vehmgerichte (vas f, ch guttural)

[Pl. of Ger. vehmgericht, from O. Ger. veme, feme, fem= punishment, and gericht =a court of justice.] Hist .: A system of secret tribunals which origin ated during the Middle Ages in Westphalia, and then spread over Germany, where the regular administration of justice had fallen into complete disorder. The supreme government of the Vehmic tribunals was vested in the Great or General Chapter, composed of the Free graves and all the other initiated members, high and low. The a emblies of the tribunals were generally held in broad daylight and in public, sometimes by night and in secret. The last tribunal was held at Zell in 1568, but a few Vehmic tribunals existed in name, though without po e ing any remnant of their pristine power, as late as the middle of the eighteenth century. Westphalia was divided into districts, each of which usually contained one, and sometimes many, Vehmic tribunals, whose boundaries were accurately defined. The court itself was composed of "Echevins," nominated by the Lord or Graff, and divided into two cla es (1) the ordinary, and (2) the Wis sender, or Witan-who were admitted under a strict bond of secrecy. The criminal jurisdiction of the Vehmic tribunals took the very widest range. They, like the Echevins, were of two cla es -(1) the open court, or Folkmoot, and (2) the farfamed and dreaded Secret Tribunal. Charlemagne, according to the tradition, was the founder of the Vehmic tribunal, but this is not confirmed either by documentary evidence or by contemporary history. More probably these tribunals were the orig. inal summary jurisdictions of the old Saxons, which survived the subjugation of their country, In fact, these proceedings differed in no e ential character from the summary jurisdiction exercised in the townships and hundreds of Anglo-Saxon England. (For illustrations of the proceedings of the Vehmgerichte, see Sir W. Scott's Anne of Geier stein .)