Page:A History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments in England During the Middle Ages.djvu/362

 342 Hijlory of DomeJIic Ma?iners The punilhments of the middle ages are remarkable, ftill more lb in other countries than in England, for a mixture of a fmall amount of feeling of ftrift juftice with a very large proportion of the mere feeling of vengeance. Savage ferocity in the commillion of crime led to no lefs favage cruelty in retaliation. We have feen, in a former chapter, that this was not the fentiment of our Anglo-Saxon forefathers, but that their criminal laws were extremely mild ; but after the Norman conqueft, more barbarous feelings on this fubjeft were brought over from the Con- tinent. Imprifonment itfelf, even before trial, was made frightfully cruel 3 the dungeons into which the accufed were thrown were often filthy holes, fometimes with water running through them, and, as a refinement in craelty, loathfome reptiles were bred in them, and the prifoners were not only allowed infufficient food, but they were fome- times ftripped naked, and thrown into prifon in that condition. In the early Englifli romance of the " Seven Sages" (the text printed by Weber), when the emperor was perfuaded by his wife to order her fiep-fon for execution, he commanded that he fhould be taken, ftripped naked of his clothes, and then hanged aloft — Slidk he het (commanded) his /one take. And Jpo'ili him of clothes nake, And beten him ivith Jcourges Jironge, And afterivard him hegge (high) anhonge. — Weber, iii. 21. At the interceflion of one of the wife men, the youth is refpited and thrown into prifon, but without his clothing ; and when, on a fubfequent occafion, he was brought out of prifon for judgment, he remained ftill naked. Our three cuts which follow illuftrate the fubjeft of mediaeval punilh- ments for crimes and offences. The firft (No. 230) is taken from a well- known manufcript, in the Britifli Mufeum, of the fourteenth century (MS. Reg. 10 E. iv.), and reprefents a monk and a lady, whofe career has brought them into the ftocks, an inftrument of punilliment which has figured in fome of our former chapters. It is a very old mode of punilliing offenders, and appears, under the Latin name of cippus, in early records of the middle ages. An old Englilh poem, quoted by Mr. Halliwell in his