Re: Heortling social structure and wergeld confusion

From: bryan_thx <bethexton_at_r_hz3p158KBtIBvRwWLY-8Y9RXVEqvanYobOG8-YEpTXVzZvvA8eDVZ88eQups-E2x>
Date: Mon, 23 Apr 2007 17:51:20 -0000

Oh, I think it is far from a socialist utopia! Really it is the strong holding onto most of the wealth and only handing down what they 'need' to (need could be for collective strength, religious belief, to keep the poor strong enough to work, or other reasons). There is certainly no equal distribution of food or wealth! It is something along the lines of "From each according to their place in society and to each according to their importance in the clan."

The one thing that may seem 'communistic' is the owning land in common. But this was actually very widespread. By way of example, in early France (i.e. under the Francs, before it was thought of more as a country than a people) to 'sell' land took agreement basically from an entire extended family. The land was expected to support the family and future generations of the family, so to make any change to the land needed the entire family's consent. Two critical changes which led to the modern state were primogeniture (handing down to the oldest son, which meant one person was in charge not the whole family) and crown ownership of land (so that ultimately the entire country was considered to belong to the king, so people could only hold land by permission from the crown). These were medieval than dark age concepts, however (in very broad terms--different cultures took these on at different times in different places).

Remember too that in theory a clan is all one family--although the connections may be a couple of thousand years old. Still, no matter jealousies, rivalries, and even hatreds may exist, religiously and culturally these people are your family. Implicitly they have your back and you have theirs. Someone who screws over his clan to help someone outside the clan is a traitor.

I'm also not going to claim that this arrangement makes for maximum economic effeciency. I'm sure it does not, but that is probably part of why it is stable. When the priority becomes effeciency then people start embracing changes, and things can change quickly. The Heortlings, I think, don't see the world that way.

Of course you are in part right. In each stead every person and everyone in the dependant huts and whatnot no doubt have certain obligations to the common fields and herds. Hunters have to deliver a certain part of their catch to the head of the stead, herders of smaller bloodlines will have to take care of some portion of the herds of the clan and of larger bloodlines, and contribute some level of their own animals to what the clan has to pay out. Each stead will contribute certain amounts of grain, animals, pottery, and so on to the chief, who in turn uses those to pay the chief's dependants, contributions to the tribe, and things like lunar levies. You could view these as taxes, but I don't think the Heortlings see them like that. The effect is very much the same--each level contributes wealth to the level above, some of which provides common services (like weaponthanes to defend the clan), while some goes on to yet higher levels.

I think a key thing here is that in Heortling culture things have to be viewed as a choice. I agree to give 20 cows to my chief each year because it is the right thing to do and because I support the clan and because it is a matter of pride that my herds are big enough to support this level of donation. I don't do it because my chief tells me I must. After all "Nobody can make you do anything." And if a chief from another bloodline gets too grasping, my bloodline can always leave the clan, taking our people and wealth with us (and hopefully our land--but violence is likely to be an option as soon as the bonds of clan are severed and it would no longer be kinstrife).

--Bryan            

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