Cyninges fedesl: the king's feeding in Æthelberht, ch. 12
Lisi Oliver
The twelfth-century Textus Roffensis contains a collection of early English laws, which the first is attributed to Æthelberht Kent, who reigned c . 580–616. Although these laws remain us only in copy made some six centuries later, there are strong linguistic grounds, proposed by Sievers and Liebermann, recently elaborated on expanded myself, assume that text as we have it genuinely reflects an original, albeit much changed generations scribal modernization. Yet problems interpretation often arise, among them difficulty definition hapax legomena: words occur corpus Old this text. One such term contained Æthelberht, ch. 12, states: ‘Cyninges fedesl XX scillinga forgelde.’ This presumably formulated along lines 8, reads: mundbyrd L scillinga.’ There basic agreement scholars meaning, if not precise interpretation, mundbyrd: most would agree with Bosworth's ‘protection, patronage’. Along lines, clause can be interpreted as: ‘[For violating] king's protection: 50 (of) shillings.’ Using template, one might translate iEthelberht, fedesl: let [the perpetrator pay] 20
Anglo-Saxon England