Posted on 12/29/2010 6:27:55 PM PST by SunkenCiv
A team of experts hope to shed new light on one of Nottinghamshire's most mysterious ancient monuments.
A 'Thing', or open-air meeting place where Vikings gathered to discuss the law, was discovered in the Birklands, Sherwood Forest, five years ago...
It started after husband and wife team Lynda Mallett and Stuart Reddish, along with their friend John Wood, came into possession of a 200 year old document.
It described a walk around part of Sherwood Forest which marked an ancient boundary.
They searched for the boundary on the landscape and found a place called Hanger Hill on which stood three stones.
The historians, from Rainworth, researched further and found that the same place was called Thynghowe on a 1609 map...
"A 'thyng' is the name of a Viking assembly site while a 'howe' is possibly a Bronze Age burial ground," said Lynda...
References to Nottinghamshire's Thynghowe have been found in an ancient Forest Book dating back to the 1200s.
The site is also thought to be a bronze age burial mound...
However, it may date back much further, as 'howe' is a term often used to indicate a prehistoric burial place...
"We've got documentary evidence that people met there right up to the 1800s. Local people were still meeting up there and raising each others spirits 200 years ago," said Stuart.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
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thynghowe
They wanted to do their own thyng.....
And howe...
Probably some of my people.
barrow-wights?
Bump.
Ah, the reddish mallet team.
I visited with relatives who live in Nottingham a few years back. I asked about visiting Sherwood Forest and was told that it is no more, but there exists what is referred to as the Sherwood Tree. I thought they were serious.
Hey! Take a look at this “Thing!”
Me and Mrs. Jones, we have a thyng going on...
It’s your thyng, do what you wanna do. I can’t tell you, who to sock it to.
See also Thingvellir in Iceland - home of the oldest Paliament and allegedly of democracy. http://www.edwebproject.org/scandinavia/thingvellir.html
In early England, descendants of Germanic invaders lived in tribal units. The bulk of the tribe consisted of “freemen,” adult males with the obligation of bearing arms, with the right to participate as equals in the tribal assembly held every month and to hold a share of tribal land. The assembly had the power to appoint and depose all chiefs and officials, decide on war and peace and try important disputes.
The most important tribal subdivisions were the “pagus” or “hundred” which designated a territorial unit of varying size. (In large complex tribes, there was a further subdivision of the hundred called the “vicus” or “vill”.) Each hundred had an assembly under the chairmanship of a lesser chief. The primary function of these assemblies were judicial. However, except for capital offenses, (treason, cowardice, desertion or sexual perversion,) which were reserved to the jurisdiction of the greater assembly; the jurisdiction over the “res” or subject matter of all the lesser assemblies and the greater assembly was concurrent. What distinguished the jurisdiction of these various assemblies was, rather, the status of the “personam” involved. (A dispute involving a great man would more likely be tried by the greater assembly.)
The law applied by all assemblies was unwritten, unlegislated, customary law and was considered immutable. It was a law of torts, designed to prevent feuds, which assigned damages to be paid for injury to persons or property, commensurate with the social value assigned to the injured party. Once the damages were paid, the injury was completely canceled - even in the case of homicide.
The thing was a place of assembly which occurred customarily on certain seasonal dates.
One can see Germanic/Viking influences in the evolution of our current forms of modern government.
a thing (Thyng-howe) ping....
plus i love the forest.....
Thanks marsh2.
Sherwood Forest, eh? I am descended from one of Robin Hood’s “Merrie Men”, a chap by the name of “Oakie”. Perhaps he once stood upon this site.
Okay, I'm a little confused about why this is being called a discovery if it was being used so recently.
Nevertheless, it is a fascinating article, thanks for posting it.
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