Trial by combat
Trial by combat was a method of Germanic law to settle accusations in the absence of witnesses or a confession in which two parties in dispute fought in single combat; the winner of the fight was proclaimed to be right. In essence, it was a judicially sanctioned duel. It remained in use throughout the European Middle Ages, gradually disappearing in the course of the 16th century.
History
Origins
Unlike trial by ordeal in general, which is known to many cultures worldwide, trial by combat is known primarily from the customs of the Germanic peoples. The practice was "almost universal in Europe" according to medievalist Eric Jager. It was in use among the ancient Burgundians, Ripuarian Franks, Alamans, Lombards, and Swedes.It was unknown in Anglo-Saxon law and Roman law and it does not figure in the traditions of Middle Eastern antiquity such as the code of Hammurabi or the Torah. However, it is recorded in the medieval Irish Brehon Laws, such as Din Techtugad.
The practice is regulated in various Germanic legal codes. Being rooted in Germanic tribal law, the various regional laws of the Frankish Empire prescribed different particulars, such as equipment and rules of combat. The Lex Alamannorum prescribes a trial by combat in the event that two families disputed the boundary between their lands. A handful of earth taken from the disputed piece of land is put between the contestants and they are required to touch it with their swords, each swearing that their claim is lawful. The losing party besides forfeiting their claim to the land is required to pay a fine.
Capitularies governing its use appear from the year 803 onwards. Louis the Pious prescribed combat between witnesses of each side, rather than between the accuser and the accused, and briefly allowed for the Ordeal of the Cross in cases involving clerics.
In medieval Scandinavia, the practice survived throughout the Viking Age in the form of the holmgang.
An unusual variant, the marital duel, involved combat between a husband and wife, with the former physically handicapped in some way. The loser was killed.
Holy Roman Empire
in 967 expressly sanctioned the practice of Germanic tribal law even if it did not figure in the more "imperial" Roman law. The celebrated case of Gero, Count of Alsleben, is a good example. The Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 deprecated judicial duels, and Pope Honorius III in 1216 asked the Teutonic Order to cease its imposition of judicial duels on their newly converted subjects in Livonia. For the following three centuries, there was latent tension between the traditional regional laws and Roman law.The Sachsenspiegel of 1230 recognizes the judicial duel as an important function to establish guilt or innocence in cases of insult, injury, or theft. The combatants are armed with swords and shields and may wear linen and leather clothing, but their heads and feet must be bare and their hands only protected by light gloves. The accuser is to await the accused at the designated place of combat. If the accused does not appear after being summoned three times, the accuser may execute two cuts and two stabs against the wind, and his matter will be treated as if he had won the fight.
The Kleines Kaiserrecht, an anonymous legal code of, prohibits judicial duels altogether, stating that the emperor had come to this decision on seeing that too many innocent men were convicted by the practice just for being physically weak. Nevertheless, judicial duels continued to be popular throughout the 14th and 15th centuries.
Trial by combat plays a significant role in the German schools of fencing in the 15th century. Notably, Hans Talhoffer depicts techniques to be applied in such duels, separately for the Swabian and Franconian variants, although other Fechtbücher such as that of Paulus Kal and the Codex Wallerstein show similar material. While commoners were required to present their case to a judge before duelling, members of the nobility did have the right to challenge each other for duels without the involvement of the judiciary, so that duels of this kind were separate from the judicial duel already in the Middle Ages and were not affected by the latter's abolition in the early 16th century by Emperor Maximilian I, evolving into the gentlemanly duel of modern times which was outlawed only as late as in the 19th century.
Hans Talhoffer in his 1459 Thott codex names seven offences that in the absence of witnesses were considered grave enough to warrant a judicial duel, viz. murder, treason, heresy, desertion of one's lord, "imprisonment", perjury/fraud, and rape.
Great Britain and Ireland
Wager of battle, as the trial by combat was called in English, appears to have been introduced into the common law of the Kingdom of England following the Norman Conquest and remained in use for the duration of the High and Late Middle Ages.The last certain trial by battle in England occurred in 1446: a servant accused his master of treason, and the master drank too much wine before the battle and was slain by the servant. In Scotland and Ireland, the practice was continued into the sixteenth century. In 1446, a trial by combat was arranged between two quarrelling Irish magnates, James Butler, 5th Earl of Ormonde, and the Prior of Kilmainham, but King Henry VI intervened personally to persuade them to settle their differences peacefully.
