Each thegn then put his hand into Harold's, and called himself Harold's man.
Enough," cried Vebba, the blunt thegnfrom Saxon Kent; "it is plain that neither King nor Witan can replace thee in thine earldom.
Abbot combined with thegn in zeal for Earl Harold.
And the child turned peevishly from thegn and prelate.
The spear and the hawk were as the badges of Saxon nobility; and a thegnwas seldom seen abroad without the one on his left wrist, the other in his right hand.
Wolnoth, the Childe or Thegn of Sussex, defeats the fleets of Ethelred, under his uncle Brightric, and goes therefore into rebellion.
The wergeld of a thegnwas six times that of a coerl.
Every trustworthy man in Kent and Sussex, whether thegn or commoner, is cognizant of these terms.
Beowulf is spoken of as gold-wlanc, but the typical thegn in Finnsburg is called gold-hladen[724].
But Hengest, the thegn of Hnaef, puts up so stout a defence, that Finn is unable to take a full vengeance upon all the Danes.
After Hnaef's death, Hengest is described as thethegn of Hnaef: an expression without parallel or explanation, if he was really his brother and successor.
The Bishop of York preached and baptized in Bernicia and in Deira, and in the parts of Lindsey, where he converted Blecca, thegn of the Lindiswaras, and all his family.
He said that he was Godric the son of Ulchel, a thegn of the Gainas.
To the general surprise, the envoy was no less a person than Eumer, the truculent thegn who, with Cuichelm, acted such a treacherous part at the battle of Bampton.
Blecca, the great thegn of Lindum, promised to join with the Lindiswaras, and the Gainas were stanch.
In fact, Wessex had been so hard hit by the slaughter at Hastings, that scarce a thegn of note survived to organize resistance.
While, sincethegn and thane are both archaisms, I prefer the former; not only for the same reason that induces Sir Francis Palgrave to prefer it, viz.
All this is a Norman fable," said the Thegn of Kent, with a disturbed visage; "and Godwin cleared himself on oath of all share in the foul murder of Alfred.
Dare they speak as we speak of king and of law, of thegn and of captain?
The thegn was expected to fight for his lord, and generally to place his services at his disposal in both war and peace.
And many a thegn who had before half believed in the guilt of Godwin as the murderer of Alfred, whispered in gasps to his neighbour: "There is no weregeld for manslaying on the head of him who smiles so in death on his old comrades in life!
I have done proud things in my day; I have made kings and built thrones, and I stand higher in England than ever thegn or earl stood before.
The thegnand the retainers looked at the maiden in surprise.
Stopping at the houses of ceorl and thegn alike for shelter and refreshment, she gave her merriest smile and sang her gayest songs.
The thegn at last declared himself satisfied, and, after making her promise that she would abide in the manor till after the next night, Egwina retired to the chamber assigned her.
I would that the thegn had not done this," she mused.
Would that thegn and coerl were filled with thy spirit, and the Dane would no longer uprear his raven standard in the land.
Oswald the thegn then took the oath, and swore to the truth of what the other two had said, adding, that though he compassionated the maiden, he felt that he must deliver her to the doom of the land.
Have it thine own way, girl," said thethegn good naturedly, "though I wish thou wouldst stay.
A silence fell upon the people as the thegn sent for his bond-women, and as they waited their appearance some were there who, won by the beauty of the maiden, openly expressed a belief in her innocence.
Methinks that we could find some thegnto take us under his mund.
It hath been proved by witnesses, both unbought and unlying, that thou didst take from the manor of Oswald the thegn the harp of Edwy the gleeman.
But a rule which valued the oath of a single thegn as highly as the oath of six ceorls would make the ceorl but a poor witness and tend to keep him out of court[170].
Even the holder of book-land who wished to alienate it, for example, the thegn who wished to pass on his book-land to a church, did not in general execute a written conveyance.
Closely connected with this matter is another thorny topic, namely, the status of the thegn and the relation of the thegn to his lord.
The thegn offers a heriot with a prayer that 'his will may stand.
The thegn is the man who for one reason or another is a warrior.
To this distinction the famous exchange which Æthelbert effected with his thegn Wulflaf may point.
Again, the relation between thegn and lord is no longer conceived as a menial, 'serviential' or ministerial relation.
But from our present point of view by far the most interesting form that the loan takes is the loan to the thegn or the cniht.
The same Offa gave land to his thegn Dudda so that by church right he might enjoy it during his life and leave it on his death to whom he would[901].
The thegn is a 'twelve hundred man'; his wergild and his oath countervail those of six ceorls.
This done-- the ships sail back to their haven; the thegn seeks his homestead and the ceorl returns to the plough; for with Godwin are no strangers; and his force is but the love of his countrymen.
So too the Yorkshire thegn who held six Manors or less paid three marcs to the sheriff; if he held more than six, twelve marcs to the king (Domesday, i.
This suggestion is highly probable, and in any case, the thegnbearing this English name, it may fairly be presumed that his father Reinbald was not of Norman birth.
King's thegn in Glo'stershire 'was evidently a son' of the chancellor.
It may be worth throwing out, as a hint, the suggestion that his father Uchtred might have been identical with Uchtred, son of Ligulf, that great Northumbrian thegn who was slain at Durham in 1080.
Of course this brings us to the notoriously difficult question of the thegn and his qualification.
We know, at least, that more than one noble thegn will be present.
Some of the old thegn Ealdred's men had visited the battlefield several days after the fight, to see how the land lay and what the king's men were doing.
But the word thegn itself, that is, when it was used as the description of an attendant of the king, appears to have meant more especially a military attendant.
It is pretty clear, therefore, that the word cniht could never have superseded the word thegn in the sense of a military attendant, at all events of the king.
It happened that the man of God was, at that time, called thither by the thegn to consecrate a church; and when that was done, the thegn desired him to come into his house and dine.
Hunwald betrayed him, and Oswy, by the hands of his reeve, Ethilwin, foully slew him and the thegn aforesaid.
He was of noble birth and a thegn of King Oswy, born in 628.
This he did, declaring that he had been a thegn of the king's, and the noble answered, "I perceived by all your answers that you were no peasant.
The long insecurity of a century of warfare drove the ceorl, the free tiller of the soil, to seek protection more and more from the thegn beside him.
But these wars had often driven the ceorl or freeman of the township to "commend" himself to a thegnwho pledged him his protection in consideration of payment in a rendering of labour.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "thegn" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
