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oath In the Middle Ages the oath or solemn pledge
invoking a divine name to witness the truth of a state-
ment was an essential social and legal act reflecting the
value placed on a person’s word. Fundamentally a verbal
statement, with a physical gesture, as important as the
words said, the oath was formally recorded. It was sworn
on a symbolic object. In the early Middle Ages, this was
usually on arms, as the guarantee of an oath. With the
progress of Christianization, oaths were taken on RELICS
or on the BIBLE.Special oaths were devised for JEWS, the
inramentum judaeorum.
The CAROLINGIANSimposed oaths of allegiance to
the emperor on all the men of the empire to try form
a bond to uniting all subjects. From 1000, the PEACE
AND TRUCE OF GOD movements attempted to unite
Christian, feudal, and knightly society around an oath
of peace that was publicly sworn on relics. In the
early medieval administration of JUSTICE, because of
distrust of written proofs or documents, an oath by the
accused and by his guarantors sufficed for purposes
of exoneration in many cases. The declarations of a
witness were likewise tied to oaths and could free a
defendant.

A PERMANENT INSTITUTION

These concepts endured throughout the Middle Ages.
Oaths among the seigniorial or noble classes reflected
social status and established relations with themselves
and others. Interpersonal relations were often based on
oaths promising and guaranteeing reciprocity. The vassal’s
swore homage to lords. The dubbing or making of a
KNIGHT, the consecration of bishops, and the coronations
of a king involved all oaths that entailed rituals. Soon
written CHARTERSlisted witnesses and guarantors.

PERJURY AND OTHER PITFALLS

The frequency of oaths and the play of multiple loyalties

made preventing perjury difficult. Judicial oaths in some

instances displaced probatory oaths. There was some

concern to confine the use of sworn pledges to the nobil-

ity, so peasants or townspeople were forbidden to bind

themselves by oath in many matters. Groups based on

mutual oaths—peace movements, leagues, commercial

agreements, GUILDS, or COMMUNES—antagonized the

nobility and the church. For the nobility such groups

could only subvert lordly status and privileges. According

to some, the dependent status of peasants and workers

entailed an inability to keep their word if it was contrary

to the bond owed to their lords. To permit them to swear

oaths was to increase the probability that they would sin

by breaking oaths they should never have presumed to

make. Compounding this ethical difficulty was the

church’s tendency to avoid involvement with group oaths

or their verbal administration. The increasing sophistica-

tion of the legal structures of the later Middle Ages grad-

ually marginalized the judicial oath, which nonetheless

persisted as an indispensable portion of legal processes

and the discernment of justice.

See alsoORDEALS.

Further reading: Frederick Pollock and Frederic

William Maitland, The History of English Law before the

Time of Edward I,2d ed. (1895; reprint, Cambridge: Cam-

bridge University Press, 1968); J. E. Tyler, Oaths: Their

Origin, Nature, and History,2d ed. (London: John W.

Parker, 1835).

oblates Oblates were children who had not yet

reached the age of puberty, that is, barely beyond the