Celtic Law : A Short Summary
Filed by Aine MacDermot
offenseS AGAINST PROPERTY
Of course, the laws do not only care about offenses against the person, but also for offenses against a person’s property. There’s a wide range of texts dealing with damage done to grass, crops, trees, breaking of fences up to erecting of a building on another’s land.
ANIMAL TRESPASS AND HUMAN TRESPASS
Probably one of the most common legal problems in ancient Ireland was that of Animal Trespass. The text “Bretha Comaithchesa” (judgments of neighbourhood) deals extensivly with such situations. It is recommended by this text that neighbours give fore-pledges to each other to lessen the chances of disputes arising from such instances. Of course, a landowner cannot claim for any damage done to his property by his neighbour’s animals, if he has his land inadequately fenced. The four legal types of fences therefore are described in detail in Bretha Comaithchesa.
If it, however, happens that a man has his land adequately fenced and still an animal of his neighbour gets on his land (by breaking through the fence in whatever way), the general principle of the law is to relate the amount of compensation to the amount of damage done. Following from this, the penalty when a cow breaks into a meadow is twice as much as if it breaks in moorland. Similarly, grazing-trespass is more severely penalised in winter, when grass is scare, than in summer, where it exists in abundance.
Additionally, certain kinds of animal trespass may be specially penalised. E.g. if pigs do not only eat the grass but also root up the ground, their owner has to lend alternative land until the damage to the field has been restored. As well there are special penalties if a dog defecates on the land of a neighbour.
If there is malice or neglect on part of the owner of the trespassing animal, the penalty is greater, as then this is considered as “human trespass” (duine-chaithig) rather than animal trespass (rop-chaithig). This also applies where a farmer drives his cattle onto his neighbour’s land, or deliberately breaks down a fence. This also applies if the farmer lets his animals trespass across three or four holdings. Similarly, trespass by night involves twice the penalty than by day, because “cattle should be locked up in an enclosure by night.” (KELLY 1988, 143).
Animals that cannot be reasonably restrained by fences, like bulling bulls, cows in heat and similar, induce no penalties. Cutting trees is considered as human trespass if it happens on another one’s land.
offenseS AGAINST BUILDINGS
Basically the same principle applies here as it does with trespass: The penalty is in relation to the damage done. Additionally, if buildings are used without the consent of the owner, a like penalty applies.
Exception to this rule are damage to a person’s mill which is used illegally, in this case the honour-price of the owner has to be paid additionally to restoration of the damage.
As most buildings in the time of the law texts were built from wood, there seem to have been special considerations about arson. However, the text on this, “Bretha Forloiscthe” (judgments of arson) has not come down to us, so its contents can only be glimpsed at from a few surviving commentaries. Apparently, the text distinguished between fires caused by neglect and such set deliberately, and laid down the fines for the burning of various buildings and for causing death or injuries to people or animals inside. Nonetheless, a king is entitled to perpetrate arson on his royal circuits if his subjects have evaded their duties towards him. (KELLY 1988, 145).
DAMAGE TO MOVEABLE PROPERTY
Little is known from the surviving Irish law texts on damage to moveable property, but it can be assumed from what we know that a restitution had to be paid which equalled the worth of the damaged object, as it is in Welsh law. No fines had to be paid if the damage was done to precious objects, as the owner was expected to keep them safe.
More attention is devoted to the damage of livestock in the Irish laws. Here the same principle applies as in case of animal trespass. Additionally, there existed a separate text on dogs, “Conslechta” in which injuries by and to dogs were treated, but of this only a few quotations and commentaries have survived.
THEFT
Once again, the main text on that matter,”Bretha im Gata” (judgments of theft), is missing. We can, however, guess at what stood in that text from various other texts. The basic principle is, that if you steal something, you have to give back twice the amount of the stolen good, except when the stealing involved large livestock, where four times to five times the amount stolen had to be returned.
Additionally, if you stole something from the property of a third person (so if something belonging to A but lent to B), additionally the honour-price of the person from which’s land the item was stolen has to be paid, one third of which goes to the person to which the item belonged, two thirds to the person from which’s land it was stolen.
As far as we can guess from other texts, there was also distinguised between theft by stealth (gat) and theft with violence (brat). If this paralleled the Welsh law, where theft by stealth induced a higher fine than one with violence is not known.
Additionally, the place from which a good was stolen was taken into consideration. The rule is, the further it is from the house, the less penalty has to be paid.
However, some cases of “theft” were allowed to any freeman, such as taking something from a burning building, from a corpse on a battlefield, scrap metal from a forge, the sweepings of a treshing-floor and similar waste.
The sale of stolen goods is included in the list of invalid contracts, and the man who receives these goods is considered a “fer medóngaite” (man of middle theft), but only if he knows that the goods are stolen. If a thief brings stolen items into the house of somebody, he must pay half of the honour-price of the householder, if he brings it only into the airlise (the enclosed area around the house), he has to pay one seventh.
Stolen goods may not be reclaimed if they crossed the border as part of the recompense for the violation of a treaty.
A habitual thief loses all his rights in society. If he has to be punished, the usual punishment is hanging.
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