laws and legal codes: Europe laws from the descriptions of Roman observers and from laws that were written slightly after the ancient period The best evidence of Celtic legal codes comes from Ireland’s Brehon laws, which were first written down in the 600s c.e but are presumed to have come from ancient Celtic laws Historians think that these laws may have developed among Celtic peoples in Europe during the Bronze Age, between 2300 and 900 b.c.e Legal experts memorized the laws and transmitted them orally over the years After many years of study, these experts became skilled at interpreting the law, advising rulers, and arbitrating disputes (The name Brehon is an Anglicization of the Irish word for “judge.”) Celtic law divided people into five social classes At the top were kings, followed by nobles Free people who owned property formed a third class and free people without property a fourth The fi ft h class consisted of slaves and other nonfree people These ranks indicated how people had to behave with respect to other members of society Kings and nobles owned their own property and paid no rent to anyone Men of the third class, freemen with property, did not own land but did own cattle and other movable goods, which allowed them to function as the lowest level of chiefs The vast majority of people fell into the bottom two classes The fourth class rented land from nobles, to whom they owed allegiance in war Some members of the fi ft h class were slaves, many of them captured from other tribes; others were not slaves but did not hold all the rights of full members of the tribe In addition to defining social classes, Celtic laws organized people into groups that served as the basis for distributing land The family was the smallest group The clan was a larger group of relatives descended from a common ancestor A tribe consisted of several clans likewise descended from a common ancestor Each tribe and clan was governed by its own chief, who in turn owed allegiance to higher rulers Allegiance took the form of yearly payments of property and military assistance Celtic laws did away with the ancient practice of retaliation for crimes and replaced them with a scheme of compensation designed to end disputes peacefully If a person harmed another, the victim or the victim’s family would bring the case before a chief and a legal expert The legal expert would listen to the facts and decide the appropriate punishment Every crime merited a specific compensation; cutting off someone’s hand earned a smaller fine than murdering someone would There were several levels of court; petty disputes went to the courts of local chiefs, while major disputes might go all the way to a king A party who brought a case to court had to bring at least two witnesses to testify on her behalf Social rank was important in courts; a person of lower rank could not always testify against someone of higher class One notable aspect of ancient Celtic law is its near absence of capital punishment for crimes The only time Celtic laws recommended death was when a murderer failed to pay the full amount of the specified fine Celtic kings and chiefs 627 did execute criminals, but this practice was done outside the legal setting Methods of execution included hanging and drowning Germanic tribes did not begin to compile formal legal codes until the very end of the Roman Empire in the 400s For almost all of the ancient period they governed themselves according to custom, passed orally from generation to generation These laws specified the treatment of criminals and the settlement of disputes German tribes assembled periodically to hold a festival that in medieval times was called the Thing, which was an occasion to trade, exchange spouses, and settle disputes People who believed they had been wronged would wait until a major gathering and then bring their grievance before the king, who acted as a judge Both parties were allowed to speak and bring witnesses to back them The king would then issue a judgment If all went well, both parties would abide by the agreement, and the dispute would be ended Sometimes people settled disputes themselves by force, but there was community pressure to follow the king’s judgment and settle matters peacefully If the king summoned a person to appear at the Thing and he failed to come, he would be fined Any party who summoned another person to appear because of a dispute and then himself failed to appear would have to pay a fine to the person he had summoned German laws covered many different types of crime Stealing cattle was a serious offense, and penalties varied depending on the value of the cattle stolen; a bull owned by the king merited a higher fine than a bull that serviced only the cows of a single herd owned by an ordinary man Stealing an object that lay outside a house was not as serious as breaking into a house to steal something Merely breaking into a house without stealing anything was also a crime, especially if the thief broke a lock to get in Rape, assault, insult, and murder were all criminal offenses punishable by fines Tribes set fines according to the value of the victim Killing a pregnant woman merited a higher fine than killing a woman past her childbearing years If a murderer concealed his victim in an attempt to hide his crime, the punishment was greater than if he did not A murderer who did not have enough money to pay the fine was expected to ask his relatives and friends for help If he still could not raise enough money, he might be executed Germanic inheritance law favored male heirs If a father died and left sons, they would inherit his property If he had no sons, then his property would go to his parents, his siblings, or his relatives on his father’s side In most cases, the inheritance could not go to a woman During the 400s c.e., Germanic groups began compiling codes of laws The Visigothic leaders Theodoric I, Thorismund, and Theodoric II all created bodies of law that they used to govern their people, but they did not write these laws down The Visigothic king Euric (d 484 c.e.) made the first compilation of Visigothic law in 471, gathering the laws of his predecessors and arranging them in a single volume His laws regulated only disputes involving Goths or Goths and