The Magna Carta is one of the world’s most famous documents, celebrated as a cornerstone of constitutional government. Such is its totemic status, it is more frequently referenced than read. From its articles emerged the concept that nobody, not even the king, is above the rule of law.
Legal principles such as due process under the law and trial by jury have also been traced to provisions in the Magna Carta, as has the gradual and contested emergence of parliamentary democracy. Over the centuries, its principles have been incorporated into legal codes and embodied in such foundational documents as the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Magna Carta, or ‘Great Charter’, was first granted in June 1215 by King John of England as a treaty of rights and concessions to end a baron-led revolt. A charter was any proclamation or letter granting property or rights. Henry I, King Stephen, and Henry II had previously issued ‘coronation charters’ establishing ‘traditions’ that the kings swore to reinstate and uphold. Indeed, Henry I’s coronation charter was cited as a precedent by the rebel barons.
In the Magna Carta, King John undertook to restore and uphold ‘traditional’ customs and liberties granted to the Church, nobles and ‘free men’. In a subsequent writ John stated that ‘a firm peace’ had been resolved ‘between us and the barons and free men of our kingdom as they can hear and see by our charter’. However, less than two months later John’s ‘great charter’ was annulled, leading to civil war and the invasion of England by France.
The story of the Magna Carta did not end there. Throughout the 13th century, it was revised and reissued by John’s successors as each faced their own political crises. Only a month after John’s death in 1216, proxies for his young son Henry III issued a revised and shortened Magna Carta as a promise of good government. It was further amended and reissued in 1217 and 1225. In 1297 and 1300 Henry’s son and successor, Edward I, confirmed the 1225 version with minor amendments and issued the Inspeximus Magna Carta. The 1297 issue was entered on the Statute Roll of the Chancery.
Clerks in the Royal Chancery produced these manuscripts. Their role was to draft, copy, and certify documents, with the king’s Seal affixed as a sign of official authentication. In the 1200s, the Chancery began recording all issued charters and letters on a series of rolls. For each reissue of the Magna Carta, the King’s official Chancery Scribes produced and certified copies which were then proclaimed – read aloud in a public place – in all English counties and major towns. Notably, the frequency of which the Magna Carta and other charters were issued – almost a dozen occasions in Henry’s reign alone – testifies to the early monarchs’ reluctance to have their authority constrained.
The 1297 Inspeximus issue of the Magna Carta
The 1297 Inspeximus issue of the Magna Carta owned by the Australian nation is an official charter sent in Edward I’s name for public proclamation. The term inspeximus means that the King had inspected and confirmed the great charter of his father Henry III. It closes with an admonition that the charter be observed in perpetuity. It was witnessed by Edward’s son (later Edward II) at Westminster during the King’s absence campaigning in Flanders. It was originally accompanied by the reissued ‘Charter of the Forest’, now held by the British Library, which established access to the royal forests for ‘free men’.
The hand-written document or ‘manuscript’ is written in iron-gall ink on a single sheet of sheepskin parchment. Chancery Clerk Hugh of Yarmouth signed (‘warranted’) the manuscript. The various inscriptions on the back of the document include confirmation that the text was reviewed and declared by Edward I in 1297.
The text is written in Latin, the language of the Church and government, even though French was used at the Royal Court at the time. Its ‘standard chancery hand’ which incorporated an established and comprehensive abbreviating system designed to save time and parchment. Edward I’s Royal Seal is attached to the folded lower edge by red and green silk cords. On close inspection, the scribe’s pale grey horizontal guiding lines can be identified. Much more apparent are the vertical and horizontal creases, revealing that the manuscript has been previously folded into as many as 16 sections.