centena among the Lombards. Politically the sept recedes as well, but in matters of right it is only gradually superseded by the State. Rothari's legislation endeavours to restrain the feud-right to the sept; high penalties are fixed for the purpose of making the injured choose these instead of feud; guiltless acts are not to lead to feud. The members of the sept intervene as assistants at an oath, as combatants for a woman's right at an ordeal; and the mundium of an unmarried woman is due to the members of the sept if she has no nearer family relations. In contrast to these poor remnants of the sept's power, which once had been so great, family-connexion is very powerful, so that even by a disposal a last will was allowed only very late and quite exceptionally. The national assembly, that is the assembly of arimanni, still existed, and this as well as the kingship expressed the Lombard unity; but this assembly also was naturally entirely changed by the territorial State, having lost its organic foundations in the septs, and as an assembly comprising all or nearly all warriors was quite impossible considering the territorial extension of the State. In reality it consisted only in the army that was just ready for military operations, the king's attendants and the dukes and nobles present, and, whereas the nobles were actually often summoned to the preparatory council, the assembly of warriors had no possibility of influencing current state affairs and only served to heighten solemnities at a king's election or law-giving. The other element of unity, which had probably been born only in the time of wanderings — the kingship — predominated more and more in comparison; it seems to have been attached to one family at a very early period, and up to the eighth century connexion with the Lethingians was kept up at least by the feminine line; but besides this inherited right, general German custom demanded election, raising upon the buckler, and a solemn act of fealty from the fideles. On the other hand, the territorial State and Roman influence soon decided the extent of the king's power, though he called himself rex gentis Langobardorum. This influence expresses itself not only in the addition of the Roman name of Flavius and the Roman name of honour, vir excellentissimus, but also in the assertion of the king's nearly unlimited power, which is already expressed in Rothari's Edict: "we believe that the hearts of the kings are in the hands of God." The king has not only the arrière-ban, and all rights in connexion with it. As supreme justice and protector of peace, he has his own peace secured by a high penalty, intercedes wherever all other forces give way, is the Lombard State's supreme guardian in a certain sense, and being the State's only representative, no difference is made between his own rights and those of the State. His alone is the right of coinage, since the Lombards — before Rothari even — had learnt the art and use of coining from the Romans; and that the duke of Benevento coined as well as the king only shews how independent he kept himself of the Lombard State.
