800 Years On, Magna Carta Is Recognized as a Foundation of Democracy

That first 1215 charter—essentially a contract between King John of England and the country’s powerful barons about the monarch’s limits on their authority—was in fact annulled shortly after it was agreed by Pope Innocent III, who called it “shameful, demeaning, illegal and unjust.” 

When rebellion was in the air again during John’s son Henry III’s reign, Magna Carta was resurrected in several new iterations, with the 1225 one being especially significant.

“The 1225 reissue of Magna Carta is now generally viewed as the definitive version of the charter of rights that was first issued at Runnymede [in Surrey, England] in 1215,” explained Michelle Johansen, the learning and outreach manager at the London-based Society of Antiquaries, which recently hosted a Magna Carta 1225 exhibition including the 1225 copy.

“The 1225 Magna Carta included clauses that remain part of UK law today, most famously, the right to due legal process,” Johansen said. “The 1225 reissue is important, too, as it included a subsidiary document known as the Charter of the Forest, which provided radical new rights to ‘ordinary’ people and went on to influence rural life and access to land for over 750 years. Over time, the document has become a global symbol of liberty and justice, shaping the founding documents of the USA and informing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.”

Indeed, the then-colonies used it to justify rebellion against British policies. The Massachusetts Assembly invoked Magna Carta as it declared the 1765 Stamp Act void, and adopted a new seal depicting a militiaman with a sword in one hand and Magna Carta in the other.

Between 1215 and 1300, more than 200 individual single-sheet parchment originals were issued, most of which have not survived, and there’s still considerable interest in the historic document today. A portable copy of Magna Carta was sold for £32,760 ($44,600, double its low estimate) at Christie’s in London this summer. “By the beginning of the fourteenth century, Magna Carta and accompanying enrolled statutes began to appear in small, portable formats designed for ease of consultation by administrators and lawyers,” said Eugenio Donadoni, the international specialist in medieval and renaissance manuscripts at Christie’s. “This was a particularly early example of one of these manuscripts.”

And earlier in the year, what Harvard Law School had considered just a copy of Magna Carta was revealed to be an original survivor from 1300 from John’s grandson King Edward I’s reign, one of only seven extant. David Carpenter, a professor of medieval history at King’s College London who discovered it, will give a talk at St Albans Cathedral in St Albans, England, on October 9 about the find and its relevance.

Magna Carta celebrations have already been held this year at Lincoln Castle and the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford. Hereford Cathedral will be displaying its 1217 copy from October 17 to 18, and Durham Cathedral is exhibiting 1216, 1225, and 1230 issues until November 2. 

“Magna Carta is an extraordinary document underpinned by a belief that all people, including those who hold most power, are accountable to God,” stated the Dean of Durham, the Very Revd Dr. Philip Plyming, in a release. “The principles of freedom and access to justice go all the way back to the Old Testament and are as relevant now as they were then. I am delighted that the display will give all visitors the chance to reflect on the story of their creation and their meaning today.”