User:Ltwin/Sandbox 25

Witan

* Lyon, Ann (2016). Constitutional History of the UK (2nd ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-20398-8.

Attendance and locations

According to historian Bryce Lyon, the witan "was an amoebic sort of organization with no definite composition or function". It does appear, however, that an indispensable requirement was the presence of leading secular and ecclesiastical magnates. Kings issued royal charters at meetings of the witan, and the witness lists to these charters also serve as attendance lists. About 2,000 charters and 40 law codes survive which attest to the workings of around 300 recorded witan meetings. Typically, individuals are listed in hierarchical order with the king listed first followed by:

• the queen
• æthelings (princes)
• bishops
• abbots
• ealdormen (later earls)
• thegns

When English kings claimed overlordship over their Welsh neighbors, the Welsh kings might also be in attendance.

The witan could meet anywhere at any time. Christmas, Lent, and Easter were favorite times because many nobles were at the royal court. London and Winchester were common locations. The king and his court were itinerant, and witenagemots are known to have met in at least 116 locations, including Amesbury, Calne, Cheddar, and Gloucester. The meeting places were often on royal estates, but some witenagemots were convened in the open at prominent rocks, hills, meadows and famous trees.

Role

The king relied on these magnates for advice and for implementation of royal policy at the local level.

Electing and deposing kings

When a king died, the witan nominally elected a new king. When a king gained power by conquest, he was careful to gain the witan's assent.

References

Bibliography

• Chadwick, H. M. (1905). Studies on Anglo-Saxon Institutions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Garmonsway, George Norman, ed. (1954). The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (2nd ed.). London.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Hindley, Geoffrey (2006). A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Robinson. ISBN 9781472107596.
• Lapidge, Michael; et al., eds. (2001). The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England. Wiley. ISBN 9-780-63122-492-1.
• Lapidge, Michael, ed. (2002). Interpreters of Early Medieval Britain. British Academy. ISBN 9-780-19726-277-1.
• Leyser, Henrietta (2017). A Short History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: I. B. Taurus. ISBN 978-1-78076-600-3.
• Liebermann, Felix (1913). The National Assembly in the Anglo-Saxon Period. Halle: Max Niemeyer.
• Loyn, H. R. (1984). The Governance of Anglo-Saxon England, 500–1087. Governance of England. Vol. 1. Stanford University Press. ISBN 9780804712170.
• Lyon, Bryce (1980). A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England (2nd ed.). W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0-393-95132-4. 1st edition available at the Internet Archive.
• Maddicott, J. R. (2010). The Origins of the English Parliament, 924-1327. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-199-58550-2.
• Middlekauff, Robert (2005). The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763-1789. Oxford History of the United States. Vol. 3 (revised and expanded ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-531588-2.
• Roach, Levi (2013). Kingship and Consent in Anglo-Saxon England, 871–978: Assemblies and the State in the Early Middle Ages. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9-781-10703-653-6.
• Robertson, Agnes, ed. (1956). Anglo-Saxon Charters (2nd ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. OCLC 504288415.
• Sturdy, David (1995). Alfred the Great. Constable. ISBN 0094765707.
• Thorpe, Benjamin (1840). Ancient Laws and Institutes of England. G. E. Eyre and A. Spottiswoode, printers to the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty.
• Whitelock, Dorothy (1956). "Review: The Witenagemot in the Reign of Edward the Confessor by Tryggvi J. Oleson". The English Historical Review. 71 (281): 640–642. JSTOR 556848.
• Wormald, Patrick (1999). The Making of English Law: King Alfred to the Twelfth Century. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 0-631-13496-4.