Ancient German polity.

the original immigrants consisted of the three kindred tribes of Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. Of these, Tacitus does not even mention the Saxons or Jutes, and only names the Angles as one of a number of North German tribes, without fixing their locality. In the 2nd century Ptolemy identifies the seats of the Saxons and Angles as the district between the Elbe, the Eyder, and the Warnow, now constituting the modern Duchies of Holstein, Lauenburg, and Mecklenburg. Before the age of Bede the name of Saxon had been extended from the designation of a single insignificant tribe to that of a wide confederacy of North German tribes. Retaining their independence of Rome, tenacious of their heathen. worship and their primitive barbarism, they habitually plundered the richer nations who had succumbed to the Roman sway.

Scarcely, if at all, affected by contact with Roman influences, the Teutonic tribes who invaded Britain had probably a less distinctly marked political organization than that of their kindred on the banks of the Rhine and the Danube, a picture of whose institutions has been handed down to us in the pages of Cæsar and Tacitus. But after making due allowance for this difference, for the indistinctness of the picture itself, and for the contradictory ways in which it has been interpreted, we may yet gather from this source some general knowledge of the primeval institutions of our Teutonic forefathers.

In the time of Tacitus, Germany appears to have been divided among a number of independent tribes, who had ceased to be nomadic and occupied fixed seats in settled communities.

The whole land of the settlement belonged to the community (the Mark, or Vicus), who annually allotted

part transcribes the 'Liber querulus de Excidio Britanniae' of Gildas the Wise, a monk of Bangor, who was born in 516, and composed his history about the year 560.

the arable land among the freemen, while the pasture land was both held and used in common.

An aggregate of communities (vici) of the same tribe constituted the pagus (the Gau, or shire); and an aggregate of pagi made up the civitas, or populus.

In their political life the monarchic, aristocratic, and democratic elements were clearly marked; but the ultimate sovereignty seems to have resided in a free and armed people.1 Some of the tribes had kings, selected from particular families; others had not. But the king had only a limited power, and was rather the representative of the unity of the tribe than its ruler.

In the Vici and pagi justice was administered by principes, elected by the nation in its popular assembly, and assisted in each district by a hundred companions or assessors.3

They had also Duces, their leaders in war, elected probably from among the principes, but whose authority was based, not like that of the kings, on noble birth, but on personal valour. Each district contributed its hundred fighting men to the national host.

The principes were attended by bands of retainers (comites), who protected the person of their lord in war and upheld his state in peace, receiving in return such presents as their leader could confer.

The power of all the chiefs, whether reges, duces, or principes, was greatly limited. All important State affairs

1 'De minoribus rebus principes consultant, de majoribus omnes; ita tamen ut ea quoque quorum penes plebem arbitrium est, apud principes pertractentur.'-Tac. Germ. xi.

The well-known words of Montesquieu, speaking of the English constitution, Ce beau système a été trouvé dans les bois,' have reference to the existence of this triple constitution among the Germans.

2 Nec regibus infinita aut libera potestas.-Tac. Germ. vii.

3 Eliguntur in iisdem consiliis et principes qui jura per pagos vicosque reddunt. Centeni singulis ex plebe comites consilium simul et auctoritas adsunt. Id. c. xii.

4 Reges ex nobilitate, duces ex virtute sumunt. Id. c. vii.

• In pace decus, in bello praesidium. Id. c. xiii.

were discussed and determined in the national assemblies, held at stated times and attended by all the freemen of the tribe. Questions of minor importance were settled by the principes meeting as a separate body, and this body also appears to have taken the initiative in bringing matters before the larger assembly.

Below the freemen was a class of men intermediate between the slave and the freeman. They were not

They were the

slaves, but they had no political rights. cultivators of the soil which they held under the freemen, to whom they rendered a part of its produce as rent. Last of all came the mere slaves, chiefly made up of prisoners of war and of freemen who had been degraded for some crime.

