7. DOOMS OF AETHELSTAN (925-40)
II, 1. In the first place, no thief caught in the act is to be spared, [if he is] over twelve years old and [if the stolen property is worth] over 8d....
2. And with regard to lordless men from whom no justice is to be obtained, we have ordained that their kindred be commanded to settle them in homes [where they will be subject] to folkright, and to find them lords in the popular court (folcgemote). And if, by the day set. the kindred will not or cannot do so, he[1] shall thenceforth be an outlaw, to be treated as a thief by any one who meets him....
3. Should a lord intervene on behalf of his guilty man and [thereby] deny justice [to some one], and should the [latter] man then appeal to the king, [the lord] shall pay [to the complainant] the value of the goods [in question], and to the king 120s. He, however, who appeals to the king before seeking justice [in the local court][2] as often as he should, shall pay the same fine as the other would have been liable for had he denied justice....
4. And with regard to betrayal of the lord, we have declared that he who cannot deny it, or [having denied it] is convicted by the threefold ordeal,[3] shall forfeit his life....
7. And with regard to the simple ordeal for men who have been often accused of theft, we have ordained that, if they are convicted, they shall be imprisoned and shall be released only on the conditions already stated.[4] ...
10. And no one shall exchange any livestock without witness of the reeve,[5] the priest, the lord of the land (londhlafordes), the [lord's] steward, or some other reliable man. If any one does so, he shall pay a fine of 30s.. [to the king], and the lord of the land shall seize whatever has been exchanged....
12. And we have ordered that no one shall trade in goods worth more than 20d. outside a port;[6] but every one shall do his trading inside, with the witness of the portreeve or of some other trustworthy man, or else at the popular court (folcgemote) with the witness of the reeves.
13. And we have ordered that every borough (burh)[7] shall be repaired within a fortnight after Rogation....
14. [We have also ordered] that one coinage shall have currency throughout all the king's realm and that no one shall mint [money] except within a port.... There shall be seven moneyers at Canterbury: four for the king, two for the archbishop, and one for the abbot. At Rochester [there shall be] three: two for the king and one for the bishop. At London [there shall be] eight, at Winchester six, at Lewes two, at Hastings one, another at Chichester, at Southampton two, at Wareham two, at Dorchester one, at Exeter two, at Shaftsbury two, and besides these one in [each of] the other boroughs (burgum)....
20. And if any one thrice neglects attendance at the court (gemot), he shall pay the king's oferhyrnesse.[8] And the holding of the court shall be announced seven days in advance. If, however, he will neither do what is right nor pay the oferhyrnesse, then all the chief (yldestan) men who belong to the borough shall ride against him and take all that he has and put him under surety....
23. If any one is obliged to [go to] the ordeal, he shall come three days in advance to the priest in charge of the consecration; and before he does so, he shall feed himself on bread, water, salt, and herbs; and on each of the three days he shall attend mass; and on the day he undergoes the ordeal he shall make an offering and take communion; and then, before he goes to the ordeal, he shall swear an oath that, according to folkright, he is innocent of the charge made against him. And if it is [the ordeal of cold] water, he must sink an ell and a half on the rope [to clear himself].[9] If it is the [ordeal of] iron, three days must elapse before the hand is uncovered.[10] ...
25. If, now, any of my reeves will not enforce this [ordinance], or shows less zeal [in the matter] than we have commanded, he must pay my oferhyrnesse, and I shall find another man who will [enforce it].
V, 1.... And in the district (manunge) of every reeve let there be named as many men as are known to be trustworthy, so that they may serve as witnesses in every suit. And their oaths shall count as those of trustworthy men, [to be numbered] acording to the value of the property without selection.[11]
(Anglo-Saxon) Ibid., I, 150 f.
[1] A lordless man of this sort.
[2] Cf. Edgar, III, 2 (below, p. 19); Canute, II, 17 (below, p. 22).
[3] See no. 8b.
[4] When a surety has been found.
[5] The king's reeve is apparently meant; cf. art. 12, below. That the hordere of this passage was an ordinary rural steward, rather than some sort of treasurer, has been shown by R. L. Poole (The Exchequer in the Twelfth Century, pp. 22 f.).
[6] A modification of Edward, I, 1 (above, p. 12).
[7] This is the first appearance of the word in the dooms to refer to the official centres of defence and administration that are so frequently mentioned in the contemporary Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It is clear from the following article that such a borough might also be called a port; see above, p. 12, n. 3.
[8] See above, p. 12, n. 4.
[9] In this ordeal the accused was tied hand and foot and then lowered on the end of a rope into a pond or other still water. If he sank to the required depth, as marked on the rope, he was declared innocent, on the theory that a guilty person would not be received by the consecrated water. But a psychological factor may be detected in the possibility of a man's struggling to keep himself up.
[10] See below, p. 16, n. 5.
[11] See above, p. 7, n. 6; p. 12, n. 5.