| ~~~``~ | Question In ancient Celtic society, what is considered "coming of age" for children? How does age affect tribal leaders, in other words, is the eldest considered leader of the tribe? What happens to the elderly of the tribe, are they cared for? Answer 17 years, according to the Brehon Laws. The following is from Patrick C. Power's _Sex and Marriage in Ancient Ireland_, Mercier Press, 1976, Dufour Editions, 1997: "Apart from questions of rank..., the foster-son had a status which varied with his age. The brehon laws saw three separate ages of development. Up to the age of seven the boy was punished corporally for his misdemeanors. He had to receive three warnings first ... Between the ages of seven and twelve the boy was not allowed to be given corporal punishment for what he did amiss. Instead of this he was deprived of food. Anyone who knows the appetite of small boys between these ages understands how effective this punishment was then. In the final age between twelve and seventeen the boy had to pay compensation according to the law like an adult. He thus left fosterage trained to carry himself as a responsible adult. ... The misdemeanors mentioned as likely to be committed by a foster-child are theft and assault. ((Footnote here: "Ibid., pp. 187 - 191.")) "It was also provided for in the brehon laws that exemption from corporal punishment be granted to the sons of kings. ((Footnote here: "Ibid., p. 151.")) By implication this was also extended to girls. The sons of others must be punished in such a manner that no marks are left on them. Compensation for marking and also for nicknaming them was decreed.((Footnote here: "Ibid.")) ..." The Rights of Children - from a post made to WhiteOak and to Clan an Tir na Samhradh in 1999. First, how a family treated their children was mainly a matter for the family, so Early Irish law is limited on the subject. That said, a child under 14 years old had no legal responsibility nor any right to independent legal action. A girl of 14 has normally completed her fosterage and then it's time for her to be betrothed. Liability for any offense she may cause before 14 is normally borne by the father, or by the foster father while she is under fosterage. A male freeman after age 14 is a bit of a different matter. There seem to be two categories of 'fer midboth' (man of middle huts): The lower fer midboth is probably between 14 and 17, and resides temporarily on his father's land. His honor-price is lower (a yearling heifer), but he has the right to act as surety, oath-helper or witness up to his honor-price. He can provide legal protection for a boy of his own rank to the border of the territory. The higher fer midboth (17 to the age of "beard encirclement", which is approximately 20) can also do these things up to his honor price, and unlike the lower fer midboth, he can accept a fief worth 5 sets from a lord (usually cattle, for which he pays an annual food-rent). A boy under twenty, even if he does inherit, does not become a full-fledged 'boaire' (strong farmer) until he's over twenty years old. Also, a man over twenty remains at fer midboth until he does inherit, even if this doesn't happen until he's old. A dependant child seems to be dependant until at least the age of 17, in any event, unless it is a female child who marries, and then she is considered to have the honor-price and duties and legal standing of a wife. This shows us that there is a mid-point where the teenager is in-between childhood and adulthood, having some of the rights of the adult after age 14, but is not by any means totally autonomous. According to the Bretha Crólige, a child between baptism and age seven has the same honor-price as a cleric -- a high legal worth. Any injury inflicted on a young child entails a heavy penalty no matter what social class the child belongs to (male or female), and the sick-maintenance of the child (in case of inflicted injury) is the same as a cleric; ie., with all possible comfort. After the age of seven a child's honor-price is half that of his or her father or guardian, and stays at that level as long as the child is a dependant. The rearing of children is usually the responsibility of both parents. However, if the child has been conceived through wrongdoing on the part of the father, he alone is responsible. This is the case if he impregnates another man's wife, servant woman, or slave woman, or if he takes advantage of a woman by stealth or is guilty of forcible rape. Even if he impregnates an unmarried woman of free status with her consent, he may still have sole responsibility for the child if her father has forbidden the union. Also, sickness or disability or death on the part of the mother may require the father to assume total responsibility for their child. The mother must rear the child herself if the father is a slave, an alien, an illegal satirist, or a man expelled by his kin. A prostitute is also solely responsible for raising her child. As you can see, children had legal rights and a high honor-price in Early Irish society, and considerable thought seems to have been given to the care and value of children. Fosterage: from Brehon Laws: a Legal Handbook by Lawrence Ginnell " There were various kinds of fosterage, and minute rules are laid down for all, especially with reference to the mode of treating children in fosterage according to the position they were intended to fill in after life, the amount payable by the different classes for the different kinds of fosterage, the relations between the child and its foster parents both during the fosterage and after, and various other matters. Foster parents were bound under heavy penalties to teach their foster children or have them taught, whether boys or girls, the branches of knowledge, business, trades, or exercises suited to their rank. During the fosterage the foster father was liable for injuries and offences committed by the foster child, and entitled to compensation for injury done to the foster child." "As a rule a child was not sent to fosterage until it was one year old. 