Research
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Magna Carta: uncovering a ‘totem of liberty’
Magna Carta, first issued by King John in 1215 and outlining the laws and rights under which the population — including the monarchy — functions, is the foundation of constitutions across the globe. The discovery and authentication of a presumed lost edition in the Harvard Law School Library by King’s College London Professor David Carpenter and UEA Professor Nicholas Vincent is therefore a groundbreaking achievement.
Prof Vincent is a leading expert in the history and provenance of Magna Carta. In 2014, his knowledge and research led to the discovery of a 1300 edition in the council archives of Sandwich, Kent. However, it was not the last waiting to be found.
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The discovery
In 2024, Prof Carpenter was trawling through the archives of the Harvard Law School (HLS) Library when he made an incredible discovery: a document described as a copy was, he suspected, a 1300 original, one of seven issued by King Edward I. At this point, Prof Carpenter turned to his Magna Carta Project partner, Prof Vincent.
Together, through painstaking research and analysis of the text and document, involving cutting-edge tools such as spectral imaging, the two researchers established its authenticity.
Discover the fascinating breakthrough:
The provenance
Unsurprisingly, a document this rare has a fascinating story. Prof Vincent’s work indicates its journey began in 1300 as the Magna Carta issued to Appleby in Westmorland, a historical county now part of Cumbria, before finding its way in the early nineteenth century into the hands of Thomas and John Clarkson, leading figures in the campaign for the abolition of slavery. In 1945, First World War flying ace, Air Vice-Marshal Forster ‘Sammy’ Maynard, heir to part of the Clarkson archive, sold the document at Sotheby’s, advertised as a mere 'copy' of Magna Carta, for £42. The purchaser, a London-based book and manuscripts dealer, then sold it to Harvard for $27.50 the following year.
The importance of Magna Carta cannot be underestimated. It has laid the foundations of constitutions and human rights around the world. It is, says Prof Vincent, “a totem of liberty, central to our sense of who we are: a freedom-loving, free-born people”.
Read more about Prof Vincent’s work and The Magna Carta Project below.
The mystery of the Magna Carta
The Magna Carta has been a mystery to scholars for centuries, research in recent years has shown there is so much more to discover and learn. However, despite this ancient text being a constant source of conundrum, experts from the Magna Carta Project have established the scribe of at least one and possibly two of the original Magna Cartas of 1215.
“To have found and identified the work of these scribes, 800 years after their writing, is a significant achievement, certainly equivalent to finding needles in a very large haystack.”
Prof. Nicholas Vincent
Our scholars set out to examine and research sections of the Magna Carta in the hope of new discoveries. Collaborating with King’s College London, we made the landmark discovery of who it was that wrote the Lincoln Charter (and most likely who wrote the Salisbury Charter). This discovery came on the eve of the 800th anniversary of the ratification of the Magna Carta. Authorised on June 15th, 1215 by King John, Magna Carta asserts the fundamental principle of the rule of law. However, the new finding of who actually penned these principles points to the church as the stimulus behind the charter’s production.
The Magna Carta Project has undertaken detailed work on the four surviving 1215 charters. The project also works closely with curators at the British Library and an expert at the University of Cambridge. The researchers on the project established that the Lincoln and Salisbury charters were written by religious scribes working outside the kind own writing office.
“King John had no real intention that the charter be either publicized or enforced. It was the bishops, instead, who insisted that it be distributed to the country at large and thereafter who preserved it in their cathedral archives.”
Prof. Nicholas Vincent
Therefore, the major finding that the church was responsible for the production of the texts lends itself to other exciting discoveries: namely, that one of the original copies of the Magna Carta was sent in 1215 to Canterbury Cathedral and can now be known as ‘The Canterbury Magna Carta’. Professor Vincent states that three of the four surviving originals of the charter went to cathedrals: Lincoln, Salisbury and Canterbury. It is probably that cathedrals were the destination for the majority of other original charters issued in 1215.
“The cathedrals were like a beacon from which the light of the charter shone round the country, thus beginning the process by which it became central to national life.”
Prof. Nicholas Vincent
The researchers on the project have concluded that the church was central to the production, preservation and proclamation of Magna Carta. The eye-opening exhibition demonstrates the importance of understanding the society we live in today and the formative influence of the United Kingdom’s experience on institutions all over the world.
The Magna Carta Project has been made possible for researchers from UEA, and other collaborating universities, by a grant from The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). The British Library is a partner and UEA Medieval History Professor, Nicholas Vincent, works alongside Professor David Carpenter to carry out this project.
The aim of this study is to investigate the context, production and reception of the Magna Carta. A project website has been established to provide detailed information about the Magna Carta and the outcomes of the investigation.
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