86
THE SAXONS IN ENGLAND.
[book i.
But we have evidence that some division into shires
was known in Wessex as early as the end of the
seventh or beginning of the eighth century, since
Ini provides for the case where a plaintiff cannot
obtain justice from his shireman or judge1; and
the same prince declares that if an ealdorman com-
pounds a felony, he shall forfeit his shire2 ; while
he- further enacts that no man shall secretly with-
draw from his lord into another shire 3. As it will
be shown hereafter that a territorial jurisdiction is
inseparably connected with the rank of a duke or
ealdorman, I take the appearance of these officers
in Mercia, during the same early period, to be evi-
dence of the existence of a similar division there.
Its cause appears to me to lie in the consolidation
of the royal power. As long as independent asso-
ciations of freemen were enabled to maintain their
natural liberties, to administer their own affairs un-
disturbed by the power of strangers, and by means
of their own private alliances to defend their tèrri-
tories and their rights, the old division into Gas
might continue to exist. But the centralization of
power in the hands of the king implies a more ar-
tificial system. It is more convenient for judicial
and administrative purposes, more profitable, and
more safe for the ruler, to have districts governed
by his own officers, and in which a territorial unity
shall supersede the old bonds of kinsmanship : cen-
tralization is hardly compatible with family tradi-
tion. The members of the Ga met as associated
ɪ Ini, § 8. Thorpe, i. 106.
, Ini, § 39. Thorpe, i. 126.
2 Ini, § 36. Thorpe, i. 124.
сн. ι∏∙]
THE GA' OR SCΓR.
87
freemen, under the guidance of their own natural
leaders, and formed a substantive unit or small
state, which might, or might not, stand in relations
of amity to similar states. The Shire was a poli-
tical division, presided over by an appointed officerb
forming part only of a general system, and no longer
endowed with the high political rights of self-govern-
ment, in their fullest extent. I can imagine the Ga,
but certainly not the Shire, declaring war against
a neighbour. As long as the Ga could maintain
itself as a little republic, principality, or even king-
dom, it might exist unscathed : but as the smaller
kings were rooted out, their lands and people in-
corporated with larger unions, and powerful mon-
archies rose upon their ruins, it is natural that a
system of districts should arise, based entirely upon
a territorial division. Such districts, without pecu-
liar, individual character of their own, or principle
of internal cohesion, must have appeared less dan-
gerous to usurpation than the ancient gentile ag-
gregations.