It is unnecessary here to examine the various rival theories professing to explain the composition of the Anglo-Saxon Witenagemot, or to discuss the exact connection between that venerable institution and the _Curia Regis_ of the Norman kings. As a matter of fact, the early constitution of the court of the Conqueror or of Rufus seems to have been monarchic rather than aristocratic or democratic; that is to say, it depended to a great extent on the personal will of the king, who might issue or withhold writs of summons very much as he pleased. No evidence exists, of date anterior to the Great Charter, of any magnate thrusting himself unbidden into a royal council or forcing the king to issue a formal invitation. On one occasion, indeed, the action of Henry II. in omitting to issue a writ laid him open to unfavourable criticism. This was in October, 1164, when a special council was summoned to Northampton to pass judgment upon various questions at issue between the king and Thomas à Becket. The primate was ordered to appear for judgment, but the formal writ of summons, which every archbishop, as holder of a barony, was wont to receive as matter of course, was deliberately withheld. Apparently contemporary opinion condemned this omission.[501] It is safe to infer, then, that as early as 1164, the method of issuing these writs had become uniform, but this constitutional understanding was not reduced to writing until embodied in Magna Carta. Thus it was in 1215 that the magnates of England formulated for the first time a distinct claim to be present at the king’s councils; and even then the demand only referred to assemblies summoned for one specific purpose. Previously, attendance was reckoned not as a privilege, but merely as an expensive burden, incident, like so many other burdens, to the possession of land.[502] ----- Footnote 501: See Ramsay, _Angevin Empire_, p. 54, and authorities there cited. Footnote 502: See L. O. Pike, _House of Lords_, 92, "There is no trace of any desire on the part of the barons to be summoned to the king’s great Council as a privilege and an honour before the reign of John." Cf. also _Report on the Dignity of a Peer_, I. 389. -----