(An Anecdote)
Introduction
On the 15th of June, 1215, an English King was forced by his subjects to sign a document that would change the course of history. On that day, King John reluctantly signed the Magna Carta, also known as the Great Charter, at Runnymede, a meadow near Windsor Castle.
This document, composed of 63 clauses, aimed to limit the king’s power, protect the rights of the nobility and the church, and establish the principle that the king was not above the law. In this post I’ll quickly tell you what happened and the events that led up to the signing of the Magna Carta.
We are all familiar with the idea that nobody is above the law, right? Well, that idea didn’t exist before the 13th century, and even now there are some people who would toss it out the window. No matter what your opinion is though, at least in the eyes of the law, nobody is above the law.
Wait, who passed that law?
Let’s get started.
Medieval England Before The Magna Carta
Life in early medieval Europe (pre 13th century) wasn’t really nice for the common man. There were social strata that people were born into, and they generally remained there till they died. The stratification was a lot more complex, but I’ll simplify it for you.
In Medieval England, and most of Europe in general, you were born into one of the three strata below:
- Upper class: Kings/monarchs, nobles/knights, and clergy
- Middle class: Merchants, doctors, and lesser clergy
- Lower class: Peasants and serfs
In medieval society, social mobility was extremely limited. It was nearly impossible for someone to move up the social ladder from one class to another. The idea was that each social class was divinely created to serve a specific function in society, so how could a social ladder jump be sustained? For example, a peasant had almost no chance of becoming a knight. Such exceptions were so rare that they’re mostly found in fictional stories, like in Hollywood movies.
You know what I think about Hollywood and taking some of their historical adaptations with a pinch of salt. Those guys make entertaining videos, not documentaries.
Let us move on.
This social pyramid widened the lower you went, and that meant that the king and upper class, who were few in number, had near absolute control over the lower classes, who were much more numerous. By control, I mean they owned almost all the resources (stuff) and land, and basically did whatever they wanted on their own land. Peasants could move around, but couldn’t own land. Serfs fared worse. They were tied to their lord’s land.
This system, called the feudal system, wasn’t only unfair to the lower class. Like I said, it was complex, and there was some level of intra-class stratification. The nobles, while being members of the upper class, were still below the king. The king could tax them, and he could give and take away their land and castles whenever he wished. The barons, a group of powerful nobles subject to the king, weren’t so pumped about the affair, but what could they do? The king was the law.
At the start of the 13th century, England was ruled by King John, the third of the Angevin kings. The Angevins were from Anjou in France, a region close by Normandy. They had intermarried with the Normans and inherited the English throne. They were powerful kings, force was all they knew, and they ruled by “force and will,” taking arbitrary decisions. Under their rule, there were laws, but there was no law to fall on if the king didn’t obey the law.
Technically this meant that the king was above the law. If he took your stuff, you just had to EstyFU about it.
King John, the third Angevin king, was the great grandson of King William of Normandy. Yes, Wiliam, Duke of Normandy, who conquered England and became William the Conqueror. That William. Before he did any conquering though, he was just Duke of Normandy, and he wasn’t going to ditch his ancestral lands just because he claimed England. Because of this, the Norman kings were both Kings of England, and Dukes of Normandy at the same time.
Being a duke meant King John was technically a subject of the French king, because well, Normandy was (and still is) in France. He had squabbles with his liege lord, King Phillip II of France, and they went to war in 1204 AD. He lost the battle and had to give up a HELLUVA lot of territory and other stuff. King Johnny didn’t like this, but he lacked funds, so he heavily taxed his subjects for a war that he LOST, shamefully.
Disagreements Between King John and his Barons
His barons already didn’t like him because of his high handed rule, and now they had to face the shame of losing to the French. Add a few more taxes and you have everyone enraged at the king, from serf to nobleman. Johnny came back from France and learned that some barons to the north and east were organising some resistance. They tried to force him into confirming the Charter of Liberties that had been declared by King Henry I the previous century. It was tense.
When the elected leader of the rebels, Baron Robert Fitzwalter of Essex publicly accused King Johnny of trying to rape his daughter, things got much worse. Robert was also implicated in a plot to assassinate King John in 1212 AD.
In 1215, John met with the rebels in London to discuss potential reformatory measures. John had gummed up with his buddy Pope Innocent III, asking him to back him up in this dispute. John swore to Innocent that he’d join the crusades against the pesky muslims. He had previously declared himself a papal vassal in 1213, and Innocent was going to help him. By the time Pope Innocent had gotten letters to support his buddy, the rebel barons had organised into a military body, renounced feudal ties to John, and were advancing on London.
And no, it was not a peaceful protest.
King John proposed to have an arbitrary council set up, with Pope Innocent at the head. The rebels said no uh, thank you. John was trying really hard to be peaceful here, so he instructed Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury and rebel coconspirator, to start peace talks.
