720 
SAXON. 
by his sureties to answer the crime of which he was accused, 
and to do what the judges should appoint. Felonies were 
bailable in the Saxon times. But the most curious part of 
the Saxon “ borh” was not the sureties which they who 
were accused or condemned were to find to appear to the 
charge, or to perform the judgment pronounced; but it 
was the system that every individual should be under bail 
for his good behaviour. Nothing seems to be more repug¬ 
nant to the decorous feelings of manly independence than 
this slavish bondage and anticipated criminality. Such a 
law was a libel on human nature, and must have created 
more depravity than it prevented: and this seems to have 
been experienced ; for no period more abounded with po¬ 
litical or social vices and calamities than the reigns which 
followed the establishment of this law, if we date it from 
Edgar. 
The supreme legal tribunal of the Saxons was the wHena- 
gemot.; which see. The scire-gemot was another tribunal. 
By the laws of Canute it was ordered, that there should be 
two shire-gemots and three burgh-gemots every year, and 
the bishop and the ealdorman should attend them. By the 
laws of /Ethelstan, punishments were attached to those who 
refused to attend gemots. Every man was to have peace in 
going to the gemot, and returning from it, unless he were 
a thief. 
As much of their judicial proceedings rested on oaths, 
the punishment of perjury was very severe. A perjured man 
was usually classed with witches, murderers, and the most 
obnoxious beings in society; he was declared unworthy of 
the ordeal; he was disabled from being a witness again; and 
if he died, he was denied Christian burial. 
In the laws of Ina we have a full account of the Anglo- 
Saxon ordeals, of hot water and hot iron. See Ordeal. 
The jury is an institution, the principle of which may be 
traced, according to Mr. Turner’s statement, to the earliest 
Anglo-Saxon times. See Jury. 
The poetry of the Anglo-Saxons was of two sorts; the 
poems which they composed in their own tongue, and the 
poems which they wrote in Latiu. These two kinds of 
poetry were completely distinct from each other;—distinct in 
origin, distinct in style. 
The characteristics of the Anglo-Saxon native poetry 
seem to be these: it consists chiefly of periphrasis, and meta¬ 
phors expressed in a metrical but simple arrangement of 
words, with some alliteration. The usual particles are most 
frequently omitted ; and the intended meaning is conveyed 
in short and contracted phrase, multiplied by the periphrasis 
and metaphor. The position of the words is forced out of 
their natural arrangement by a wilful inversion, and the re¬ 
gular course of the subject is frequently interrupted by vio¬ 
lent and abrupt transitions. By these peculiarities, which 
seem to be quite artificial, the Saxon poetry is distinguished 
from prose. 
The style of the Anglo-Saxon poetry seems to have been 
originally the common, imperfect language of the people, in 
its half-formed and barbarous state; but its metre is the 
simplest that can be conceived, and is, indeed, often little 
else than a series of short exclamations. Its inversions are 
more artificial. But when music was applied to poetry, and 
men found it beneficial to sing or recite a chieftain’s praise, 
we may conceive, that, to secure to themselves the profits of 
the profession, some little ingenuity was exerted to make 
difficulties which would raise their style above the vulgar 
phrase. Its inversion was one of the easiest modes of making 
a peculiar style of composition : and as society advanced in 
its attainments, the transition, the alliteration, and other 
ornaments, may have been added, either as new beauties or 
as new difficulties. 
The history of the Saxon poetry, and, indeed, of all 
modern European poetry, in its ruder state, may be divided 
into three heads: songs, or ballads; the lengthened narra¬ 
tive poems, or romances; and that miscellaneous kind which, 
if we term it lyric, it is more for the convenience of using a 
short generic word, than for the exact appropriation of its 
meaning. 
That our ancestors had popular songs on the actions of 
their great or favourite characters, or on such other subjects 
as interested the vulgar mind, is proved by many instances, 
which may be traced in the ancient writers. Aldhelm 
applied himself to compose songs, or ballads, in the Anglo- 
Saxon language, to instruct, as well as to amuse, his coun¬ 
trymen. None of Aldhehn’s vernacular poetry has survived; 
but the circumstance that he composed and sang these bal¬ 
lads as if “ he professed the art of singing,” shew that the 
harpers of the day were accustomed to recite them. That 
such things were then in general circulation is also implied 
by Bede, when he mentions, that in a festive company the 
harp was sent round, that those might sing who could. 
It was a book of Saxon poems which first allured Alfred 
to learn to read ; and the fact, that he had his children 
taught to read Saxon poems, and that he himself visited the 
Danish camp as a harper, which, in the reign of his grand¬ 
son, Anlaf imitated, prove the existence of popular songs, 
which interested both the child and the rude warrior. 
The genuine ballad seems to have originated when the 
old Saxon poetry began to decline. The laboured metaphor, 
the endless periphrasis, the violent inversion, and the abrupt 
transition, were the great features of the Saxon poetry. These 
constituted that pompousness which William of Malmsbury 
truly states to have been its great .characteristic. But it was 
impossible that, while these continued prevalent and popular, 
the genuine ballad could have appeared. The ballad, there¬ 
fore, probably arose from more vulgar and homely poets; 
from men who could not bend language into that difficult 
and artificial strain, which the genius of the Anglo-Saxon 
bard was educated to use. The ambulatory glee-men, who 
strove to please the public by their merry-andrew antics, 
were most probably the first inventors of the genuine ballad. 
While at one time they tumbled and danced, shewed their 
bears, and frolicked before the people in the dresses of 
various animals; at others, they may have told little tales 
to interest the mob, from whose liberality they drew their 
maintenance. 
Incidents narrated in verse were more intelligible than the 
pompous songs of the regular poets, and far more interesting 
to the people. In time they gained admission to the hall 
and the palace: and, by the style of Canute’s ballad, this 
revolution must have been achieved by the beginning of the 
eleventh century. Then the harsh and obscure style of the 
old Saxon poetry began to be unpopular; and being still 
more discredited after the Norman conquest, it was at length 
completely superseded by the ballad and the metrical ro¬ 
mance. See Romance. 
The Anglo-Saxon versification, says Mr. Turner, possesses 
occasional rhyme and occasional alliteration, and sometimes 
the alliteration peculiar to the Welsh poetry. But none of 
these form its constituent character. Mr. Tyrhwit and Mr. 
Ellis are also right in asserting, that it does not depend upon 
“ a fixed and determinate number of syllables, nor on that 
marked attention to their quantity which Hickes supposed to 
have constituted the distinction between verse and prose” 
The only rule of the Saxon versification, which we can now 
discover, is, in our author’s opinion, that the words are 
placed in a peculiar rhythm or cadence, examples of which 
the specimens of their poetry extant supply ; and to produce 
this rhythm seems to have been the perfection of their versi¬ 
fication : but, happily for the strength of their poetry, they 
extended their rhythm into a more dignified cadence. The 
Latin poetry of the Anglo-Saxons originated from the Ro¬ 
man poetry, and was composed according to the rules of 
Roman Prosody. 
The literature of the Anglo-Saxons must be dated from 
their conversion to Christianity, which event took place 
about the year 570; and it is certain, if we allow that they 
had Runic letters and songs before this era, that their know¬ 
ledge of books, and of the learning which had been accu¬ 
mulated in happier regions of the world, were derived from 
their religious intercourse with Rome. During this period, 
it was the prevailing practice among the Saxons, not only of 
the clergy, but of the better sort of laity, to make a voyage 
• to 
