Tithing
A tithing or tything was a historic English legal, administrative or territorial unit, originally ten
Etymology
The noun tithing breaks down as ten + thing, which is to say, a
for a single household.Sound changes in the prehistory of English are responsible for the first part of the word looking so different from the word ten. In the West Germanic dialects which became Old English, n had a tendency to elide when positioned immediately before a th.
The noun is not to be confused with the verb to
History
The term originated in the 10th century, when a tithing meant the households in an area comprising ten hides. The heads of each of those households were referred to as tithingmen; historically they were assumed to all be males, and older than 12 (an adult, in the context of the time). Each tithingman was individually responsible for the actions and behaviour of all the members of the tithing, by a system known as frankpledge. If a person accused of a crime was not forthcoming, his tithing was fined; if he was not part of the frankpledge, the whole town was subject to the fine.[4]
Unlike areas dominated by Wessex, Kent had been settled by Jutes rather than Saxons, and retained elements of its historical identity as a separate and wealthy kingdom into the Middle Ages. While Wessex and Mercia eventually grouped their hundreds into Shires, Kent grouped hundreds into lathes. Sussex, which had also been a separate kingdom, similarly grouped its hundreds into rapes. The different choice of terminology continued to the level of the tithing; in Kent, parts of Surrey, and Sussex, the equivalent term was a borgh, borow, or borough (not to be confused with borough in its more usual sense of a chartered or privileged town);[5][6][7] their equivalent to the tithingman was therefore a borsholder, borough-holder or headborough.[8][9]
The
Frankpledge eventually evolved into both the
References
- ^ Dictionary definition of "Tithing" Archived 2013-04-16 at archive.today
- ^ Dictionary definition of "Tithingman". Webster's Online Dictionary. Retrieved 19 January 2012.
- ^ Kenneth F. Duggan "The Limits of Strong Government: Attempts to Control Criminality in Thirteenth-Century England" Historical Research 93:261 (2020) pp. 402–409
- ^ Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 26 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 1022.
- ISBN 0952534355.
- ^ Baker, A.R.H. (1966). "Field Systems in the Vale of Holmesdale". Agricultural History Review. 14 (1): 11 (note). Click on the link for "Full text of article" to download the article in PDF format.
- ^ E 179/249/33 Part 2 of 10. (1663). The National Archives. Retrieved 19 January 2012.
- ^ Johnson, S. et al. (1835), English Dictionary, p. 148.
- ^ Dictionary definition of "Borsholder" Archived 2013-04-16 at archive.today. Webster's Online Dictionary. Retrieved 19 January 2012.
Further reading
- Pratt, David (2010). "Written Law and the Communication of Authority in Tenth-Century England". In Rollason, David; Leyser, Conrad; Williams, Hannah (eds.). England and the Continent in the Tenth Century:Studies in Honour of Wilhelm Levison (1876-1947). Brepols. ISBN 9782503532080.
- Duggan, Kenneth F. (2020) "The Limits of Strong Government: Attempts to Control Criminality in Thirteenth-Century England", Historical Research 93:261, pp. 399–419