length of time, a red-hot iron.
Torture was sometimes prescribed, and the so called abrevement (water
test) used. The assize says:

'If the accused confess the crime charged, he shall be hanged; if
he do not confess, he shall be drawn to the torture, and kept in
the water until he shall confess, and shall then be immediately
hanged. But if he continue three days without confessing or dying
under torture'--a thing not easily imagined--'he shall be
imprisoned one year, and then set free.'

The complainant must prove a charge of murder, high treason, or
manslaughter, by single combat with the accused. Women, old men, and
non-combatants might be represented by a so-called champion.

John of Ibelin describes the combat as follows:

'The knights who engage in the combat for murder or manslaughter
must fight on foot and without helmet, with heads shorn around,
being dressed in red military coats, or shirts of red silk falling
down to the knees, the arms cut off above the elbow, red breeches
of cloth or silk, and shields higher by half a foot than their
heads, with two holes of the ordinary size, so that the antagonist
can be seen through them. Each shall have a lance and two swords,
one of the latter girded about him, the sheath drawn up to his
hips, the other fastened to the shield, so that he can have it when
needed.'

Only three days may intervene between the interchange of pledges and the
combat.

'When the combatants who shall have mutually pledged themselves to
the combat present themselves, they must appear on the appointed
day on foot, between six and nine o'clock in the morning, before
the palace of the lord, and call him, being clothed and equipped as
above, having also several shields and swords borne before them, in
order that, on entering the place of combat, they may select what
they need.

'And then the lord shall cause all the weapons to be examined by
his court, so as to know whether they are in order; and if one
lance is longer than the other, he shall shorten it, and he shall
have the two combatants well watched as they go to the place of
combat, that neither may run away; also that they receive no bodily
injury or annoyance, and be not insulted or derided; for the lord
must protect them against all this, since they are in his keeping.
When they