular law, s. 63, is the following:[294]—