40 Unusual Laws in History

3. George I passed a law making it illegal for a commoner’s pet to fornicate with a royal animal

During George I’s reign (1714-27), power shifted from monarch to parliament, with Britain’s first de facto Prime Minister, Robert Walpole. This didn’t stop George passing some silly laws, however. Most famously, he didn’t want common animals getting too familiar with his own. â€˜The severest penalties will be suffered by any commoner who doth permit his animal to have carnal knowledge of a pet of the Royal house’, roared the legislation. The â€˜severest penaltys’, by the way, potentially meant execution. It’s still illegal to let your pets copulate with royal animals, though the UK scrapped the death penalty long ago.

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2. Batman wouldn’t have lasted long in 17^th century England

During Charles II’s reign, a group of vigilantes found themselves on the wrong side of the law. All apprentice boys, they tried to destroy a brothel in 1663. Unfortunately, they wound up standing trial for high treason, since â€˜for men to go about to pull down brothels, with a captain and an ensign… who is safe?’ The Chief Justice convicted them. A few decades later, yet more crusaders against sin tried to burn down a brothel, and got convicted of treason. The judge acknowledged brothels â€˜a nuisance’, but said destroying them took â€˜the right out of the queen’s hand’.

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1. In the middle ages, animals could be tried in courts for criminal offenses

Our final item may well be the stupidest of our weird laws. Across Europe in the middle ages, people sometimes tried animals in court. Small animals, such as mice and insects, got ecclesiastical trials for destroying grain or damaging churches. Such small-fry usually got excommunicated. Larger creatures like pigs and horses faced secular prosecution for injury or murder and usually got a death sentence. One man in France, whose pig killed a young child, got convicted of negligence, but the animal was hanged for murder. Though we treat animals better these days, we thankfully don’t treat them this much like humans!

Where did we find this stuff? Here are our sources:

My London News – The Remarkable Reason Why The Queen Owns All Of The Swans In England

National Geographic Channel – Wacky Texas Laws: Guess Which of These 4 Are Real

Library of Congress – Odd Laws of the United Kingdom

Slater Gordon Lawyers – 14 Of The Most Obscure Australian Laws You’ve Never Heard Of

USA Today – Weirdest Laws Passed In Every State

The Connexion France – Women Wearing Trousers Was Illegal In France Until 2013

AEON – Why The Trial By Ordeal Was Actually An Effective Test Of Guilt

JSTOR Daily – When Societies Put Animals on Trial

Medium – 10 Animals That Were Put on Trial

Bartlett, Robert. Trial by Fire and Water: The Medieval Judicial Ordeal. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986.

Bratskeir, Kate. “The Craziest Laws That Still Exist In The United States”. The Huffington Post, January 22, 2016.