WITENAGEMOT, Wit'e-Mi.-0-mot' (AS., as sembly of counselors). The supreme council of the English nation in Anglo-Saxon times, Eaeh of the separate kingdoms in the so-called heptarehy (q.v.) had its Witenagemot, and when the kingdoms were brought under a common overlord he lied his Witenagemot. The members of the Witenage mot were usually the King, the bishops, the ealdormen, and the dependents of the King, who were called ininistri, or thanes. It is probable that the Witenagemut was earlier a much larger body, and that the less wealthy and less power tul members ceased to attend because of the ex pense or from lack of interest. The actual num bers recorded as present on various occasions are not large. Stubbs regards the Witenagemot of the year 966 as a fair example; there were present then the King's mother, 2 archbishops, 7 bishops, 5 ealdormen, and 15 ministri. The 1Vitenagemot participated in the enactment of laws, both civil and ecclesiastical; assented to grants of land; was a court of last resort ; gave its consent for extraordinary taxation; advised as to the deter mination of war and peace; consented, in theory, to the appointment of ealdormen and possibly of bishops; and elected and sometimes deposed the kings. Kemble lays down a number of canons
about the power of the Witeuagemot. His first, which, as Stubbs says, "is large enough to cover all the rest," is: "First, and in general, they [the members of the Witenagemot] possessed a consultative voice and a right to consider every public act which could be authorized by the King." The actual power of the Witenagemot would vary inversely with that of the King: and under a strong kink the Witenagemot would tend to become merely the King's council. This would be especially true if the King had, as he seems to have had, the right of packing the Wite nagemot by introducing more min istri. Consult: Stubbs, Constitutional History, vol. i. (6th ed., Oxford, 1897) ; Gneist, Vermaltangsrecht (2 vols., 2d ed., Berlin, 1867) Kemble, History of the Anglo-Saxons in England, vol. ii. (London, 1876) Freeman, History of the Norman Con quest (5 vols., Oxford, 1S70-76),