Amercements are fines collected by lieges and the Crown for various offenses. These may equal or exceed the financial restitution granted to the injured party, and both parties in a trial may be condemned to pay amercements to liege or state.
Often, the fear of having to pay amercements lead the conflicting parties to seek an out of court solution, but the lawmakers have sought to make this a crime in itself, as amercements are a major source of income to the crown, and to the officials who collect them.
A criminal may be condemned to pay restitution to the injured party, and to pay the entire cost of the trial. Restitution is often a function of the estimated wergild of the injured party.
Each man's life has its value, and this value is the wergild. When the wergild is paid, the injured party's honour is restored, and no vengance is required nor allowed. However, no free man is under any obligation to accept a wergild, though bondsmen and serfs are accepted to bow and smile if wergild is offered by a social superior.
A free man (status 0) has a wergild of 10 cows ($6000), for every level of status above this, the wergild doubles ($24 000 for a knight, $96 000 for a baron). Reduce the wergild by 25% per level of status below 0 ($4500 for a bondsman, $3000 for a servant, $1500 for a serf). This money is paid equally for women. For seducing a woman, one must pay her father or husband half her wergild, for raping her, full wergild must be paid. However, in such cases, high-status people are unlikely to accept wergild, unless the offending party is invincible.Gnomes and foreigners are only entitled to half-normal wergild, and the same goes for dwarves, in theory. However, dwarves are unlikely to accept wergild unless it is much inflated.