Germanic law
[4] While the Leges Barbarorum were written in Latin and not in any Germanic vernacular, codes of Anglo-Saxon law were produced in Old English.[6] Until the middle of the 20th century, the majority of scholars assumed the existence of a distinct Germanic legal culture and law.This reconstructed legal system also excluded certain criminals by outlawry, and administratively contained a degree of sacral kingship; retinues formed around the kings bound by oaths of loyalty.[16] Early ideas about Germanic law have come under intense scholarly scrutiny since the 1950s and specific aspects of it such as the legal importance of kinship groups, retinues, and loyalty, and the concept of outlawry, can no longer be justified.[24] The term leges barbarorum, 'laws of the barbarians', used by editor Paolo Canciani [it] as early as 1781, reflects a negative value judgement on the actual law codes produced by these Germanic peoples.[14] The Leges share features such as orality, the importance of court procedure, and a reliance on compensatory justice to settle disputes.[29] The earliest of the Leges dealt with Germanic groups living either as foederati or conquerors among Roman people and regulating their relationship to them.[30] These earliest codes, written by Visigoths in Spain (475),[a] were probably not intended to be valid solely for the Germanic inhabitants of these kingdoms, but for the Roman ones as well.[45] It is unclear to what extent the written legal texts were used in court: whereas Patrick Wormald and many German scholars have argued that the Leges texts mostly existed for reasons of representation and prestige, other scholars, such as Rosamund McKitterick, have argued that the number of surviving manuscripts and physical indications of their frequent use means that they were in fact employed in practice.[58] Academic works in the 1990s and 2000s rejected the notion of Friedelehe as a construct for which no evidence is found in the sources,[59] while Kebsehe has been explained as not being a form of marriage at all.[63] Since the work of Reinhard Wenskus in the 1960s, scholars have begun to use the term gens (plural gentes), communities claiming (rather than possessing) shared biological descent, as a way to distance discussion of Germanic tribes from this earlier way of thinking.[70] However, scholarly disagreement exists whether the earliest law codes, those of the Goths and Burgundians, were meant for all persons in their territory or only those of a particular ethnicity.[74] In common with many archaic societies without a strong monarchy,[75] early Germanic law appears to have had a form of popular assembly.[82] The Leges Alamannorum specified that all free men were required to appear at a popular assembly, but such a specification is otherwise absent for the Frankish Merovingian period.[93] The power of the kings grew over time: while they originally seem to have been mostly military leaders, they became more institutionalized, authoritative rulers in the course of the migration period.[100] It aided him in seeking revenge (see feuding), receiving wergild for those who were slain or injured (see compensatory justice), and acted as oath helpers.[108] The post-Roman Barbarian kingdoms appear to have seen an increase in non-state violence and violent deaths with the decline in central authority.[113] This form of legal reconciliation aimed to prevent the erupting of feuds by offering a peaceful way to end disputes between groups.[116] More recent scholarship has instead argued that the range of enumerated offenses for personal injury is generally uniform or at least patterned across the codes and that the compositions mirror one another closely if calculated as a percentage of an individual's Wergild value, indications of a shared tradition.[117].He argues that the practice is absent in the early Burgundian, Alemannic, Bavarian, and Kentish law codes and therefore cannot have a pan-Germanic origin.[132] Heinz Holzhauer instead argues that ordeal by fire and water was a common Germanic, pre-Christian method of trial, which he connects to the casting of lots found in Tacitus.
Edictum RothariGermanic peoplesTacitusCaesarRoman lawGermanic vernacularAnglo-Saxon lawOld EnglishJulius CaesaroralityD.H. GreenReformationJacob GrimmKarl von AmiraHeinrich Brunnercanon lawthingsSippesblood feudwergildoutlawrysacral kingshipretinuesReinhard WenskusWalter GoffartMonumenta Germaniae HistoricaAnglo-Saxon law codesfoederatiVisigothsLex BurgundionumGundobadLex SalicaClovis IEdictus RothariRothariLex and Pactus AlemannorumLex BajuvariorumCatholic ChurchEwa ad AmoremLex FrisonumLex SaxonumLex ThuringorumCharlemagneLaw codeCode of EuricBurgundiansSalian FranksLaw of ÆthelberhtKingdom of KentÆthelberht of KentPactus AlamannorumAlamanniLex RipuariaRipuarian FranksLombardsLex VisigothorumRecceswinthLaw of Hlothhere and EadricHlothhereEadric of KentLaw of WihtredWihtred of KentLex AlamannorumBavariansLex FrisionumFrisiansSaxonsoral legal cultureFinnic languagesGothic Biblemorning giftOld High GermanOld Norseconcubinageearly Middle AgespolygamyethnogenesisSachsenspiegelThing (assembly)GermaniaMars ThingsusLeges AlamannorumFrankish Merovingian periodVisigothic lawsAnglo-Saxon lawsGermanic kingshipsolidusOstrogothicTheodoric the GreatHerulesGepidsWalter PohlsacralDennis Howard GreenLex ThuringiorumRoman predecessorLex BurgundonumTrial by ordealCode of Hammurabitrial by combatRobert BartlettMedieval Scandinavian lawsOstrogothsTheodoric IIGreen, Dennis H.Karras, Ruth MazoEthnolinguistic groupNorthern EuropeanGermanic languagesNordic Bronze AgePre-Roman Iron AgeRoman Iron AgeRomano-Germanic cultureGermanic Iron AgeViking AgeEarly cultureArchitectureCalendarClothingFamilyFestivalsFolklore Proto-Germanic folkloreAnglo-Saxon mythologyContinental Germanic mythologyNorse mythology