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Medieval Scandinavian law, also called North Germanic law, [1] [2] [3] was a subset of Germanic law practiced by North Germanic peoples.It was originally memorized by lawspeakers, but after the end of the Viking Age they were committed to writing, mostly by Christian monks after the Christianization of Scandinavia.
Holmgang (Old Norse: holmganga, Icelandic: hólmganga, Danish and Norwegian: holmgang, Swedish: holmgång) is a duel practiced by early medieval Scandinavians. It was a legally recognized way to settle disputes.
Besides his function as the president of the thing, his duties were restricted to counselling and to reciting the law. It was the sole government office of the medieval Icelandic Commonwealth. The lawspeaker was elected for a term of three years and was supposed to declaim the law at the Althing, a third of it each summer.
The word appears in Old Norse, Old English, and modern Icelandic as þing, [b] in Middle English (as in modern English), Old Saxon, Old Dutch, and Old Frisian as thing (the difference between þing and thing is purely orthographical), in German as Ding, in Dutch and Afrikaans as ding, and in modern Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Faroese, Gutnish, and Norn as ting. [1]
Grágás GKS 1157 fol.. The Gray (Grey) Goose Laws (Icelandic: Grágás [ˈkrauːˌkauːs]) are a collection of laws from the Icelandic Commonwealth period. The term Grágás was originally used in a medieval source to refer to a collection of Norwegian laws and was probably mistakenly used to describe the existing collection of Icelandic law during the sixteenth century.
Gulating (Old Norse: Gulaþing) was one of the four ancient popular assemblies or things (lagting) of medieval Norway. Historically, it was the site of court and assembly for most of Western Norway, and assembled at Gulen. It functioned as a judicial and legislative body, resolving disputes and establishing laws.
Tinghaugen at Frosta Frostatinget bautasten at Tinghaugen Inscription: at lögum skal land várt byggja en eigi at ulögum øyða (with law shall our land be built, and not desolated by lawlessness) Frostating (Old Norse: Frostuþing) was one of the four ancient popular assemblies or things (lagting) of medieval Norway.
The compound noun weregild means "remuneration for a man", from Proto-Germanic *wira-"man, human" and *geld-a-"retaliation, remuneration". [2] In the south Germanic area, this is the most common term used to mean "payment for killing a man" (Old High German werigelt, Langobardic wergelt, Old English wer(e)gild), whereas in the North Germanic area, the more common term is Old Norse mangæld ...