THE CHANNEL ISLANDS 



147 



and waters" were worshipped on altars 

 of stone, or by magic wells in sacred 

 groves, or "high places," as the Bible calls 

 them. 



In spite of persecutions of church and 

 state, these old worships endured ; witches 

 and warlocks used to meet at cross-roads 

 or at so-called "Druidic" remains and 

 perform secret rites and ceremonies, 

 which, though degraded and perverted 

 after so many centuries of use, undoubt- 

 edly were survivals of obsolete faiths 

 and primitive cults. 



A WOMAN CONDEMNED FOR WITCHCRAFT 

 ONLY SIX YEARS AGO 



The Puritans of the sixteenth and 

 seventeenth centuries did their best to 

 extinguish these practices, and the rec- 

 ords at the Guernsey Greffe show that in 

 that island alone, between the years 1563 

 and 1639, 20 men and 71 women were 

 imprisoned, banished, or burnt alive in 

 the market-place for witchcraft and sor- 

 cery. That these beliefs even now are 

 not extinct is proved by the fact that, as 

 late as January 29, 1914, a woman was 

 tried and condemned by the Guernsey 

 Royal Court for "fortune-telling and 

 witchcraft." 



In Jersey and Guernsey these remind- 

 ers of Stone and Bronze Age cults are 

 supplemented by the more tangible col- 

 lections of stone axes and implements, of 

 Neolithic pottery, of bronze and iron 

 swords, and by Jersey's golden torque, to 

 be seen in the Museum of the Societe 

 Jersiaise at Saint Helier and in the Lukis 

 Museum in Saint Peter Port. There also 

 can be seen evidences of successive Gaul- 

 ish and Roman occupations in a nearly 

 perfect series of coins unearthed at dif- 

 ferent periods in the four larger islands. 



THE NORMANS ORIGINATED OUR COURTS 



It is not until the tenth century A. D. 

 that we discover written records directly 

 dealing with English history ; and then 

 we find that hordes of pirates from the 

 far north swept down upon the unpro- 

 tected islands, burning, pillaging, and 

 conquering, and from the churches the 

 despairing prayer went up : "From the 

 fury of the Normans, Good Lord deliver 

 us!" 



It is to these Normans we can ascribe 



the foundations of our local courts. Their 

 in the open air and presided over by a 

 tribal king who was also the priest of the 



gods 



/TV 



There is evidence that originally all 

 our feudal courts were held in the open 

 air, either near sacred stones, or wells, 

 or other consecrated sites. In Guernsev 

 some of the smaller feudal courts still 

 assemble at the same spots, and their 

 officers — senechal, greffier, and vavas- 

 seurs — still swear with uplifted hand to 

 be faithful vassals to their liege lord. 



Among the enduring monuments of 

 the Northmen are the "hougues," or arti- 

 ficial mounds of earth which they raised 

 over their dead chieftains. 



HOW THE DUCHY OF NORMANDY WAS 

 CREATED 



By the treaty of Saint Clair-sur-Epte. 

 dating from the first quarter of the tenth 

 century, Charles the Simple of France 

 granted to the Scandinavian Jarl Rollo. 

 King George's famous ancestor, the land, 

 including the Channel Islands, situated 

 "on the seacoasts of the Bretons" ; and 

 thus the Duchy of Normandy came into 

 being. 



Later documents show that in 1066. 

 when the soldiers of William, Duke of 

 Normandy, marched in triumph (the last 

 alien enemies to do so) through London 

 streets, the islands were already divided 

 into parishes ; churches had been en- 

 dowed and built ; the Norman langatasre. 

 laws, and customs were well established; 

 Grosney Castle in Jersey and the Chateau 

 des Marais in Guernsey were in exist- 

 ence, and Norman abbots and barons 

 practically divided the land and wealth 

 of the islands between them. 



This connection with Normandy lasted 

 unimpaired up to the days of King John. 

 until the year 1204, when continental 

 Normandy was lost to him forever. After 

 that date, although the islands politically 

 belonged to England, yet their language, 

 their laws, and their customs remained 

 as before and have continued, with very 

 little alteration, to this day. 



For instance, the "Clameur de Haro." 

 which was abolished in Normandv in 

 1583, can still be, and occasionallv is. 

 resorted to by any Channel Islander who 

 thinks his property encroached upon or 



