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ENGLAND - Government and society
The Anglo-Saxons were organised in family groups where the most important social bond was loyalty to the other members and to the lord of the tribe. They had no idea of law as something imposed from above; law was not what they were told to do, but what custom required of them, it was a large set of customs inherited from the past. The early laws of the Anglo-Saxon kings were called dooms and were drawn up only after consultation with the witan. The purpose of the dooms was the elaboration, enforcement or codification of already existing customs.
The Saxon created institutions which made the English state strong for the next 500 years. One of these institutions was the King’s Council, called the Witan. The Witan probably grew out of informal groups of senior warriors and churchmen to whom kings had turned to advice or suppot on difficult matters. By the tenth century the Witan was a formal body, issuing laws and charters. It was not at all democratic, and the king could decide to ignore the Witan’s advice. But he knew that it might be dangerous to do so. For the Witan’s authority was based on its right to choose kings, and to agree the use of the king’s laws. Without its support the king’s own authority was in danger.
The Saxons divided the land into new administative areas, based on shires, or counties. These shires, established by the end of the tenth century, remained almost exactly the same for a thousand years. “Shire” is the Saxon word, “county” the Norman one, but both are still used nowadays. Over each shire was appointed a shire reeve, the king’s local administrator. In time his name became shortened to “sheriff”. The sheriff was another important figure of Anglo-Saxon administration; he was directly appointed by the king to guarantee his authority, and whose office was not hereditary.
The Saxons settled previously unfarmed areas. They cut down many forested areas in valleys to farm the richer lowland soil, and they began to drain the wet land. As a result, almost all the villages which appear on eighteenth-century maps already existed by the eleventh century.
In each district was a “manor” or large house. This was a simple building where local villagers came to pay taxes, where justice was administered, and where men met together to join the Anglo-Saxon army, the fyrd. The lord of the manor hod to organise all this, and make sure village land was properly shared. It was the beginning of the manorial system which reached its fullest development under the Normans.
At first the lords, or aldermen, were simply local officials. But by the beginning of the eleventh century they were warlords, and were often called by a new Danish name, earl. Besides earls, there were also the thegns, high-ranking warriors who devoted their lives to hunting, war, collecting taxs and to the administration of justice. In return for their service, they received lands and therefore became the peasants’lords. It was the beginning of a class system, made up of king, lords, soldiers and workers on the land.
However, the Anglo-Saxons could hardly have established their settlements without the skills of craftsmen: the bronze-smiths and goldsmiths who made the elaborate jewels and drinking horns used by kings and nobles; the blacksmiths who worked iron for making weapons, fish hooks, needles, tools and coins; the carpenters who built houses and ships; the singers and musicians who entertained the nobility. Anglo-Saxon society also included a slave class. Throughout Saxon times, slaves were exported to Spain, North Africa and Scandinavia, where there was a considerable market.
Reconstruction of an Anglo-Saxon village. Each house had probably only one room, with a wooden floor with a pit beneath it. The pit may have been used for storage, but more probably to keep the house off the dampo ground. Each village had its lord. The word “lord” means “loaf ward” or “bread keeper”, while “lady” means “loaf kneader” or “bread maker”, a reminder that the basis of Saxon society was farming. The duty of the village head, or lord, was to protect the farm and its produce.
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