The Collaborative International Dictionary
Weregild \Were"gild`\, n. [AS. wergild; wer a man, value set on
a man's life + gild payment of money; akin to G. wehrgeld.
[root]285. See Were a man, and Geld, n.] (O. Eng. Law)
The price of a man's head; a compensation paid of a man
killed, partly to the king for the loss of a subject, partly
to the lord of a vassal, and partly to the next of kin. It
was paid by the murderer. [Written also weregeld,
weregelt, etc.]
--Blackstone.
Wiktionary
n. (alternative spelling of wergeld English)
Wikipedia
Weregild (also spelled wergild, wergeld, weregeld, etc.), also known as man price, was a value placed on every being and piece of property, for example in the Frankish Salic Code. If property was stolen, or someone was injured or killed, the guilty person would have to pay weregild as restitution to the victim's family or to the owner of the property.
Weregild payment was an important legal mechanism in early Germanic society; the other common form of legal reparation at this time was blood revenge. The payment was typically made to the family or to the clan.
No distinction was made between murder and manslaughter until these distinctions were instituted by the re-introduction of Roman law in the 12th century.
Payment of the weregild was gradually replaced with capital punishment due to Christianization, starting around the 9th century, and almost entirely by the 12th century when weregild began to cease as a practice throughout the Holy Roman Empire.
Usage examples of "weregild".
If we sit quietly at our hearths - if Heorot takes whatever weregild he might deign to offer - he will know he is free to crush us altogether.
Therefore he egged men on against it, thwarted the kin of murdered Christians when they sought weregild, at last rammed laws through his Great Moot that left them open to wholesale slaughter as soon as some happening made tempers flare.
He would not pay double weregild, because that would be to admit wrongdoing.
With many Danish folk already dwelling thereabouts, the Englander's remaining kin now dared do naught else than accept weregild and land-price from Orm, thus making the farm his in law.
Orm paid the weregild but saw that his son was not safe to have around.
But now you owe me a great weregild, and you shall surrender your freedom to me until your life's end.
But now, if we must go without the rewards and the weregilds that are owed to us, the sooner we return to our own lands the better pleased we shall be.