Hist. [OE., pl. of wita WITE sb.1] The members of the national council in Anglo-Saxon times; the council itself, the WITEN-AGEMOT. Also transf.
1807. S. Turner, Hist. Anglo-Saxons, X. iv. II. 226. The treaty … is said to have been made by the king and his witan.
1839. Keightley, Hist. Eng., I. 36. Edward, the Elder,… was chosen by the Witan to succeed his father, Alfred.
1874. Green, Short Hist., i. § 1. 4. Their homesteads clustered round a moot-hill…. Here, too, the ‘witan,’ the Wise Men of the village, met to settle questions of peace and war, [etc.].
1877. Tennyson, Harold, II. ii. William. Good, good, and thou wilt help me to the crown? Harold. Ay … if the Witan will consent to this.
