Page:The Normans in European History.djvu/37

Rh and routine, the Norman princes had a sure instinct for state-building, at home and abroad. The Norman duchy was a compact and powerful state before its duke crossed the Channel, and the central government which the Normans created in England showed the same characteristics on a larger scale. The Anglo-Norman empire of the twelfth century was the marvel of its day, while the history of the Norman kingdom of Sicily showed that the Norman genius for assimilation and political organization was not confined to the dukes of Rouen. Highly significant during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, Norman institutions remained of permanent importance, affecting the central administration of France in ways which are still obscure, and exerting a decisive influence upon the law and government of England. Normandy was the connecting link between the Prankish law of the Continent and the English common law, and thus claims a share in the jurisprudence of the wide-flung lands to which the common law has spread. The institution of trial by jury, for example, is of Norman origin, or rather of Prankish origin and Norman development.

By virtue, then, of its large part in the events of its time, by virtue of the decisive character of the events in which the Normans took part, and by virtue of the permanent influence of its institutions, the Normandy of the dukes can claim an important position in the general history of the world. In seeking to describe the