Crime and Punishment in Medieval Wales

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of the provisions of the Welsh Laws of Hywel the Good, related to the criminal law. The law remained the main source of law in Wales until the conquest of the Principality of English by King Edward I in 1284, and the introduction of Statute of Rhuddlan in 1284. The creation of the Act is attributed to the Welsh King Hywel the Good (X century), although the earliest surviving manuscripts of the Act are dated back to the 13th century. Particular attention is given to the substance of the third part of the Act Justices' Test Book, original manuals, knowledge of which was mandatory for the administration of the duties of a judge. This part of the Law distinguishes the contemporary medieval vaults from the Laws of Hywel the Good. Justices' Test Book, which is a set of rules of criminal and procedural law, consists of subsections, dealing with murder, theft, fire, compensation for damage caused to property, personal injury. The main part of the Justices' Test Book is dedicated to order payment of all sorts of compensation and fines associated with the commission of an offence. The author emphasizes the role of the clan in Welsh society: all fines and compensation payments were laid on the shoulders of the perpetrator and his relatives. A major issue addressed in the article is the evidence of the commission of the offence by the accused. The author draws the attention to the process of announcement and the process of finding an acquirer in bad faith of assets recognized as stolen. It is interesting that such a rule is found in the Russian Justice and Swedish Vestgjotalage. The author finds the ascendancy of compensation payments for damage caused prevailing over the above penalties in Welsh law, explaining this relative weakness of public authorities on the one hand and the other by legal tradition, as even the increased power of Welsh Princes in the XII-XIII centuries. has not led to significant changes in the rules.