Archaic British Laws

[fluffymark]

All English males over the age 14 are to carry out 2 or so hours of longbow practice a week supervised by the local clergy.

In London, you are not allowed to keep a pigsty in the front of your home.

Any person found breaking a boiled egg at the sharp end will be sentenced to 24 hours in the village stocks.

All male orgies are illegal, although add one woman and it’s legal.

Until 1976 cab drivers were required by law to carry a bale of hay to feed a horse.

It is illegal to stand within one hundred yards of the reigning monarch when not wearing socks.

It is still an offence to beat or shake any carpet rug or mat in any street in the Metropolitan Police District, although you are allowed to shake a doormat before 8am.

Placing a postage stamp that bears the Queen (or King) upside down is considered treason.

A Member of Parliament must not enter the House of Commons wearing a full suit of armour.

Committing suicide is classified as a capital crime – punishable by death.

A 1307 law ensures that the head of any dead whale found on the British coast becomes the property of the king and the tail belongs to the queen (she need the bones for her corset).

Royal Navy ships which enter the Port of London are required to provide a barrel of rum to the Constable of the Tower of London.

In Chester you are allowed to shoot a Welsh person with a bow and arrow provided it is done inside the city walls and after midnight.

It is still illegal for cabbies to carry rabid dogs or corpses and by law they must ask all passengers if they have small pox or the plague.

In Scotland, it is illegal to be a drunk in possession of a cow.

Anybody know any more amusing obsolete british laws?

Comments

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

AIUI Thatcher had a sweep-out of a lot of archaic laws in her first term, so a lot of mad things that used to be law aren't any more. Of course the Tories then went on to make lots of mad laws of their own. Did you know that it's legal for a uniformed constable who believes that a person is on their way to a music event within a 5-mile radius to stop them and direct them away from the area - but only if the music to be played at the event is "wholly or predominantly characterised by the emission of a succession of repetitive beats"? Now there's a mad law that doesn't date from very long ago...