The Laws of Alfred: The Domboc and the Making of Anglo-Saxon Law (Studies in Legal History)
Cambridge University Press, 5/27/2021
EAN 9781108840903, ISBN10: 1108840906
Hardcover, 320 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 3.2 cm
Language: English
Originally published in English
Alfred the Great's domboc ('book of laws') is the longest and most ambitious legal text of the Anglo-Saxon period. Alfred places his own laws, dealing with everything from sanctuary to feuding to the theft of bees, between a lengthy translation of legal passages from the Bible and the legislation of the West-Saxon King Ine (r. 688–726), which rival his own in length and scope. This book is the first critical edition of the domboc published in over a century, as well as a new translation. Five introductory chapters offer fresh insights into the laws of Alfred and Ine, considering their backgrounds, their relationship to early medieval legal culture, their manuscript evidence and their reception in later centuries. Rather than a haphazard accumulation of ordinances, the domboc is shown to issue from deep reflection on the nature of law itself, whose effects would permanently alter the development of early English legislation.
List of Figures
List of Tables
Acknowledgments
Preface
Part I.
1. The emergence of written law in early England
2. Legal erudition in seventh- and ninth-century Wessex
3. Reshaping tradition
oaths, ordeals, and the 'innovations' of the domboc
4. The transmission of the domboc
old English manuscripts and other early witnesses
5. Reception, editorial history, and interpretative legacies
Part II. Editions
6. Rubrics in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MSS 173 and 383
7. Alfred's prologue
8. The laws of Alfred
9. The laws of Ine
Appendix I
handlist of prior editions
Bibliography
Index.