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Noxal Surrender, the Deodand, and the Laws of King Alfred

Noxal Surrender, the Deodand, and the Laws of King Alfred This article considers provisions of the laws issued by Alfred the Great that offer remedies for inadvertent harm and are supposed examples of “noxal surrender.” The clauses in question concern injuries by dogs and oxen, and death by falling trees. Scholars have long been fascinated by these instances, and they have routinely deemed them survivals of folk-law in Alfred’s compilation in work published in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The present article questions such conclusions. That these clauses are indebted in some fashion to ordinances of the Pentateuch—a possibility given little consideration in prior scholarship—perhaps better explains their role in Alfred’s laws than conjectures about the nature of primitive custom. As for the clauses themselves, their significance has likely been misunderstood. The celebrated clause on trees in particular fits not at all within the framework of noxal liability so often adduced to explain it, being instead an amalgam of biblical source material and notions drawn from the written legal traditions of the Anglo-Saxons. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Studies in Philology University of North Carolina Press

Noxal Surrender, the Deodand, and the Laws of King Alfred

Jurasinski, Stefan.
Studies in Philology , Volume 111 (2) – Apr 16, 2014
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Publisher
University of North Carolina Press
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 The University of North Carolina Press.
ISSN
1543-0383

Abstract

This article considers provisions of the laws issued by Alfred the Great that offer remedies for inadvertent harm and are supposed examples of “noxal surrender.” The clauses in question concern injuries by dogs and oxen, and death by falling trees. Scholars have long been fascinated by these instances, and they have routinely deemed them survivals of folk-law in Alfred’s compilation in work published in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The present article questions such conclusions. That these clauses are indebted in some fashion to ordinances of the Pentateuch—a possibility given little consideration in prior scholarship—perhaps better explains their role in Alfred’s laws than conjectures about the nature of primitive custom. As for the clauses themselves, their significance has likely been misunderstood. The celebrated clause on trees in particular fits not at all within the framework of noxal liability so often adduced to explain it, being instead an amalgam of biblical source material and notions drawn from the written legal traditions of the Anglo-Saxons.

Journal

Studies in Philology – University of North Carolina Press

Published: Apr 16, 2014

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