DOC 7 -- Anglo Saxons Laws
The Laws of Æthelberht, King of Kent, 560-616 4. If a freeman steal from the king, let him
pay ninefold.
5. If a man slay another in the king's tun
[farm, manor, dwelling, village], let him make bot [compensation] with
fifty shillings.
13. If a man slay another in an eorl's [earl
or ealdorman] tun, let him make bot with twelve shillings.
31. If a freeman lie with a freeman's wife,
let him pay for it with his wergeld [money value of a person's life], and
provide another wife with his own money, and bring her to the other.
32. If any one thrust through the riht hamscyld
[legal means of protecting one's home], let him adequately compensate.
34. If there be an exposure of the bone, let
bot be made with three shillings.
35. If there be an injury of the bone, let
bot be made with four shillings.
38. If a shoulder be lamed, let bot be made
with thirty shillings.
39. If an ear be struck off, let bot be made
with twelve shillings.
40. If the other ear hear not, let bot be
made with twenty-five shillings.
41. If an ear be pierced, let bot be made
with three shillings.
42. If an ear be mutilated, let bot be made
with six shillings.
43. If an eye be (struck) out, let bot be
made with fifty shillings.
50. Let him who breaks the chin-bone pay for
it with twenty shillings.
53. Let him who stabs (another) through an
arm, make bot with six shillings.
57. If any one strike another with his fist
on the nose, three shillings.
59. If the bruise be black in a part not covered
by the clothes, let bot be made with thirty scaetts [coin worth 1/20th
of a shilling].
60. If it be covered by the clothes, let bot
for each be made with twenty scaetts.
64. If any one destroy (another's) organ of
generation, let him pay with three leud-gelds [fine for killing a man];
if he pierce it through, let him make bot with six shillings; if it be
pierced within, let him make bot with six shillings.
65. If a thigh be broken, let bot be made
with twelve shillings...
82. If a man carry off a maiden by force,
let him pay fifty shillings to the owner, and afterwards buy (the object
of) his will of the owner.
83. If she be betrothed to another in money,
let him make bot with twenty shillings.
The Laws of King Wihtræd, Kinf of Kent, 690-725
16. Let the word of a bishop and of the king
be, without an oath, incontrovertible.
18. Let a priest clear himself by his own
sooth, in his holy garment before the altar, thus saying: "Veritatem dico
in Christo, non mentior." In like manner, let a deacon clear himself.
19. Let a clerk clear himself with four of
his fellows, and he alone with his hand on the altar, let the others stand
by, make the oath.
20. Let a stranger (clear himself) with his
own oath at the altar; in like manner, a king's thane.
21. Let a ceorlish man [ceorl is a freeman
of the lowest class] clear himself with four of his fellows at the altar;
and let the oath of all these be incontrovertible.
The Laws of Alfred and Edward the Elder, Kings of Wessex (871-924) and Guthrum, King of the Danes
These are the dooms which King Alfred and King Guthrum chose when the English and Danes fully took to peace and to friendship.
2. If any one violate Christianity, or reverence
heathenism, by word or by work, let him pay as well wer, as wite [Anglo-Saxon
fine] or lah-slit [Danish fine],
according as the deed may
be.
The Laws of King Edward the Elder, king of Wessex, 901-924
1. And I will that every man have his warrantor;
and that no man buy out of port [market], but have the port-reeve's witness,
or that of other unlying men whom
one may believe.
The North People's Law (from the Kingdom of Northumberland)
1. The North people's king's geld is thirty
thousand thrymsas [coin worth 3 denarii/pennies]; fifteen thousand thrymsas
are for the wergild, and fifteen thousand for the cynedom [kingdom]. The
wer belongs to the kindred, and the cynebot to the people.
2. An archbishop's and an aetheling's [member
of the royal family] wer-gild is fifteen thousand thrymsas.
3. A bishop's and ealdorman's, eight thousand
thrymsas.
4. A hold's [freeman holding a certain amount
of land] and a king's high-reeves [royal official], four thousand thrymsas.
5. A mass-thane's and a secular thane's [member
of the nobility], two thousand thrymsas.
6. A ceorl's wergeld is two hundred and sixty-six
thrymsas, that is two hundred shillings by Mercian law.
[Source: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/asbook.html]