Message #127607

[Trena Alloway]

within six weeks and three days, he was again summoned by four persons. Six weeks was the least term set for appearing to this summons, and it was requisite that a piece of imperial coin should be given with it. Should he still neglect appearing, he was summoned for the third and last time by six schöppen and a count, and the term set was six weeks and three days as before.

If the accused was not merely initiated but also a count, he was treated with corresponding respect. The first summons was served by seven schöppen, the second by fourteen and four counts, and the third by twenty-one and six counts.

The uninitiated, whether bond or free, did not share in the preceding advantages. The summons was served on themselves, or at their residence, by a messenger, and only once. There is some doubt as to the period set for their appearance, but it seems to have been in general the ordinary one of six weeks and three days.

The summons of a town or community was usually addressed to all the male inhabitants. In general some of them were specially named in it; the Arensberg Reformation directed that the names of at least thirty persons should be inserted. The term was six weeks and three days, and those who served the summons were required to be true and upright schöppen.

The noth-schöppe, that is, the person who had surreptitiously become possessed of the secrets of the society, was summoned but once. The usual time was allowed him for appearing to the charge.

Should the accused be a mere vagabond, one who had no fixed residence, the course adopted was to send, six weeks and three days before the day the court was to sit, and post up four summonses at a cross-road which faced the four cardinal points, placing

p. 362