King s Peace and EnglisJi Peace-Magistracy. ly 



are fully sustained by the evidence of the folk-laws. No- 

 where among the Germanic peoples does the clan-feud appear 

 in so primitive a form as in the Icelandic Gragas, the earliest 

 code of the Scandinavian North.^ Nowhere, says Wilda, is 

 the identity between manslaughter and vengeance so clear, 

 nowhere is the right to slay the offender before judgment so 

 extended, as in the Gragas ; therefore it is all the more in- 

 teresting to note that even here the execution of vengeance 

 is kept within certain limits, which are exactly defined by the 

 law.2 On the other hand, the oldest text of the Lex Salica is 

 silent as to private vengeance before legal process ; but every 

 one is provided with adequate means in the form of law for 

 securing such reparation as Germanic custom approves.^ 



The earliest English codes reveal the state already engaged 

 in developing and enforcing a tariff of compositions, minutely 

 graduated both according to the rank and dignity of the 

 aggrieved and according to the character of the offence. 

 Every limb, every joint, every feature of the human body has 

 its assessed value.'* Moreover, in all cases the state, as a 



of the Continental Germans are conveniently summarized by Davoud-Oghlou, 

 Histoire de la Legislation des anciens Gennains. The faida is especially promi- 

 nent in Lombard laws: lb., II, 13-15. Cf., in general, Grimm, Rechtsalterthiimer, 

 646 ff. ; Walter, Deutsche Rechtsgeschichte, I, 18 ff.; Arnold, Deutsche Urzeit, 

 339 ff.; Schulte, Reichs- und Rechtsgeschichte, 30-31, 347; Meyer, Institutions 

 Judiciaires, I, 24 ff. 



1 Gragas = German Gratigans. This compilation is one of the most important 

 sources used by Wilda, who gives special attention to the various Scandinavian 

 codes. See his general discussion of them, Das Strafrecht der Germanen, 7-6 1. 



2 See the proofs collected in his Strafrecht, 160-62. 



3 Waitz, Das alte Recht, 1 86-7. Certain passages in later additions to the Lex, 

 which have been regarded as proofs that vengeance was optional on the part of 

 the aggrieved, are shown by Waitz to be capable of a contrary interpretation; lb., 

 186, note 2. See Behrend, Lex Salica, c. XLI-III, LIV, LXII-III, pp. 52-6, 71, 

 79-80, for the principal passages relating to homicide. The greater portion of the 

 entire code is concerned with compositions. 



■* See especially the Laws or Domas of /Ethelberht, consisting wholly of a 

 tariff of compositions arranged in ninety paragraphs : Schmid, Gesetze, pp. 2-10; 

 Thorpe, Ancient Laws, I, 2-25. Very similar are the codes of Hlothar and Ead- 

 ric, Wihtrajd, Ine, and even those of Alfred: Schmid, Gesetze, 10-58, 98-105; 

 Thorpe, Ancient Laws, I, 26-43, 91-101, 102-51. For the three systems of wer- 

 geld recognized in the early English codes — those of Wessex, Mercia, and East 



251 



