Code of Saint Patrick (c.440) was brought to the British Isles and Europe by Irish monks as they evangelized. When Roman troops had withdrawn from Britain in 410, and when the Roman Empire fell in 476, the Code of Patrick increasingly superseded Latin Law in influencing the development of English Common Law.
English Common Law was eventually brought by colonists to America, influencing American Law, as referenced in New York's 1777 Constitution:
<Such parts of the common law of England...as together did form the law of the said colony...shall...continue as the law of this State.> 0440CP001
Saint Patrick (c.389-March 17, 461) founded over 300 churches and baptized over 120,000 converts. The World Book Encyclopedia (Chicago, IL: Field Enterprises, Inc., 1957, vol. 13, p. 6142) stated of Patrick:
<His labors were so successful that he came to be known as one who "found Ireland all heathen and left it all Christian."> 0440CP002
The voyaging monks that followed Patrick, such as Brendan (484-577), Columba (521-597) and Columbanus (543-615), not only carried the Gospel, but also carried the Code of Patrick.
Kurt von S. Kynell, Ph.D. in history from Carnegie-Mellon University, wrote in "Saxon and Medieval Antecedents of the English Common Law" (Edwin Mellen Press, 2000, p. 85):
<Christian monks of Patrick's time translated them into Latin, a meticulous endeavor...The legal implications of such works provide a refreshing antidote to convention. The Brehon Codes go back in time possibly as long as the time of King Cormac Mac Art...
More definitely, however, are the Cain Padraic, the statute of law of St. Patrick, and the Senchus Mor, dealing with civil law, including contract law and the consideration (bargain) of the litigants, as well as the rights and duties of each participant, penalties for non performance, the spectre of fraud, and portions of that area of modern statutory law we now call Agency.
But beyond contract law, this exceptional historical document deals with illegitimacy and adoption, cottage industries, trespass and damages, fees, evidence including corroborative testimony, tithes, and various problem situations in land law, and loans and pledges.
The startling resemblance of these earliest Irish Common Laws not only to later English Common Laws, but indeed to modern statutory law, provides meaning to the antiquity of legal development far before Henry II.
The Brehon criminal law also changed the old method of an-eye-for-an- eye to payment of fines, the substitution of so-called "eric law" for the Lex Talionls...
Before King Alfred's edicts in the 9th century, the Brehon Laws placed even the King under the law, as did the Great Charter (Magna Carta) of Runnymede in the thirteenth century, wisely reported in English jurist Henry de Bracton's own words in the 1240's:
"The law...is not what has been rashly presumed to be the personal will of the king...For there is no king where arbitrary will dominates, and not the law."
The line from both the Saxon and Irish Common Law to English Common Law and modern statutory law, is historically verifiable in the current maxim that "no man is above the law."> 0440CP003
The influence of the Code of Patrick on English Common Law was noted by attorney Richard L. Federer, President of the St. Louis Association of Realtors, whose mother, Marie Katherine Hoffmeier Federer, happened to have been born on St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 1896. In his article, "The Code of Patrick," published in the St. Louis Post Dispatch, Sunday, March 21, 1999, Section G, Richard L. Federer wrote:
<Oh Begorrah! What is St. Patrick doing in the middle of a real estate column? And St. Paddy's day is gone and past at that!
Well, as if you hadn't heard enough about the Irish saint already, I thought you might want to know how he came to write the laws of Ireland down about the year 440.
It seems that when Patrick, as he was known then, was around 33, he returned to Ireland from Auxerre, France, where he had been ordained. He was a missionary to Ireland and decided to try a new technique to gain Christians for the church.
Instead of converting individuals one by one, he first converted the King, a certain King O'Leary. The king saw to it that all of his subjects followed suit.
Patrick and O'Leary hit it off quite well, and in 440 AD, Patrick persuaded the King to appoint a set of three kings, three historians and three priests to write down the common-law of Ireland in script.
You see, the common-law of Ireland was called the Brehon Law (from which we get "Brian") because the law was declared by the "brehons," the judges. It was an oral compilation of judicial decisions, mostly sung in couplets because it was too difficult to remember if merely spoken. It was handed down around the campfire from generation to generation. This may explain why Irish lawyers are such good singers!
At any event, the three sets of commissioners met at Tara, about 25 miles northwest of present day Dublin, and began their work. The work of the commission resulted in a 186-page book called the Senchus Mor, or Great Custom: The Customary or common-law.
There were five categories of land ownership.
One type was the "ferann bord," or land of the table or the king's land. He held the land until his death then it went to his successor. This devolution was called the "tanistry."
Nobles held lands in fee and could divide their lands among their heirs during their lifetime but had no right to divide the lands to outsiders at death.
Tenants and lessees always paid their rent in kind: a cow, a day's work or some other service. Leases ran typically for seven years and could be sublet.
Tribe or clan land was the fourth estate and any freeman (there were slaves) could occupy a part of it up to three years or upon his death. Then there was a "gavelkind" or redistribution.
Finally, there was a "common" tract of land where cattle were grazed and hunting was permitted.
Some of the laws were quite sound.
For instance, the judgment of Cormac states that if a sheep wanders into another's field and eats some of the crops thereon, the correct punishment in not the forfeiture of the sheep, but the forfeiture of the wool on the sheep. Both croppings of the grass and the wool are equal and both will grow back again.
Shouting at a pig and causing it to run into a person subjects the shouter to punitive as well as actual damages.
And that is the law, sure'n begorrah!> 0440CP004
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Endnotes:
0440CP001. New York State Constitution, 1777.
0440CP002. The World Book Encyclopedia (Chicago, IL: Field Enterprises, Inc., 1957, vol. 13, p. 6142.
0440CP003. Kurt von S. Kynell, Ph.D., Saxon and Medieval Antecedents of the English Common Law (Edwin Mellen Press, 2000, p. 85).
0440CP004. Richard L. Federer, "The Code of Patrick" (St. Louis Post Dispatch, Sunday, March 21, 1999, Section G).