The secular law codes which survive from the Anglo-Saxon period, along with canon laws and penitentials as well as records of actual cases, have provided scholars with extensive material for the study of crime and punishment in England from the seventh into the eleventh centuries. Although kings took on themselves the authority for the promulgation and implementation of the law, including the endorsement of physical punishment, English law itself was far from homogeneous and neither was its application. Furthermore, the influence of the church on secular law did not prevent violent death or mutilation as judicial punishments; rather, the punishment of the body was tied in with the salvation of the soul.
The questions of how the law was formulated and applied is the subject of this volume. These ten essays aim, as the editors declare, to investigate “how capital and corporal punishments developed and operated in English society between c. 600 and c. 1150” as a means of maintaining peace and order for those in authority and of encouraging Christian morals and behavior (3). The essays, they state, “examine how and why attitudes and understandings of the law shifted, the anxieties and aspirations of authorities regarding violence, and the moral status of punishment” (10). The editors identify three major themes to this collection, one being the change from compensatory to punitive justice; another is the relationship of capital and corporal punishment in secular law to Christian moral theology and eschatology; the third theme deals with how leaders used punishment and the threat of punishment to consolidate their power.
The matter of Christian moral theology and the influence of the church on secular law are prominent in three chapters. In chapter 5, “Incarceration as Judicial Punishment in Anglo-Saxon England,” Daniel Thomas examines the rare use of imprisonment in secular law (there being little evidence for numerous purpose-built prisons) and the relationship to penitential practices. Stefan Jurasinski, in chapter 4, “‘Sick-Maintenance’ and Earlier English Law,” explores the law that an injured party is entitled to medical attention from the perpetrator, a law well attested in Irish and other Indo-European traditions. Most scholars refer to Exodus 21:18–19 as one basis upon which to propose an Indo-European rule of sick-maintenance. Jurasinski points out the dearth of evidence in Anglo-Saxon legal history, but examines what little exists in the laws and in the pententials pertaining to injury, especially the penitential known as the Scriftboc. Nicole Marafioti, in chaper 6, “Earthly Justice and Spiritual Consequences: Judging and Punishing in the Old English Consolation of Philosophy,” tackles the issue of how violent punishments were justified. The souls of offenders could be cleansed through physical punishment on earth, but what of the souls of judges who ordered such punishments? And what about those who escaped punishment of earth? The Consolation, she argues, offered a way of reconciling earthly justice with divine justice.
Daniela Fruscione, in chapter 2, “Beginnings and Legitimation of Punishment in early Anglo-Saxon Legislation From the Seventh to the Ninth Century,” discusses the evolution of the idea of the punishment through the evolution of Anglo-Saxon society from family-based communities, which prescribe restitution, to central governments, which prescribe physical punishments for crimes such as murder, injury, theft or treason. She contends, too, that the idea of personal responsibility, which grew under the influence of the Church, also influenced the development of criminal law. The monetary costs of death or injury are dealt with by Valerie Allen in chapter 1, “When Compensation Costs an Arm and a Leg,” and by the late Lisi Oliver in chapter 3, “Genital Mutilation in Medieval Germanic Law,” both of which underscore that change from feud-based retaliation to rule-based legal penalties.
The evidence for, and types of, capital and corporal punishment in the Anglo-Saxon period has increased thanks to archaeological investigations of burial sites and bones; criminals could be denied a Christian burial, and thus possibly salvation, by being buried in so-called “execution” cemeteries situated outside consecrated burial grounds, but it is only since the tenth century that churchyards were consecrated for Christian burials. Nevertheless, separate burial grounds from before this period have been identified along with evidence of decapitation and dismemberment. However, Jo Buckberry, in chapter 7, “Osteological Evidence of Corporal and Capital Punishment in Later Anglo-Saxon England,” points out in graphic detail the difficulties of forensic interpretation from the evidence of skeletal remains. Daniel O'Gorman, in chapter 8 “Mutilation and Spectacle in Anglo-Saxon Legislation,” examines the effect of displaying excised body parts in certain situations (in particular, hanging a forger's severed hand over a mint) and how the display of body parts was seen in literary, legal and religious contexts.
The final two essays of the volume, “The ‘Worcester’ Historians and Eadric Streona's Execution” by Jay Paul Gates (chapter 9) and “Capital Punishment and Anglo-Saxon Judicial Apparatus: A Maximum View?” by Andrew Rabin (chapter 10) exemplify the two scholarly “camps” regarding bodily punishments: the “maximalist,” which contends that royal power was centralized in the late Anglo-Saxon period, so that kings could enforce their laws from the top down; and the “minimalist,” which argues that the actual implementation of the law and capital punishment happened more at the level of local authorities.
Although the topics of these essays at times crisscross one another, it is more likely that the individual essays, each with their particular focus, will attract their individual readers. Yet, readers will gain some stimulating insights into this aspect of English legal history and the study of early English law.
