Quotation from: Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period

Written by: Paul Lacroix


Penalties and punishments were almost always to be averted by a money
payment. A son, for instance, instead of avenging the death of his
father, received from the murderer a certain indemnity in specie,
according to legal tariff; and the law was thus satisfied.


The tariff of indemnities or compensations to be paid for each crime
formed the basis of the code of laws amongst the principal tribes of
Franks, a code essentially barbarian, and called the Salic law, or law of
the Salians (Fig. 7). Such, however, was the spirit of inequality among
the German races, that it became an established principle for justice to
be subservient to the rank of individuals. The more powerful a man was,
the more he was protected by the law; the lower his rank, the less the law
protected him.

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