The king distributed large tracts of lands to various noblemen who governed the lands with the king's authority. Over the years, the government became more centralized by concentrating the power in a single ruler, the king. Originally, the tuns ruled themselves through the election of tithingmen and reeves. This principle of direct citizen participation survives today in the procedure known as posse comitatus or posse. Any citizen hearing the alarm was then legally responsible for helping to bring the criminal to justice. If a criminal or escaped suspect was at large, it was the sheriff's responsibility to give the alarm, the hue and cry as it was called. However, every citizen's duty was to assist the sheriff in keeping the peace. Under England's King Alfred the Great, the sheriff was responsible for maintaining law and order within his county. To distinguish the leader of the hundreds from the leader of the shire, the more powerful leader became known as the shire-reeve (later becoming sheriff - meaning the keeper or chief of the county). Just as the hundreds elected a reeve, each shire had a reeve. A new unit of government, the shire, was formed when groups of hundreds joined together (the shire is the forerunner of the county). Each group of ten tithings, one hundred families, elected its own chief called a gerefa (later shortened to reeve).ĭuring the next two centuries, a number of changes took place in the tithing and hundreds. They elected a leader of each tithing called a tithingman.
Sometime before 700 A.D., the Anglo-Saxons decided to systemize their methods of fighting by forming a system of local self-government based on groups of ten.Įach tun was divided into groups of ten families called a tithing. More than 1200 years ago, England was inhabited by a small group of Anglo-Saxons who lived in rural communities called tuns (later towns). Then the princes, the governors, and captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counselors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, were gathered together unto the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up and they stood before the image.” Medieval England “.Nebuchadnezzar the king sent to gather together the princes, the governors, and the captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counselors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, to come to the dedication of the image which Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. in the Book of Daniel, which recounts the presence of the sheriff at the setting up of the golden image by the Chaldean King of Babylon, Nebuchadneszzar. Another reference says "hu e cri" is a Norman-English phrase combining the French 'huer' and 'cri' which mean "respectively to shout and cry out." From The Dictionary of Cliches by James Rogers (Wings Books, Originally New York: Facts on File Publications, 1985).The first mention of sheriff is found dated back to 600 B.C. Actually, the term always was somewhat redundant since 'hue' comes from the Old French 'huer' (to cry out) and 'cry' obviously means the same thing." From Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins by William and Mary Morris (HarperCollins, New York, 1977, 1988). The expression 'hu e cri,' as it was in Anglo-Norman, has, of course, long since become merely a synonym for loud outcry. HUE AND CRY - "In the Middle Ages, under common law, if someone called out for help in pursuing a thief or other criminal, people hearing the cry and failing to assist in the chase could be adjudged guilty of a misdemeanor. where did this expression originate? thanks Guy
: hue and cry has 2 defintions.one is a protes, the other deals w/ a response to clamor by police. In Reply to: Hue and cry posted by guy andrews on October 07, 2003
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