hls_ should be held annually,
one in the month of May, the other in the autumn, and, in addition, that
in each county two annual _plaids_ should meet independently of any
special _mahls_ and _plaids_ which it should please him to convoke. In
788, the emperor found it necessary to call three general _plaids_, and,
besides these, he was pleased to summon his great vassals, both clerical
and lay, to the four principal feasts of the year. It may be asserted that
the idea of royalty being the central authority in matters of common law
dates from the reign of Charlemagne (Fig. 297).

The authority of royalty based on law took such deep root from that time
forth, that it maintained itself erect, notwithstanding the weakness of
the successors of the great Charles, and the repeated infractions of it by
the Church and the great vassals of the crown (Fig. 298).

[Illustration: Fig. 298.--Carlovingian King in his Palace personifying
Wisdom appealing to the whole Human Race.--After a Miniature in a
Manuscript of the Ninth Century in the Burgundian Library of Brussels,
from a Drawing by Count Horace de Vielcastel.]

The authoritative and responsible action of a tribunal which represented
society (Fig. 299) thus took the place of the unchecked animosity of
private feuds and family quarrels, which were often avenged by the use of
the gibbet, a monument to be found erected at almost every corner. Not
unfrequently, in those early times, the unchecked passions of a chief of a
party would be the only reason for inflicting a penalty; often such a
person would constitute himself sole judge, and, without the advice of any
one, he would pass sentence, and even, with his own sword or any other
available instrument, he would act as his own executioner. The tribunal
thus formed denounced duelling, the pitiless warfare between man and man,
and between family and family, and its first care was to protect, not each
individual man's life, which was impossible in those days of blind
barbarism, but at least his dwelling. Imperceptibly, the sanctuary of a
man's house extended, first to towns of refuge, and then to certain public
places, such as the church, the _mahlum_, or place of national assemblies,
the market, the tavern, &c. It was next required that the accused, whether
guilty or not, should remain unharmed from the time of the crime being
committed until the day on which judgment was passed.

[Illustration: Fig. 299.--The Court of the Nobles.--