Treaty of Alfred and Guthrum

The Treaty of Alfred and Guthrum is an agreement between Alfred of Wessex and Guthrum, the Viking ruler of East Anglia. Its date is uncertain, but must have been between 878 and 890. The treaty is one of the few existing documents of Alfred's reign; it survives in Old English in Corpus Christi College Cambridge Manuscript 383, and in a Latin compilation known as Quadripartitus. All translations below come from Dorothy Whitelock, English Historical Documents 500-1042.

A prologue begins the document, outlining that it is a treaty between "King Alfred and King Guthrum and the councillors ("witan") of all the English race and all the people which is in East Anglia".

The first point is the most famous. First concerning our boundaries: up on the Thames, and then up on the Lea, and along the Lea unto its source, then straight to Bedford, then up on the Ouse to Watling Street. This has been taken by many later writers as the boundary of the Danelaw. However, the treaty does not describe it as such, and it appears to be primarily a political boundary, perhaps created in the wake of Alfred's taking of London.

The second article raises wergeld values to a considerably higher rate than would normally be expected. This is next, if a man is slain, all of us, Englishman and Dane at the same amount, at eight half-marks of refined gold, except the ceorl who occupies rented land, and [the Danes'] freedmen; these also are estimated at the same amount, both at 200 shillings. In the treaty, as noted by Simon Keynes and Michael Lapidge, a ceorl living on his own land was essentially treated as a noble. They argue that this discouraged killings, as it placed the price of compensation as too high. This presents two problems, according to Paul Kershaw: first, it assumes premeditation. Second, by placing too high a value of compensation, the treaty might actually discourage peaceful dispute settlement. Kershaw argues instead that this was merely a simplification of social structures over the border: Anglo-Saxon and 'Danelaw' social structures did not necessarily correlate, and so a carte-blanche simplification may have been the only way forward.

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