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Frankpledge - 4 dictionary results

frank⋅pledge

  [frangk-plej]
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–noun Old English Law.
1. a system of dividing a community into tithings or groups of ten men, each member of which was responsible for the conduct of the other members of his group and for the assurance that a member charged with a breach of the law would be produced at court.
2. a member of a tithing.
3. the tithing itself.
Origin:
1250–1300; ME fra(u)nkplegge < AF frauncplege. See frank 1 , pledge
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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frank·pledge   (frāngk'plěj')   
n.  
  1. An Anglo-Saxon legal system in which units or tithings composed of ten households were formed, in each of which members were held responsible for one another's conduct.
  2. A member of a unit in frankpledge.

[Middle English frankplegge, from Anglo-Norman frauncpledge : Old French franc, free, frank; see frank1 + Old French plege, pledge; see pledge.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Frankpledge

Frank"pledge`\, n. [Frank free + pledge.] (O. Eng. Law) (a) A pledge or surety for the good behavior of freemen, -- each freeman who was a member of an ancient decennary, tithing, or friborg, in England, being a pledge for the good conduct of the others, for the preservation of the public peace; a free surety. (b) The tithing itself. --Bouvier.

The servants of the crown were not, as now, bound in frankpledge for each other. --Macaulay.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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frankpledge

system in medieval England under which all but the greatest men and their households were bound together by mutual responsibility to keep the peace. Frankpledge can be traced back to the laws of King Canute II the Great of Denmark and England (d. 1035), who declared that every man, serf or free, must be part of a hundred, a local unit of government, that could put up a surety in money for his good behaviour. By the 13th century, however, it was the unfree and landless men who were so bound. While a freeholder's land was sufficient pledge, the unfree had to be in frankpledge, generally an association of 12, or in tithing, an association of 10 householders. Frankpledge existed more commonly in the area under the Danelaw, from Essex to Yorkshire, whereas tithing was found in the south and southwest of England. In the area north of Yorkshire, the system does not appear to have been imposed. The system began to decline in the 14th century and was superseded by local constables operating under the justices of the peace in the 15th century.

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Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.
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