Source Problems in English History
Source Problems in English History
while furnishing a very virile and versatile new strain; and that selective assimilation — the Northmen's chief glory — by which the better things in their new environment were taken into their life and practice, laid the foundations of future greatness. Normandy was an ideal transmitter into England of things continental.
It may be stated at the outset that the development which was to make the sworn inquest a notable thing in the world's history took place in England and not on the Continent. One obvious but fundamental reason for this needs a brief discussion before the sources are studied. The sworn-inquest seed found a favorable soil in England. It was sown in a country where there was a fairly large class of men which was at the same time responsible, well-informed, and honest. The three qualities of responsibility, informedness, and honesty were perhaps as frequent in isolation on the Continent as in England. Be that as it may, it was the combination which was needed. A nobility, while certainly responsible and sometimes truth-telling, would not have a wide range of information on local affairs. A servile peasantry, while as honest as the nobles and well-informed on the more local and petty affairs, would lack the goods and chattels on the basis of which a man could be conveniently held answerable for perjury. In men between nobles and serfs, the three qualities were more often combined. And England, in the centuries following the Norman Conquest, had more such men. England had a middle class.
This is not the place for a discussion of English classes or an explanation of their origin, but a few leading facts need emphasis. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries,
the critical period in jury development, there was in England a substantial body of men above the villeins and below the nobles. These non-noble freemen were both
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