Magna Carta
Rebel barons force King John to agree a charter limiting royal power, which becomes a lasting symbol of the rule of law.
- Magna Carta (with a new commentary) — David Carpenter, Penguin Classics (2015)
- Magna Carta: an introduction — Claire Breay and Julian Harrison, British Library (2015)
- The English and Their History — Robert Tombs, Allen Lane (2014)
At Runnymede beside the Thames, in June 1215, King John agreed to a charter of liberties demanded by rebel barons, promising, among much else, that no free man would be imprisoned or dispossessed “except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the land”. The Pope annulled it within weeks and civil war followed, but the charter was reissued in 1216, 1217 and 1225 and became a permanent part of English law.
- Magna Carta (with a new commentary) — David Carpenter, Penguin Classics (2015)
- Magna Carta: an introduction — Claire Breay and Julian Harrison, British Library (2015)
Most of its 63 clauses dealt with feudal dues, forests and fish weirs, and it protected “free men”, a minority in an age of serfdom. Three clauses remain on the statute book today. Its real power came later, when seventeenth-century lawyers such as Edward Coke used it against the Stuart kings, and when it inspired the American founders and, in the twentieth century, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
- Magna Carta (with a new commentary) — David Carpenter, Penguin Classics (2015)
- Magna Carta: an introduction — Claire Breay and Julian Harrison, British Library (2015)
- The English and Their History — Robert Tombs, Allen Lane (2014)
It also mentioned Wales: clauses promised to restore lands taken from Welshmen without lawful judgement and to return Welsh hostages, including the son of Llywelyn ab Iorwerth, Llywelyn the Great, who had allied with the barons.
- Magna Carta (with a new commentary) — David Carpenter, Penguin Classics (2015)
Why it matters today
Magna Carta is the founding myth of English liberty: the idea that even the king is under the law, and that no one may be imprisoned without due process. Most of its clauses are long gone, but the principle still turns up whenever English people argue about rights, from juries to protest laws.