Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun See
wergild .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (O. Eng. Law) The price of a man's head; a compensation paid of a man killed, partly to the king for the loss of a subject, partly to the lord of a vassal, and partly to the next of kin. It was paid by the murderer.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Alternative spelling of
wergeld .
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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If a claim in weregild is upheld then Aragorn would hold ownership of the Ring.
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If a claim in weregild is upheld then Aragorn would hold ownership of the Ring.
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In course of time men got tired of the continual slaughter produced by this arrangement, and there sprang up a system according to which the murderer might offer to the kinsmen a sum of money known as weregild, or the value of a man, and if this money was accepted, then peace was made and all thought of vengeance was at an end.
A Student's History of England, v. 1 (of 3) From the earliest times to the Death of King Edward VII Samuel Rawson Gardiner 1865
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As far as a weregild claim goes - not only could Isildur claim simple relationship, but as the leader of a world power, and member of the Last Alliance-which means he could easily also claim weregild on GILGALAD the HIGH KING OF THE NOLDOR, the Highest Elves in Middle Earth.
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Even supposing the ‘weregild’ claim of Isildur, I think that the value of the life of a great King would not be worth more than the deed to Barad-dur, which was destroyed in the war of the Last Alliance, so the next best thing would be something like the Ring of the Witch-King.
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If you are a Nature subscriber, or willing to pay the weregild, my short story "Annie Webber" is live there today.
Anonymous moves into the real world, calling for flash-crowd style protests on February 10th. matociquala 2008
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The shift from weregild or private revenge to punishment by the state no doubt represents an important social advance.
The Volokh Conspiracy » How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment 2009
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Oddly, the basis for this system was theappropriate weregild – blood-price – paidfor the deaths of different people.
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Oddly, the basis for this system was theappropriate weregild – blood-price – paidfor the deaths of different people.
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Oddly, the basis for this system was theappropriate weregild – blood-price – paidfor the deaths of different people.
trivet commented on the word weregild
see wergild comments
March 7, 2007