Perhaps there were two Tynwald Hills in King Orry's time, but I shall
assume that there was one only. It stood somewhere about midway in
the island. In the heart of a wide range of hill and dale, with a long
valley to the south, a hill to the north, a table-land to the east, and
to the west the broad Irish Sea. Not, of course, a place to be compared
with the grand and gloomy valley of the Logberg, where in a vast
amphitheatre of dark hills and great jökulls tipped with snow, with deep
chasms and yawning black pits, one's heart stands still. But the place
of the Manx Tynwald was an impressive spot. The Hill itself was a
circular mount cut into broad steps, the apex being only a few feet in
diameter. About it was a flat grass plot. Near it, just a hundred and
forty yards away, connected with the mount by a beaten path, was a
chapel. All around was bare and solitary, perhaps as bleak and stark as
the lonely plains of Thingvellir.
Such was the scene. Hither came the King and his people on Tynwald
Day. It fell on the 24th of June, the first of the seven days of the
Icelandic gathering of the Althing. What occurred in Iceland occurred
also in Man. The King with his Keys and his clergy gathered in the
chapel. Thence they passed in procession to the law-rock. On the top
round of the Tynwald the King sat on a chair and faced to the east. His
sword was held before him, point upwards. His barons and beneficed men,
his deemsters, knights, esquires, coroners, and yeomen, stood on the
lower steps of the mount. On the grass plot beyond the people were
gathered in crowds. Then the work of the day began. The coroners
proclaimed a warning. No man should make disturbance at Tynwald on pain
of death. Then the Acts of Tynwald were read or recited aloud by the
deemsters; first in the language of the laws, and next in the language
of the people. After other formalities the procession of the King
returned to the chapel, where the laws were signed and attested, and so
the annual Tynwald ended.
Now this primitive ceremonial, begun by King Orry early in the tenth
century, is observed to this day. On Midsummer-day of this year of grace
a ceremony similar in all its essentials will be observed by the present
Governor, his Keys, clergy, deemsters, coroners, and people, on or near
the same spot. It is the old Icelandic ordinance, but it has gone
from Iceland. The year 1800 saw the last of it on the lava law-rock of
Thingvellir. It is gone from every other Norse kingdom founded by the
old sea-rovers among the Western Isles. Manxmen alone have held on to
it. Shall we also let it go? Shall we laugh at it as a bit of mummery
that is useless in an age of books and newspapers, and foolish and
pompous in days of frock-coats and chimney-pot hats? I think not. We
cannot afford to lose it. Remember, it is the last visible sign of our
independence as a nation. It is our hand-grasp with the past. Our little
nation is the only Norse nation now on earth that can shake hands with
the days of the Sagas, and the Sea-Kings. Then let him who will laugh at
our primitive ceremonial. It is the badge of our ancient liberty, and we
need not envy the man who can look on it unmoved.