Edward of Wickham makes this comment (The Power of Albion) when the gang are debating how best to dispose of the corpse of the Sheriff's spy Oliver.
Except that, this is the 1190's in the reign of the absent King Richard, and they are not living in Norman times, but those of the Angevins/Plantagenets?
Possibly Kip Carpenter intended to mean that the laws were founded by the Normans in England (1066-1154)?
http://englistory.darkbb.com
Normans (or at least those of Norman descent) still hold power and it's their laws that rule the land. Most of the landholders/lords are of Norman heritage and have pushed the Saxons into serfdom.
shareYes, it wasn't until the end of the 14th century that French ceased to be the official language of the court and polite society, more than 300 years after the Conquest. This was helped along by Chaucer's decision to use English rather than French for his poetry, and by a growing sense of English national identity among the aristocracy caused by the Hundred Years' War with France. This was also the period when peasants finally began to break the bonds of serfdom, in no small part thanks to the acute labour shortage caused by the Black Death.
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