Wergild

This paper, submitted for the Ph.D. and post-doctoral training school "The Dynamic Middle Ages II, examines the position of the so-called ‘thegns’ in late Anglo-Saxon society. It is noteworthy that this field has a long tradition of research, but the role of the thegns in political structures of the time has always stood in the centre. The current research's view tilts its angle, namely, it discusses the question of this social phenomenon's emergence and development.

This thesis analyses the degree of influence and loan in the secular legislation between AD 400 and 1350. It explores the legislation on the topics of inheritance and compensation for homicide in search of the transmission of law between geographical regions and over a timespan of several centuries, and investigates how secular legislation on the distribution of inheritance and on compensation for homicide was motivated. This wide perspective has adduced evidence of legal transmission between the legal cultures in Western Europe that are not traditionally compared. Medieval legal development was born out of the Roman legal tradition, but found its own way in the following centuries. Encounters between legal cultures in medieval Europe resulted in legal advisors being inspired by the same ideology, thus producing similar legal works. In the legislation on inheritance and homicide, this thesis demonstrates a range of shared concepts in the written laws. The similarities are found in legislation regarding the larger systems of the transfer of wealth as well as the details, such as the terminology and concepts regarding rules of inheritance and homicide. The value of this extensive survey is in its broaching of traditionally demarcated historic periods, as well as its thorough investigation of law material from a large region. Thus, the thesis contributes to the available research on medieval legislation at different points in time, and discusses how existing European law influenced other secular legislative authority, either directly or conceptually.

NB: noticed typos/mistakes:
-  Page 9: "of Malmsbury", read: "of Malmesbury".
Page 10: "The early Épinal-Erfurt Glossary use", read: "The early Épinal-Erfurt Glossary uses".
- Page 15: "See also the references in footnote 54", read: "See also the references in footnote 55".
- Page 18: "See also references in footnote 79", read: "See also references in footnote 80".
- Page 28, footnote 28: "see footnote 70", read: "see footnote 71".
- Page 28, footnote 28: "Scandinavian mitigation", read: "Scandinavian mediation".

This article spotlights the thrymsa (OE þryms/trimsa/tryms) as a supposed monetary unit in pre-Norman England and the importance this individual case study may hold for research in early medieval English social history. In the main, Anglo-Saxon monetary system was meticulously reconstructed by Henry Chadwick (1905), but in it the thrymsa appears an anomaly, as it gets only a few mentions in independent sources over the whole documented Old English period. Due to various correspondences in the texts (as, dragma, ¼ stater, (⅓?) solidus, three pence) establishing the thrymsa’s exact value stops at the etymological stage (< Lat. trēmis(sis)). On the face of its marginality, numismatists are for most part little interested in the thrymsa. Nevertheless, its presence in the so-called Norðleoda laga («The Laws of the Northern People», element in York archbishop Wufstan’s (d. 1023) «Compilation on status» believed to contain older material) as the expression of the sums of wergilds has given rise to interpretations of these wergilds with far reaching implications. The article offers an original explanation of the reasons for the thrymsa’s presence and function in the Norðleoda laga. Departing from modern textual analysis of Wulfstan’s works, the author arrives at two consecutive conclusions: first, as an early loan from Latin thrymsa never assumed a stable value in the English monetary system likely due to the quick disappearance of coins of this name from circulation; second, Wulfstan deliberately used this term for stylistic reasons and archaization of the text as part of his ideology of an «orderly society». Some immediate consequences of this interpretation can be, first, a reappreciation of the Norðleoda laga’s source potential, and, second, retiring this text as a primary source at face value for studies in social history. This particular case study may further illustrate the ever-present necessity for a textual and source criticism in monetary history when the latter is taken as a steppingstone for broader historical conclusions and interpretations.

This paper was delivered at Svenska historikermötet 2019 at the Linnaeus University (Växjö). In it, I briefly touch upon the problem of an Anglo-Saxon thegn's wergild composition and how it may confer knew knowledge about the Anglo-Saxon society as a whole. My tentative conclusion is that contrary to the popular belief, (West Saxon) thegns were entitled to the 1,200-shilling wergild only from the 10th century onwards, though the very social group of the 'twelfhundimenn' had existed at least from the late 7th century in Wessex. It is probable that we can witness a conscious attempt at social engineering on the part of the royal legislators' (or Archbishop Wulfstan of York), whereby a) the de facto aristocratic thegnly stratum was merged with the hitherto legally recognised West Saxon nobility, b) the West Saxon legal 6-to-1 wergild ratio might have been imposed outside Wessex after the political integration of Mercia and Northumbria in the 10th century.

В статье представлен анализ изменений, связанных с англо-саксонской категорией «тэнов» на протяжении Х века. Основной упор сделан на работу с памятниками древнеанглийского законодательства и на особенности происхождения источников. Автор стремится показать неоднородность тэнства как социальной группы в разных областях страны, а также её эволюцию во времени.

The article presents an analysis of the transformation of the Anglo-Saxon cate-gory of “thegns” during the 10th century. The main emphasis is placed on authentic sources work. A special stress is put on the heterogeneity of the ‘thegns’ as a social group and their unequal position in early English society both in time and space.