'There are three periods at which fosterage ends: death, crime, and selection.' Selection meant marriage; and the legal age of selection was reached by girls at the end of fourteen years, and by boys at the end of seventeen years." Placement of children was usually restricted to members of the fine (persons within the 5th degree of kindred), but there was no strict rule on this point. Medieval Welsh - Rights of Children Directly from the Hywel Dda (translation by Dafydd Jenkins): (You will find the remaining Welsh word translations/explanations at the end. You will also find this fascinating, I hope, and quite different from the Early Irish law, though some similarities can be found if one looks deep enough.) From birth...until it is seven years old it is right for its father to swear and to pay on its behalf, except that he is not bound to pay either dirwy or camlwrw to the King for it; since the King is not entitled to anything for inadvertence, and the child has no judgment. He is, however, bound to indemnify the victim from what is his. From the end of its seventh year, it is for the child itself to swear for its acts, and for its father to pay; for then it goes under the priest's hand and takes God's yoke upon it. Sons From when the son is born until he is fourteen years old, it is right for him to eat at his father's platter, with his father as lord over him. And no punishment of him is right save his father's. And he is not entitled to a single penny of his goods in that period, save what his father controls. And it is not right that there should be a dead-house for him, though he should die in that period, but all the goods that are in his possession will be his father's, since his father is bound in that period to answer for him in respect of everything. “A boy is entitled to a guardian for him until he is fourteen years old -- his father if he is alive; and if his father is not alive, it is for the lord to give him a guardian, to act on his behalf to claim compensation for him, and to make compensation on his behalf.” -- Cyfn. If it happens that the father dies in the first year that he is born, the son himself enters into his father's status. It is not right to pay ebediw for a son until he is fourteen years old if his father is alive. After he enters into the father's status he will pay it. At the end of the fourteenth year, it is right for the father to take his son to the lord and to commend him to him. And then it is right for him to do homage to the lord, and to be dependant on his lord's status; and it is for him himself to answer on his own behalf to every claim that is made against him, and it is for him to control his own goods. And his father is from then on no more entitled to strike him than a stranger; and if he strikes him, and the son complains of him, he will be liable to dirwy and will make compensation to the son for his sarhaed. If a son dies, from fourteen years of age on, and he has no heir, his good will all belong to the lord, who will be entitled to be in the place of a son to him, and his house will be a dead-house. And from that age on he will be of the same status as an innate bonheddig, for he has no status except his bonedd, and he does not ascend to his father's status until his father dies; and no one will be a knight until he ascends. The worth of an innate bonheddig is three kine and three score kine; his sarhaed is three kine and three scorepence. If he is a man of the bodyguard, his worth will be four kine and four score kine; his sarhaed is four kine and four score pence. Daughters A daughter, after she is baptized, until she is seven years old, is not entitled to take an oath. From when she is born until she is twelve years old it is right for her to be at her father's platter. From twelve years old on, her breasts and pubic hair develop and she menstruates, and she is then of age to be given to a husband; and from then on, even if she does not take a husband, she is entitled to control what is hers, and it is not right for her to be at her father's platter unless he himself wishes it. And the father is not bound to pay her amobr unless he takes sureties for paying it from him to whom she is given. If it happens that a woman is taken clandestinely from her father's house to another house, and there slept with, the man of that house is bound to pay her amobr, unless he takes sureties from the man who took her clandestinely. At twelve years old it is right for a woman to menstruate, as we have said above. And from twelve to fourteen years old it is right that she should not become pregnant, and from fourteen to forty it is right for her to conceive, and from then on galanas does not fall on her and she gives no oath that she will not have children, since it is undoubted that she will not. End quoted text. Definitions: dirwy - passim; the standard financial penalty of twelve kine or 3 pounds, apparently at first imposed only for theft, fighting and violence, but soon extended to other offences. Comparision with the Irish 'dire', indicates that dirwy began as compensation to the victim of wrong; but in the classical law and long before, it is a penalty payable to the ruler; the transfer of meaning is perhaps explained by the statement in Dw 436, “the victim [of wrong] is entitled to what is his from him who caused him loss, and it is because this loss was caused to the Lord that the latter is entitled to the penalty.”. camlwrw - a penalty for loss from wrongdoing that is smaller than the dirwy; worth 3 kine or 180d. ebediw - in practice this had by the 13th century become a death duty or succession duty, sometimes related to landholding. sarhaed - the medieval form of the abstract noun from sarhau, "to insult." Its primary legal sense is similar to that of the Roman-law iniuria, which “embraced any contumelious disregard of another's rights or personality.” The word has a secondary meaning of the compensation payable, which varies according to the status of the victim and is the usual measure of status. (The honor-price?) bonheddig - freeman, free tribesman, same connotations as "gentleman." bonedd - lineage. amobr - a fee payable to a woman's lord, originally upon the loss of her virginity. galanas - compensation for homicide. The most important social distinctions in Early Irish Society seem to be 1) between those who are nemed (privileged), and those who are not nemed, and The basic meaning of nemed is "sacred, holy" so it seems that the privileges of rank were originally sustained by religious feeling as well as respect for wealth and power. Chief categories of nemed rank: king, lord (flaith), cleric, and poet. Some texts include the physician, judge, blacksmith, coppersmith, harpist, carpenter, and other craftsmen as a lower appendage of the nemed class, called dóernemed or "base nemed." But it is clear that they do not enjoy full nemed privileges. Ranking below nemed is the non-nemed freeman, the ócaire (small farmer) and bóaire (strong farmer). Ranking below freemen are the unfree, doer. These are the tenant-at-will, the hereditary serf, and the slave. The poet or fili had full nemed status, likely a reflection of the status once given the Druid. By the time of the Law texts (7th - 8th centuries), and I quote Fergus Kelly, "...it is clear that the advance of Christianity had reduced his position to that of a sorcerer or witch-doctor. He is discriminated against in the law: Bretha Crólige insists that a Druid (along with the satirist and brigand) is entitled to sick-maintenance only at the level of bóaire, no matter how great his rank, privilege, or other rights." It makes one wonder also if the cleric took the nemed place of the druid when the nemed class accepted the new god. | ~``~ |