Frostating

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When Norway was united as a kingdom (900 - 1030 AD), the existing lagtings were constituted as superior regional assemblies, Frostating being one of them. These were representative assemblies at which delegates from the various districts in each region met to award legal judgments and pass laws. Frostating, arguably Norway's oldest court, had its seat at Tinghaugen in Frosta municipality in the county of Nord-Trøndelag, close to the mediaeval church at Logtun.

The first germs of democratic evolution appeared in matters of law. The ancient regional assemblies - Frostating, Gulating and Eidsivating - were eventually joined into a single jurisdiction, and King Magnus Lagabøte had the existing body of law put into writing (1263 - 1280). This compilation of codified law which applied throughout the realm was exceptional for its time, and remained in force until Frederik III, king of the Dano-Norwegian personal union, promulgated absolute monarchy in 1660. This was codified in the King Act of 1665 which functioned as the constitution of the Union of Denmark-Norway until 1814.

[edit] Frostating seal

The Frostating seal (Frostatingseglet) shows king Magnus Lagabøte^[1] on St. John's day 1274 seated on his throne and giving the lawman the new Frostating's law (Frostatingsloven). The representatives to the Thing—three deep—stand on the king's left side. The king sits in the middle on his throne with a crown on his head and a scepter in his hand, and with the Norwegian lion under his foot. Below in the seal are two bowmen; one aiming at a squirrel while the other aims at a bird. Both the squirrel and the bird sit in trees.

The original of the Frostating seal {Frostatingseglet) is the Norwegian Diplomatarium, and is found on a document dated June 1, 1453, found in Dipl. Norv. VIII no. 349 .^[2]

[edit] References

1. ^ The seal commemorates Magnus's great effort to modernise the law-code, which gave him his epithet law-mender (Lagabøte). In 1274 he promulgated the new national law, a unified code of laws to apply for Norway, including the Faroe islands and Shetland at the Frostating. This replaced the different regional laws which had existed before. A unified code of laws for a whole country had until then only been introduced in Sicily and Castile.
2. ^ Frosta i gammel og ny tid, s. 82–83