Among the freemen there were differences of rank and social status; some were of noble blood and some were not; but this distinction carried with it no inequality of political rights. Military valour was shared by the Germans with all the northern nations; but one of their national traits was remarkable from the earliest times the respect paid by them to the women of their race, who on their side were celebrated for an exceptional chastity. The tie of kindred was strong and all-pervading; it formed the basis of social organization, and entered into the military, the legal, and the territorial arrangements. Side by side with it may be discerned the germ of Feudalism in the relation existing between the princeps and his comites, though it was as yet unconnected with the tenure of land.

Such were the general features of the political and social system which our Teutonic forefathers brought with them to their new island home. But the process of migration and conquest necessarily produced certain

1 On the importance of the family tie, see Tac. Germ., in relation to the host, c. 7; to feuds, c. 21; to inheritance, c. 20; the relations witness the punishment of the unfaithful wife, c. 19; marriages with alien nations unusual, c. 4.-Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 32.

modifications and developments of the primitive institutions. One of the earliest of these developments was the institution of royalty.

leaders assume

According to the Saxon Chronicle, the chieftains of The Teutonic the first settlers were only distinguished by the title of the regal title. Ealdorman, or Heretoga, the former word expressing the civil, the latter the military, aspect of the same office.1 But the successful leader soon won for himself a position much stronger than that of any chief in the old land, and, in most cases, assumed the regal title, as more accurately denoting his altered relation to his followers. The word Cyning, or King, closely connected as it is with the word Cyn, or Kin, marked out the bearer of the title as the representative of the race, the head and leader of the people, not the lord of the soil. His reputed descent from Woden, the god from whom all the English kings professed to descend, invested with a semi-sacred character the authority which his own prowess and the will of the people had conferred upon him.

Conversion of the English to

The conversion of the English to Christianity exercised an important influence upon the national development. Christianity. The Church not only introduced a higher civilization, (A.D. 597–681.) mitigated the original fierceness of the heathen conquerors, softened their pride of birth and race, and exalted the power of the intellect above that of brute force, but also supplied a new and powerful bond of union to a divided people. Once within the pale of the universal Christian Church, the English, moreover, were necessarily brought into relations with the general political society of Europe; and in the highly organized system of ecclesiastical synods they found a pattern by which to regulate the procedure of their own political assemblies.

1 A.D. 9. 449 (of the Jutes): 'Heora heretogan wæron twegen gebroða, Hengest and Horsa.'

A. D. 495 (of the West Saxons): Her comen twegen ealdormen on Brytene, Cerdic and Cynric his súnu.'-Sax. Chron. apud Freeman, Norm. Conq. i. 77.

National character of the Church.

The Bretwaldas.

From the first the Church entered into the closest alliance with the State, and while paying respectful deference to the Roman See, grew up with a distinctly marked national character. Theodore of Tarsus, enthroned Archbishop of Canterbury in 668, reduced the whole ecclesiastical organization of the various kingdoms into one national Church. Henceforward the Church existed as a united, central, and national institution, in spite of the separation and frequent hostility of the states to which the clergy individually belonged. Thus the ecclesiastical unity preceded and pointed the way to the civil unity of the nation. After the first missionary prelates had passed away, the highest spiritual dignities were filled by Englishmen, members, for the most part, of noble and powerful families. The tie thus created between the clergy and the State was strengthened by the union of secular and spiritual functions. The bishops were prominent members of the Witenagemôt, and frequently acted as the chief ministers of the king. They also shared with the ealdormen in the local judicial administration. The Church thus entered into close combination with the civil organization, gradually intertwining itself with all the feelings and customs of the people, and acquiring in the process its exceptionally national character.

During the whole period commonly called the Heptarchy, the land was full of petty kings or princes, some one of whom, from time to time, obtained a forcible predominance over his neighbours. Bede enumerates seven who are said to have enjoyed such a predominance or leadership over nearly the whole island; and the

1 'Isque primus erat in archiepiscopis cui omnis Anglorum aecclesia manus dare consentiret.'- Beda, Hist. Ecc. iv. 2; Kemble, Saxons in England, ii. 366.

2 There were at least nine, if not ten, independent states founded by the invaders; and there was never a confederate government composed of the different states as members. The word Heptarchy is not therefore accurate, but it is convenient if taken to denote the greater prominence of seven states out of the number.