A Source Book of Mediæval History: Documents Illustrative of European Life and Institutions from the German Invasions to the Renaissance
History
A Source Book of Mediæval History: Documents Illustrative of European Life and Institutions from the German Invasions to the Renaissance
Middle Ages -- Sources
=42.= It shall be lawful, for the time to come, for any one to go
out of our kingdom and return safely and securely by land or by
water, saving his allegiance to us (unless in time of war, by some
short space, for the common benefit of the realm), except prisoners
and outlaws, according to the law of the land, and people in war
with us, and merchants who shall be treated as is above
mentioned.[442]
=51.= As soon as peace is restored, we will send out of the kingdom
all foreign knights, cross-bowmen, and stipendiaries, who are come
with horses and arms to the molestation of our people.[443]
=60.= All the aforesaid customs and liberties, which we have
granted to be holden in our kingdom, as much as it belongs to us,
all people of our kingdom, as well clergy as laity, shall observe,
as far as they are concerned, towards their dependents.[444]
[Sidenote: How the charter was to be enforced]
=61.= And whereas, for the honor of God and the amendment of our
kingdom, and for the better quieting the discord that has arisen
between us and our barons, we have granted all these things
aforesaid. Willing to render them firm and lasting, we do give and
grant our subjects the underwritten security, namely, that the
barons may choose five and twenty barons of the kingdom, whom they
think convenient, who shall take care, with all their might, to
hold and observe, and cause to be observed, the peace and liberties
we have granted them, and by this our present Charter
confirmed....[445]
=63.= ... It is also sworn, as well on our part as on the part of
the barons, that all the things aforesaid shall be observed in good
faith, and without evil duplicity. Given under our hand, in the
presence of the witnesses above named, and many others, in the
meadow called Runnymede, between Windsor and Staines, the 15th day
of June, in the 17th year of our reign.
FOOTNOTES:
[408] The barons attended the meeting under the pretense of making a
religious pilgrimage.
[409] This charter, granted at the coronation of Henry I. in 1100,
contained a renunciation of the evil practices which had marked the
government of William the Conqueror and William Rufus. It was from
this document mainly that the barons in 1215 drew their constitutional
programme.
[410] The Knights Templars, having purchased all that part of the
banks of the Thames lying between Whitefriars and Essex Street,
erected on it a magnificent structure which was known as the New
Temple, in distinction from the Old Temple on the south side of
Holborn. Meetings of Parliament and of the king's council were
frequently held in the New Temple; here also were kept the crown
jewels. Ultimately, after the suppression of the Templars by Edward
II., the Temple became one of England's most celebrated schools of
law.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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