The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon : a history of the early inhabitants of Britain, down to the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity, illustrated by the ancient remains brought to light by recent research / by Thomas Wright.

Wright, Thomas, 1810-1877.

Date:: 1852

Credit: The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon : a history of the early inhabitants of Britain, down to the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity, illustrated by the ancient remains brought to light by recent research / by Thomas Wright. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$immunities of the king, for the condition of serving him with twenty ships for fifteen days in the year.* * * § We have another instance of municipal responsibility in the case of Thetford, in Norfolk. In 952, the people of that town were engaged in hostilities with the monks (pi’obahly in defence of some of their privileges), in the course of which they slew their abbot Eadhelm. King Edred appears to have taken no steps to discover the persons immediately concerned in this act of violence, but he sent an army, and caused “ a great slaughter ” to be made of the townsmen.f In 1040, king Hardacnut imposed a very heavy tribute on his English subjects. Two of the king’s huscarles were sent to enforce its payment by the citizens of Worcester, who rose against them, and slew them in the cathedral. The king, in revenge, sent an army to ravage the neighbourhood and destroy the city, but the inhabitants had taken sheltei*, with their most valuable effects, in an island in the river Severn, and there they set their persecutors at defiance.]; We here find a town asserting its right to exemption from extraordinary taxation; another of the muni- cipal privileges guaranteed by the charters of a later period. The city of Exeter affords a remarkable instance of the manner in which the Roman municipal institutions were preserved. In other towns the Romano-British population gi'adually disappeared; but we learn, from William of Malmsbury, that, down to the reign of Athelstan, Exeter was inhabited by English and Welsh, who lived on an equality of rights {aquo jure^), which they could only have done by virtue of an original composition with the Saxon conquerors. It may be cited as a proof of the correctness of this view of the mode in which the Roman corporations out- lived the shock of invasion, and thus became a chief instrument in the civilisation of subsequent ages, that even the Danes, in their predatory excursions, often entered into similar compositions with the Saxon towns, as with Canterbury, in 1009. It may be * Burgenses dcderunt x.v. naves regi una vice in anno ad xv. dies ; et in unaquaque navi crant homines x.\. et unus. Hoc faciebant pro eo quod eis perdonavei'at sacain et socam. f Saxon Chron. sub an. J Saxon Chron. Florence of Worcester. § Illos [Cornewallcnscs] quoque impigre adorsus, ab Excestri.a, quam ad id teniporis a>quo cum Aiiglis jure inhabitarant, cedere conij)ulit, W. Malmsb. dg Gest. Reg. p. 50.$