Cáin Adomnáin

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Cáin Adomnáin , also Cáin Adamnáin [ kaːnʼ 'aðavnaːn ] ("the Canon Adomnáns ") or Lex Innocentium ("the law of the innocent"), is a legal work of the abbot and saint Adomnán of Iona (* around 628; † 23 September 704 ).

The work

In the Cáin Adomnáin the legally low status of women in the patriarchal ancient Celtic society is described for the first time . This treatise on the legal status of women - mothers to be precise - dates from the 9th century, but is traditionally attributed to St. Adomnan. In fact, some passages are likely from his time, others were added later. As an introduction, the alleged previous status, which was almost like slavery , is presented. For example, that the woman “had to stick in a hole in the ground so deep that her genitals were hidden, and had to hold a skewer over the fire until the roast was done, and she also had to serve as a candle holder until bedtime . In battle, she carried her groceries on one shoulder and her little child on the other. On her back she carried a 30-foot staff with an iron hook, with which she was supposed to grab an opponent by the braid in the hostile crowd. Behind her came the man who urged her to fight with fence poles. The head or breasts of women were used as trophies. "

That these exaggerated descriptions were intended to make Adomnan's achievement as the liberator of women appear all the more luminous is now taken as certain by Celtology . Allegedly, his mother Rónnat was the driving force behind his legislation. To get God to support her son, she is said to have tied him to a bridge pier with a stone in his mouth for eight months and then buried him alive in a stone coffin. An angel released him and announced the grace and help of God to him.

Adomnan's basic idea was that women should be valued more highly than before as the bearer of saints, abbots and honorable men. The kings of Ireland resisted the changes for the time being, but Adomnan defeated them solely by the sound of his altar bell and the threat of his curse ( Glám dícenn ).

The killing of a woman was punished more severely than before, namely by chopping off the right hand and left foot, then the execution of the perpetrator and the payment of a wergel (honorary award, lóg n-enech ) by his relatives - worth seven Slaves or 21 dairy cows or 14 years and then pay fourteen times the wergeld. In classical Irish law, the wergeld for a woman was half that of a man. If a warband killed a woman, a maximum of 60 men should be punished. Who makes a noble woman blush has to pay a fine worth seven slaves, the rape of a non-aristocratic virgin costs half what a noble woman would be entitled to.

The punishments for women were also changed by Adomnan: In the case of murder, the culprit was put in a boat with bread and water, but only one oar. For women, as well as for other non-fighters (children, clerics - the “innocent”), special regulations on corporal punishment were provided.

At the Synod of Birr ( County Offaly , Ireland ) in 697 the law was adopted and signed by 51 kings from Ireland, Northern Great Britain and the Pict country as well as 40 high clerics. How far Adomnan's law was actually obeyed in practice cannot be determined.

Cáin

Cáin [ kaːnʼ ] is a term from Irish law that can only be translated out of context: it is the law made by a ruler or clergyman (as in this case); an obligation to a superior; a fine.

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literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bernhard Maier: Lexicon of the Celtic religion and culture . P. 4.
  2. ↑ sét , plural séoit = value of a cow, cumal = value of a slave; a slave girl ( cumal ) was worth ten séoit or ten cows, five horses or one wagon, all of these conversions being variable; Wolfgang Meid: The Celts. P. 106 f.
  3. ↑ Helmut Birkhan: Nachantike Keltenrezeption. P. 598 f. (for the entire paragraph)
  4. ^ Bernhard Maier: Lexicon of the Celtic religion and culture . P. 65.