The Signing of The Magna Carta
Both parties decided to meet at Runnymede, a meadow that always got flooded by the Thames whenever it rained. Anglo-Saxon kings frequently held meetings there in the past, and it was strategically important for the two parties involved. There, they could meet with lesser risk of being ambushed by the other.
The barons gave John with their draft demands for reform, later named the ‘Articles of the Barons’. Stephen Langton practically turned these incomplete demands into a charter capturing the proposed peace agreement, to be renamed ‘Magna Carta’ a few years later. This meant “Great Charter”. On 15th June, it was written in text, and King John grudgingly signed the charter.
The Magna Carta. Don’t worry about trying to read it, it was written in Middle English.
Now, I wasn’t there, but the guy who was there said it was signed at knifepoint.
On 19th June, the rebels swore their oaths of loyalty to John again and copies of the charter were formally issued.
Okay, so what did King John agree to by signing the Magna Carta?
Basically, John signed a paper that said: “Even though I was forced to do it I swear that I won’t do whatever I want and take whatever stuff I want just because I’m king anymore,” but let’s get into it.
Before, the king had the power to overrule some rights that the church had, like the right to handle their own internal affairs, and clause 1 handled that. The king had a huge say in who was elected bishop or abbot, and that was checked out by clause 22. Also, after signing the Magna Carta, John couldn’t seize tithes and offerings meant for the church.
The Magna Carta provided crucial protections for individuals, including protection from unlawful imprisonment, access to swift justice, and limitations on taxation. The charter restricted the Crown’s ability to impose taxes and other feudal payments without the consent of the barons. While primarily benefiting free men, particularly the barons, the Magna Carta also addressed the rights of serfs in specific articles (16, 20, and 28), providing them with some protections and safeguards. You couldn’t do with serfs whatever you wanted anymore. They were better than slaves, but not by much. Under the Magna Carta, conditions would improve a little.
Here comes the tricky part. I know you’ve been asking; “What happens if John doesn’t fall in line?”
Well, the barons included a security clause in section 61 that set up a council of 25 barons to check the king if, after 40 days of being notified of a transgression by the council, he refused to fall in line. Checks involved seizing John’s lands and castles until he made the required reforms. This was a new thing, because in no other country did the people have any means of forcing the king to be good, but John was so disadvantaged by this clause for it to survive.
The Aftermath
What happened?
The Magna Carta was a dismal failure.
John didn’t trust the barons and the barons didn’t trust John. Being a king before then meant you had the power to take a lot of stuff. Technically you owned everybody’s stuff, and the barons were more or less caretakers. Naturally, you wouldn’t be happy if there was a law that said: “Don’t take any more stuff,” passed against you. THE KING.
If you were King John, what would you do?
- Obey the law and become owned by the barons?
- Say hell naw?
Well, John said effit, and asked his buddy The Pope for help. One would think the supreme pontiff would support the Magna Carta. Talk about a fragmented church.
Pope Innocent III released a statement condemning the charter. He said it was ignominious and illegal. He complained that it was unjust. He accused the barons of twisting the arm of their king.
Also he had the barons excommunicated and Stephen Langton suspended.
The barons realised that peace was impossible . They had already crossed the Rubicon, so they said effit too and declared war on the crown, starting the First Barons’ War. The war ended inconclusively in 1217, and then Johnny the King died, passing the reins to his son Henry III.
Henry III decided that war wouldn’t be good for everybody, so he agreed to sign a peace treaty involving the Magna Carta. So everybody became friends again, right?
Of course it was a lot more complicated than that, but let’s just say Henry III started throwing Magna Cartas willy-nilly, reissuing it several times to keep the peace. Each version got a bit more twisted than the last. The barons were still miffed, but at least they weren’t taking up arms anymore… well, not all the time.
So, as Henry III kept reissuing the Magna Carta like it was going out of style, the document slowly changed into something of a medieval magazine of rights. But here’s the sad part: while it was supposed to limit the king’s power, it mostly applied to the nobles. The peasants? They were still stuck with serfdom, which was basically the medieval equivalent of being on the world’s longest, most tedious work contract. Let’s remember that they were tied to their lands.
Ouch.
Fast forward through a few centuries of “oh, look, another king ignoring the Magna Carta,” and by the time the 17th century swung by, this document had become the “I told you so” of legal documents. It was brought up whenever someone wanted to remind the monarchy that they weren’t as all-powerful as they thought.
So, the Magna Carta didn’t exactly make everyone friends again, but it did set the stage for a good old-fashioned power struggle, which, let’s face it, is what keeps history interesting. And who knows, maybe somewhere in those clauses, there’s a secret recipe for medieval peace pudding. But well, we’re still looking for it.