BOOK
VIII.

orum ;” the land of the thegns; and they are mentioned also with their milites. Thegn-lands seem to have had some analogy with the baronies of the Norman times.

If a thegn had a church in his boclande, with a place of burial, he was to give to the church one third of his own tenths; if he had not a burialplace, he was to give what he chose out of the

nine parts.

50

What Alfred calls the king's thegn is in Bede the king's minister. 51 No one was to have any socne or jurisdiction over him but the king. 52

We learn from Domesday-book, that for the tenure of five hides of land the owner was liable to the fyrd, or Saxon militia. We have also found, that the tenure of five hides of land was essential to the dignity of thegn. The king's thegn is mentioned in the laws as attending in his expeditions, and as having a thegn under him.53

The thegn was also a magistrate, and might lose his dignity. The laws declared, that if a judge decided unjustly, he should pay to the king one hundred and twenty shillings, unless he could swear that he knew no better ; and he was to lose his thegn-scipe, unless he could afterwards buy it of the king. 54

They are thus mentioned by Edgar: “In every byrig, and in every scire, I will have my kingly rights, as my father had ; and my thegns shall have

a

50 Wilk. Leg. 130. 144.
51 Bede, lib. ii. c. 9. and lib. iv. c. 22. Alfred, p. 511. and 591.

52 Wilk. Leg. 118. The thegn is not merely termed a liberalis homo,
or free man, as in Tex. Roff, but his rank is mentioned in the higher
degree of the comparative mood, as one of the liberalioribus, one of
the more free.
53 Wilk. Leg. 71.

their thegn-ship in my time, as they had in my CHAP. father's." 5

His were was two thousand thrymsa."

It is

elsewhere stated as equal to that of six ceorls, or twelve hundred shillings." If a thief took refuge with a thegn, he was allowed three days' asylum. 58

THE judicial magistracy of the thegns appears from their assisting at the shire-gemots. The Northmen had also a dignity of this sort, for thegns are mentioned in Snorre.

I AM inclined to believe that the superior thanes were those who were afterwards called barons, for the laws of Henry the First put the titles as synonymous; and that the next degree of thegns were those who were after the Conqueror's time termed knights, because five hydes of land were

55 Wilk. Leg. 80.

man.

56 Ibid. 71.

57 Ibid. 64. 72. He is mentioned as synonymous with twelfhynde Leg. Hem.; Wilk. 265.; and Du Cange voc. Liberalet. In another passage of the laws of Henry I. the twelfhynde is mentioned as a man plene nobilis, and a thane, p. 269. Such a man was to swear as for sixty hydes of land. Wilk. 18. We may, therefore, consider this as the quantity of land of the higher thane. The comparative

dignities of the land, in the time of Ethelstan, will appear from their different weres:

The king's was

VII.

30,000 thrymsa.

266

VIII.

61

BOOK the feudum of a knight, and the thegn of five

“ hydes of land is mentioned as that rank of thegn which served the more dignified thegns. These inferior thanes were called middling thanes. 62 A

A general idea of an Anglo-Saxon nobleman may be formed from the note below. 63

60 Quinque hidæ (faciunt) fædum militis.

Chr. T. Red. ap. Blamt. voc. Virgata.

61 Wilk. Leg. p. 71. The Epistle of the prior and conventof Canterbury to Henry the Second states, that before the Conqueror's time there were no knights in England but threnges, and that this king converted them into knights. Wilk. 429. This authority tends to show that Drenge was the Anglo-Saxon word at first applied to express their milites. It occurs frequently in their poems on martial subjects. The term cniht at last superseded it. Drenches occur in Domesday.

62 In Saxon medeme, and in Latin mediocris. The comparative ranks in Henry the First's time appear thus in their relevationes ; the comes, eight horses, four helmets, four coats of mail, eight lances and shields, four swords, and one hundred mancæ of gold; the king's thegn, “ who is next," four horses, two swords, four lances and shields, one helm and mail, and fifty mancæ ; the middling thane, one horse, with his trappings and arms, and his half-hang. Leg. Hen. Wilk. 245. We may look on these as corresponding with the ranks of earls, barons, and knights.

63 The Monk of Ramsay has left a full picture of what was then deemed an accomplished nobleman, in the following traits of the character of one of Edgar’s favourites, and in Oswald's conversation with his brother:

“ His innate prudence, his noble birth, and approved vigour of body in warlike affairs, had obtained from the king much dignity and favour. He was distinguished for religion at home, and for the exercise of his strength and use of military discipline abroad. He adorned the nobility which he derived from his birth by the beauty of his manners. Cheerful and pleasing in his countenance ; venerable in his mien ; courteous in his fluent conversation ; mild and sincere in his words; in duty impartial ; in his affections cautious; with a heart resembling his face; constant in good faith ; steady and devout. In council persuading what was right; ending disputes by the equity of his judgments; revering the divine love in others, and persuading them to cultivate it.”

Oswald says of him : Throughout the king's palace he was famed and esteemed; his nod seemed to govern the royal mint ; clothed in silk and purple, he shared the royal banquets with us in the court," &c. His brother, also a favourite with the king, tells the bishop : “I am a man under the power of another, exercising also authority myself.

a

CHAP.
VII.

Nobility of birth, abundance of wealth, the wisdom of the world, the grace of the lip, and the public favour, as well of the rich as of the poor, have alike exalted me; yet I cannot apply to the good studies which I desire. Often the king's difficulties, or warlike exercises, or the distributions of presents to the knights, or the judgment of causes, or the exercise of punishment on the guilty, or some other forensic business, which I can hardly if ever decline without offence, occupy and fatigue me.” Hist. Ram. 3 Gale, 395, 396.

CHAP. VIII.

+

Some Features of the Political State of the Anglo-Saxons.

BOOK
VIII.

Our Saxon ancestors appear to us at first in that state in which a great nation is preparing to be formed on new principles, unattained by human experience before. The process was that of leading their population to such a practical system as would combine the liberty of the people with the independence and elevated qualities of a high-spirited nobility, and with the effective authority of a presiding king, and of such wise and improving laws as the collected wisdom of the nation should establish from the deliberations of its witena-gemot, not legislating only for the powerful.

The first stage in this political formation was the diffusion and independence of a great and powerful nobility. After these were radically fixed in the land, the influence and prerogatives of the king were enlarged, and the numbers of the free were increased. A new bulwark was also raised for the benefit of all the three classes, in a richly endowed church, who, besides their political utility in supporting, as circumstances pressed, each order of the state from the oppressions of the rest, introduced into the Anglo-Saxon mind all the literature it possessed. The course of events led all these great bodies into occasional collisions with each other, and with foreign invaders, till the actual practice of life had abated their mutual excesses and injurious powers.

The nobility and great