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Government in Anglo-Saxon England

Before unification

Settlement (300–500)

England was part of the Roman Empire since the 1st century CE. Roman Britain was a civil diocese extending from the south coast up to Hadrian's Wall and the Antonine Wall. The diocese was divided into four or five provinces and further divided into civitates (a territorial unit roughly the size of a modern county and centered on a town).^[1]

In the 4th century, a series of barbarian invasions destabilised the Roman Empire. In Britain, the size of the Roman army decreased, urban populations declined, and the minting of Roman coins ceased. The native Britons revolted and expelled the Roman authorities in the 5th century. The end of Roman rule caused a "period of social and economic collapse".^[2] It is unclear what governments existed in the immediate aftermath of Roman rule. By the time Gildas wrote in the 6th century, there were at least five Brittonic kingdoms, including Dumnonia in modern Devon. These kingdoms were based on the Roman civitates.^[3]

Germanic people may have begun settling the island in the late 4th century. Gildas writes that Saxons were originally hired as federate soldiers but eventually seized power from the native Britons. According to Bede, who wrote c. 731, the settlers came mainly from three Germanic tribes: Saxons, Angles, and Jutes.^[4]

Eastern and southern Britain fragmented into small, independent political communities.^[5] Based on archaeological evidence (such as burials and buildings), these early communities appear to have lacked any social elite. Around half the population were free, independent farmers (Old English: ceorls) who cultivated enough land to provide for a family (a unit called a hide). Slaves, mostly Britons, made up the other half.^[6]

Origins of kingship (500–600)

The most important kingdoms to develop were the Heptarchy: Kent, Essex, Wessex, Sussex, East Anglia, Mercia, and Northumbria.

These new societies were based on Germanic law and culture. While there was some Celtic influence, especially in Northumbria and the west Midlands, nothing of Roman law or culture survived.^[7]

Early kingdoms (600–871)

Not in article:
Noblemen were expected to always be prepared for military action, and ordinary freemen (Old English: ceorl) could be recruited to serve in the fyrd.^[8]

The earliest extant charters date from the end of the 7th century. Most of these concern land grants to monasteries or laymen. ^[9]

The most important kingdoms became known as the Heptarchy: Kent, Essex, Wessex, Sussex, East Anglia, Mercia, and Northumbria.

Electing and deposing kings

Christian kingship

Local administration

Consolidation (871–899)

Not in article:
Drawing on the older legal traditions of Wessex, Mercia and Kent, Alfred issued his own law code, the Doom book.^[10]

Land taxes were levied based on hidage. While silver coins were in use, most taxes were paid in kind.^[11] 

Much of the king's time was taken up with judicial matters, and judicial profits provided an important source of royal revenue.^[11]

Alfred also exercised overlordship over the unconquered half of Mercia, which was ruled by Æthelred, Lord of the Mercians, who was married to Alfred's daughter Æthelflæd.^[12]

Royal government

Kingship

Not in article yet:
In the later Anglo-Saxon period, kings expanded their roles over a range of legal fields, especially in preserving the peace. This can be seen in the concern to punish theft or Cnut's use of outlawry.^[13]

Succession

Not in article 
Anointing had a sacramental character to it, the king gained a closer relationship with God and became his representative.^[14]

Coronation

ordo

Royal household

Not in article
The royal household conducted the secretarial, financial, and judicial work of the royal government.^[13]

Witan

Finances

Not in the article
Danegeld was first instituted by Aethelred the Unready in 991.^[15]

The king's income came from revenue generated from the royal demesne and the annual "farm" from each shire (the farm was the fixed sum paid by sheriffs for the privilege of administering and profiting from royal lands). Kings also made income from judicial fines and regulation of trade. A large source of revenue was the geld or property tax first levied in response to Viking invasions.^[16]

Coinage

Royal lands and taxation

Local government

Ealdormanries and earldoms

Shires

Not in article
Historian H. R. Loyn stated that, besides the monarchy, the shire court was "perhaps the most important institution in Anglo-Saxon England".^[17]

Hundreds and boroughs

More information on the monastice "immunities" in Anglo-Saxon England - Warren p. 49

Church and state

Military

References

Citations

^ Naismith 2021, pp. 20–21.
^ Morris 2021, pp. 17–22.
^ Naismith 2021, p. 21.
^ Yorke 1990, pp. 2–3 & 5.
^ Yorke 1990, p. 14.
^ Morris 2021, pp. 49–50.
^ Jolliffe 1961, p. 1.
^ Loyn 1984, pp. 31–32.
^ Loyn 1984, pp. 38–39.
^ Loyn 1984, p. 65.
^ ^a ^b Loyn 1984, p. 66.
^ Loyn 1984, p. 76.
^ ^a ^b Loyn 1984, p. 106.
^ Lyon 1980, p. 39.
^ Lyon 1980, p. 31.
^ Huscroft 2016, pp. 29–30.
^ Loyn 1984, p. 138.

Bibliography

Barlow, Frank (1997). Edward the Confessor (New ed.). Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-07156-6.
Baker, John (2019). An Introduction to English Legal History (5th ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-254074-4.
Green, Judith A. (2017). Forging the Kingdom: Power in English Society, 973–1189. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521193597.
Huscroft, Richard (2016). Ruling England, 1042–1217 (2nd ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-1138786554.
Jolliffe, J. E. A. (1961). The Constitutional History of Medieval England from the English Settlement to 1485 (4th ed.). Adams and Charles Black.
Keynes, Simon (2014). "Bretwalda or Brytenwalda". In Lapidge, Michael; Blair, John; Keynes, Simon; Scragg, Donald (eds.). Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England (2nd ed.). Wiley Blackwell. pp. 76–77. doi:10.1002/9781118316061. ISBN 9780470656327.
Loyn, H. R. (1984). The Governance of Anglo-Saxon England, 500–1087. Governance of England. Vol. 1. Stanford University Press. ISBN 9780804712170.
Lyon, Bryce (1980). A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England (2nd ed.). W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0-393-95132-4. 1st edition available to read online here.
Lyon, Ann (2016). Constitutional History of the UK (2nd ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-20398-8.
Morris, Marc (2021). The Anglo-Saxons: A History of the Beginnings of England: 400–1066. Pegasus Books. ISBN 978-1-64313-312-6.
Naismith, Rory (2021). Early Medieval Britain, c. 500–1000. Cambridge History of Britain. Vol. 1. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781108341547.
Powell, J. Enoch; Wallis, Keith (1968). "Witenagemot". The House of Lords in the Middle Ages: A History of the English House of Lords to 1540. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. pp. 1–11. ISBN 0297761056.
Thorpe, Benjamin, ed. (1844). The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church. The first part, containing the Sermones Catholici, or Homilies of Ælfric. Vol. 1. London: Richard and John E. Taylor for the Aelfric Society.
Warren, W. L. (1987). "The Anglo-Saxon Legacy". The Governance of Norman and Angevin England, 1086–1272. The Governance of England. Vol. 2. Stanford, CA, US: Stanford University Press. pp. 25–55. ISBN 0-8047-1307-3.
Yorke, Barbara (1990). Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England. B. A. Seaby. ISBN 0-415-16639-X.
Yorke, Barbara (2014). "Kings and Kingship". In Lapidge, Michael; Blair, John; Keynes, Simon; Scragg, Donald (eds.). Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England (2nd ed.). Wiley Blackwell. pp. 276–277. doi:10.1002/9781118316061. ISBN 9780470656327.