The wager of battle was not always available to the defendant in an appeal of murder. If the defendant were taken in the mainour, if he attempted to escape from prison, or if there was such strong evidence of guilt that there could be no effective denial, the defendant could not challenge. Similarly, if the plaintiff was a woman, above 60 years of age, a minor, lame or blind, they could decline the challenge, and the case would be determined by a jury. Peers of the realm, priests, and citizens of the City of London could also decline the battle if challenged. If the actual battle took place, it would occur in judicial lists, square, following the taking of oaths against witchcraft and sorcery. If the defendant was defeated and still alive, he was to be hanged on the spot. However, if he defeated his opponent, or if he were able to fend off his opponent from sunrise to sunset, he would go free. If the plaintiff said the word craven and gave up the fight, he was to be declared infamous, deprived of the privileges of a freeman, and was liable for damages to his successful opponent.
Middle Ages
The earliest case in which wager of battle is recorded was Wulfstan v. Walter, eleven years after the Conquest. Significantly, the names of the parties suggest that it was a dispute between a Saxon and a Norman. The Tractatus of Glanvill, from around 1187, appears to have considered it the chief mode of trial, at least among aristocrats entitled to bear arms.Around 1219, trial by jury replaced trial by ordeal, which had been the mode of proof for crown pleas since the Assize of Clarendon in 1166. With the emergence of the legal profession in the thirteenth century, lawyers, guarding the safety of the lives and limbs of their clients, steered people away from the wager of battle. A number of legal fictions were devised to enable litigants to avail themselves of the jury even in the sort of actions that were traditionally tried by wager of battle. The practice of averting trial by combat led to the modern concept of attorneys representing litigants.
Civil disputes were handled differently from criminal cases. In civil cases, women, the elderly, the infirm of body, minors, and—after 1176—the clergy could choose a jury trial or could have champions named to fight in their stead. Hired champions were technically illegal but are obvious in the record. A 1276 document among Bishop Swinefield's household records marks a promise to pay Thomas of Brydges an annual retainer fee for acting as champion, with additional stipend and expenses paid for each fight. In criminal cases, an approver was often chosen from the accomplices of the accused or from prison to do the fighting for the crown. Approvers sometimes were given their freedom after winning five trials but sometimes were hanged anyway.
In practice, a person facing trial by combat was assisted by a second, often referred to as a squire. The role of the squire was to attend the battle and to arrange the particulars of the ceremony with the opposing squire. Over time, squires would meet and resolve disputes during negotiations over combat. Ample time was made for this by creating a process for checking the saddle and bridle of horses for prayer scrolls and enchantments and requiring litigants to exchange gloves and sometimes to go to separate churches and give five pence to the church.
Early trials by combat allowed a variety of weapons, particularly for knights. Later, commoners were given war hammers, cudgels, or quarterstaves with sharp iron tips. The duelling ground was typically sixty feet square. Commoners were allowed a rectangular leather shield and could be armed with a suit of leather armour, bare to the knees and elbows and covered by a red surcoat of a light type of silk called sendal. The litigants appeared in person. The combat was to begin before noon and be concluded before sunset.
Either combatant could end the fight and lose his case by crying out the word "Craven!", from the Old French cravanté, "defeated", which acknowledged " vanquished." The party who did so, however, whether litigant or champion, was punished with outlawry. Fighting continued until one party was dead or disabled. The last man standing won his case.
By 1300, the wager of combat had all but died out in favour of trial by jury. One of the last mass trials by combat in Scotland, the Battle of the Clans, took place in Perth in 1396. This event took the form of a pitched battle between teams of around thirty men each, representing Clan Macpherson and Clan Davidson, on the North Inch in front of King Robert III. The battle was intended to resolve a dispute over which clan was to hold the right flank in an upcoming battle of both clans against Clan Cameron. The Clan Macpherson is thought to have won, but only twelve men survived from the original sixty.