CHAPTER 4
Dark Age Cri mes
Difficult times
After the fall of the Roman Empire in the west, centralised order broke down.
From the early 400s, few areas were left with effective means to maintain law
and order in any formal sense. There is some evidence that those Roman
towns that survived in the northern provinces, including England, hired their
own mercenary protection, and these forces may also have had a function in
policing the community. It is possible that in many places, people returned to
preRoman practices, which may well have survived in the background during
Roman rule. There is a vague hint of this in a document recording the state of
affairs in Brittany at the end of Roman rule. It seems to say that the Bretons
ousted the Roman administration and began to hold their own assemblies to
decide law issues‘after the example of the British’.
The fifth and sixth centuries were difficult times. Without the structure of
the Roman governmental system, struggles for land and power characterise
the histories of many countries during this period. Local leaders turned
themselves into warlords, some holding on to Roman forts such as Pevensey,
and surrounding themselves with bands of loyal warriors. In England, France
and the Low Countries, new settlers arrived– Franks, Jutes, Angles and
Saxons, bringing with them their own customs. Many of these newcomers
came from lands that had never been part of the Roman Empire, and their
ideas were based on tribal customs and pagan religious beliefs. It is probable
that population levels fell–a result of the combined effects of strife, plague
and a deteriorating climate. In some places, particularly in Southern Europe,
the emerging kingdoms tried to adopt old Roman laws, but there was little
organised effort to control ordinary crime or to protect ordinary citizens.
John Chrystosom, archbishop of Constantinople at the beginning of the
fifth century, wrote of the common crimes in his period, including house
breaking and robbery. Brigands and pirates attacked travellers, and kidnappers