The derivation from the Saxon cesc (ash) and tun (an enclosed place) accounts for the earliest orthography Estun.
These officials seem to have been located in royal villages (cyninges tun, villa regalis) or fortresses (cyninges burg, orbs regis), which served as centres and meeting-places (markets, &c.) for the inhabitants of the district, and to which their dues, both in payments and services had to be rendered.
The whole group of buildings stood in an enclosure (tun) surrounded by a stockade (burg), which perhaps rested on an earthwork, though this is disputed.
Among the points of interest within it are the old chapel of 1318, with Leopold's tomb and the altar of Verdun, dating from the 12th century, the treasury and relic-chamber, the library with 30,000 volumes and many MSS., the picture gallery, the collection of coins, the theological hall, and the winecellar, containing an immense tun like that at Heidelberg.
The defendants agreed that each of them was bound to pay the tun, and they put themselves in mercy.
