[576]. At a gemót in 1055, earl Ælfgár was outlawed. At a gemót in 1066 at Oxford, earl Tostig was outlawed, etc.
[577]. See vol. i. p. 145 note.
[578]. Cod. Dipl. No. 1019.
[579]. I conclude this from the Prologue to Ælfred’s Laws.
[580]. The Franks and the church were familiar with such officers, who under the name of Missi were dispatched into the provinces for special purposes. Perhaps the Ælfheáh and Brihtnóð mentioned in the Judicia Civitatis were the Missi who were to be employed on this commission.
[581]. Mr. Hallam, in his Supplemental Notes, p. 229, remarks upon this important document: “It is moreover an objection to considering this a formal enactment by the witan of the shire, that it runs in the names of ‘thaini, comites et villani.’ Can it be maintained that the ceorls ever formed an integrant element of the legislature in the kingdom of Kent? It may be alleged that their name was inserted, though they had not been formally consenting parties, as we find in some parliamentary grants of money much later. But this would be an arbitrary conjecture, and the terms ‘omnes thaini,’ etc. are very large.”
If the ceorls ever did form an integral part of the legislature in the kingdom of Kent, the whole question is settled. But I do not contemplate the thanes in Kent acting here as a legislative body: that is, I do not believe Æðelstán’s witan in Wessex to have passed a law, and then his witan in Kent to have accepted or continued it. I believe his witan from all England to have made certain enactments, which the proper officers brought down to the various shires, and in the shiremoots there took pledge of the shire-thanes that they accepted and would abide by the premises; just as in the case quoted on the preceding page. And this is the more striking because there is every reason to suppose that the witena gemót whose acts the shire-thanes of Kent thus accepted was actually holden at Feversham in that county. But it is further to be observed that the document we possess is a late Latin translation of the original sent to Æðelstán: I will venture to assert that in that original the words used were, “ealle scírþegnas on Cent, ge eorl ge ceorl,” or perhaps “ge twelfhynde ge twihynde.” Again, there is no reason to suppose that the ceorls did not form an integrant part of the shiremoot, the representative of the ancient, independent legislature. A full century later than the date of the council of Feversham, they continued to do so in the same kingdom or, at that period, earldom: and it will be readily admitted that during those hundred years the tendency of society was not to increase the power or improve the condition of the ceorl. Between 1013 and 1020 we thus find Cnut addressing the authorities in Kent (Cod. Dipl. No. 731):—“Cnut the king sends friendly greeting to archbishop Lýfing, bishop Godwine, abbot Ælfmǽr, Æðelwine the sheriff, Æðelríc, and all my thanes, both twelve-hundred and two-hundred men,—ealle míne þegnas twelfhynde and twihynde:”—in other words, both eorl and ceorl, nobilis and ignobilis, or as the witan of Æðelstán have it, in the Norman translation, comites et villani. The nature of Cnut’s writ, which is addressed to the authorities of the county, the archbishop and sheriff, shows clearly that the thanes in question are not those royal officers called cyninges þegnas—who could never be two-hundred men—but the scírþegnas. These are of frequent occurrence in Anglosaxon documents. The scírgemót at Ægelnóðes stán (about 1038) was attended by Æðelstán the bishop, Ranig the ealdorman, Bryning the sheriff and all the thanes in Herefordshire. Cod. Dipl. No. 755. A sale by Stigand was witnessed by all the scírþegnas[scírþegnas] in Hampshire; that is, it was a public instrument completed in the shiremoot. Cod. Dipl. No. 949. Again a grant of Stigand was witnessed about 1053 by various authorities in Hampshire, including Eádsige the sheriff and all the scírþegnas. Cod. Dipl. No. 1337: and similarly a third of the same prelate, Cod. Dipl. No. 820. About the same period Wulfwold abbot of Bath makes title to lands, which he addresses to bishop Gisa, Tofig the sheriff and all the thanes of Somersetshire. Cod. Dipl. No. 821. In the year 1049, Ðurstán granted lands at Wimbush by witness of a great number of persons, among whom are Leófcild the sheriff and all the thanes of Essex. Cod. Dipl. No. 788: and about the same time Gódríc bought lands at Offham, in a shiremoot at Wii, before all the shire. Cod. Dipl. No. 789. Lastly, Leófwine bought land, by witness of Ulfcytel the sheriff and all the thanes in Herefordshire. Cod. Dipl. No. 802. The relation of these thanes to the gódan men or dohtigan men (good men, doughty men, boni et legales homines, Scabini, Rachinburgii, etc.) will be examined in a subsequent Book, when I come to treat of the courts of justice: but I will here add one example, which is illustrative of the subject of this note. The marriage-covenants of Godwine, arranged before Cnut, by witness of archbishop Lyfing and others, including Æðelwine the sheriff, and various Kentish landowners, are stated to be in the knowledge (geenǽwe) of every doughty man in Kent and Sussex (where the lands lay) both thane and churl. Cod. Dipl. No. 732. There was nothing whatever to prevent a man from being a scírþegn, whether eorlcund or ceorlcund, as long as he had land in the scír itself: without land, even a cyninges þegn could certainly not be a scírþegn. It is true that a man might be of síðcund rank, that is noble, without owning land (see Leg. Ini, § 51), and there were king’s thanes who had no land (Æðelst. v. § 11); but such a one could assuredly not represent himself in the scírgemót. There is a common error which runs through much of what has been admitted on this subject: the ceorl is universally represented in a low condition. This is not however necessarily the case: some ceorls, though well to do in the world, may have preferred their independence to the conventional dignity of thaneship. We may admit, as a general rule, that the thanes were a wealthier class than the ceorls; indeed, without becoming a thane, a ceorl had little chance of getting a grant of folcland or bócland, but some of them may have, through various circumstances, inherited or purchased considerable estates: as late as the year 984, I find an estate of eight hides (that is 264 acres according to my reckoning) in the possession of a rusticus, obviously a ceorl:—“Illud videlicet rus quod Æðeríc quidam rusticus prius habuisse agnoscitur.” Cod. Dipl. No. 1282.
[582]. Thorpe, i. 216. Æðelstán complains on another occasion that the oaths and weds which had been given to the king and his witan were all broken: “quia iuramenta et vadia, quae regi et sapientibus data fuerunt, semper infracta sunt et minus observata quam Deo et saeculo conveniant.” Æðelst. iii. § 3. Thorpe, i. 218. Again: Æðelstán the king makes known, that I have learned that our peace is worse kept than is pleasing to me, or as was ordained at Greatley; and my witan say that I have borne with it too long.... Because the oaths, and weds, and borhs are all disregarded and broken which on that occasion were given, etc. Æðelst. iv. § 1. Thorpe, i. 220.
[583]. Conc. Wihtbordes stán. Eádg. Supp. § 1. Thorpe, i. 272.
[584]. “Lex consensu populi fit, et constitutione regis.” Edict. Pistense. an. 864. Pertz, iii. 490, § 6.