The Dictum of Kenilworth, issued on 31 October 1266, was a pronouncement designed to reconcile the rebels of the Second Barons' War with the royal government of England. After the baronial victory at the Battle of Lewes in 1264, Simon de Montfort took control of royal government, but at the Battle of Evesham the next year Montfort was killed, and King Henry III restored to power. A group of rebels held out in the stronghold of Kenilworth Castle, however, and their resistance proved difficult to crush.
Magna Carta Libertatum, commonly called Magna Carta or sometimes Magna Charta, is a royal charter of rights agreed to by King John of England at Runnymede, near Windsor, on 15 June 1215. First drafted by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal Stephen Langton, to make peace between the unpopular king and a group of rebel barons who demanded that the King confirm the Charter of Liberties, it promised the protection of church rights, protection for the barons from illegal imprisonment, access to swift and impartial justice, and limitations on feudal payments to the Crown, to be implemented through a council of 25 barons. Neither side stood by their commitments, and the charter was annulled by Pope Innocent III, leading to the First Barons' War.
Scutage was a medieval English tax levied on holders of a knight's fee under the feudal land tenure of knight-service. Under feudalism the king, through his vassals, provided land to knights for their support. The knights owed the king military service in return. The knights were allowed to "buy out" of the military service by paying scutage.
William de Longchamp was a medieval Lord Chancellor, Chief Justiciar, and Bishop of Ely in England. Born to a humble family in Normandy, he owed his advancement to royal favour. Although contemporary writers accused Longchamp's father of being the son of a peasant, he held land as a knight. Longchamp first served Henry II's illegitimate son Geoffrey, but quickly transferred to the service of Richard I, Henry's heir. When Richard became king in 1189, Longchamp paid £3,000 for the office of Chancellor and was soon named to the Diocese, or bishopric, of Ely and appointed legate by the pope.
In the Kingdom of England, the Magnum Concilium was an assembly historically convened at certain times of the year when the English nobles and church leaders outside the Curia regis were summoned to discuss the affairs of the country with the king. In the 13th century, the Great Council was superseded by the Parliament of England, which had developed out of the Council. The Great Council was last summoned by Charles I in 1640.
The First Barons' War (1215–1217) was a civil war in the Kingdom of England in which a group of rebellious major landowners led by Robert Fitzwalter waged war against King John of England. The conflict resulted from King John's disastrous wars against King Philip II of France, which led to the collapse of the Angevin Empire, and John's subsequent refusal to accept and abide by Magna Carta, which John had sealed on 15 June 1215.
A royal forest, occasionally known as a kingswood, is an area of land with different definitions in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The term forest in the ordinary modern understanding refers to an area of wooded land; however, the original medieval sense was closer to the modern idea of a "preserve" – i.e. land legally set aside for specific purposes such as royal hunting – with less emphasis on its composition. There are also differing and contextual interpretations in Continental Europe derived from the Carolingian and Merovingian legal systems.
Walter de Coutances was a medieval Anglo-Norman bishop of Lincoln and archbishop of Rouen. He began his royal service in the government of Henry II, serving as a vice-chancellor. He also accumulated a number of ecclesiastical offices, becoming successively canon of Rouen Cathedral, treasurer of Rouen, and archdeacon of Oxford. King Henry sent him on a number of diplomatic missions and finally rewarded him with the bishopric of Lincoln in 1183. He did not remain there long, for he was translated to Rouen in late 1184.
Magna Carta Island is an ait in the River Thames in England, on the reach above Bell Weir Lock. It is in Berkshire facing water-meadows forming Runnymede. Its civil and ecclesiastical parish is Wraysbury so it was transferred from Buckinghamshire to Berkshire in 1974.
Ranulf de Blondeville, 6th Earl of Chester and 1st Earl of Lincoln, known in some references as the 4th Earl of Chester, was one of the "old school" of Anglo-Norman barons whose loyalty to the Angevin dynasty was consistent but contingent on the receipt of lucrative favours. He has been described as "almost the last relic of the great feudal aristocracy of the Conquest".
Sir Falkes de Bréauté was an Anglo-Norman soldier who earned high office by loyally serving first King John and later King Henry III in the First Barons' War. He played a key role in the Battle of Lincoln Fair in 1217. He attempted to rival Hubert de Burgh, and as a result fell from power in 1224. His "heraldic device" is now popularly said to have been a griffin, although his coat of arms as depicted by Matthew Paris in his Chronica Majora was Gules, a cinquefoil argent.
Jocelin of Wells was a medieval Bishop of Bath. He was the brother of Hugh de Wells, who became Bishop of Lincoln. Jocelin became a canon of Wells Cathedral before 1200, and was elected bishop in 1206. During King John of England's dispute with Pope Innocent III, Jocelin at first remained with the king, but after the excommunication of John in late 1209, Jocelin went into exile. He returned to England in 1213, and was mentioned in Magna Carta in 1215.
The Statute of Merton or Provisions of Merton, sometimes also known as the Ancient Statute of Merton, was a statute passed by the Parliament of England in 1235 during the reign of Henry III. It is considered to be the first English statute, and is printed as the first statute in The Statutes of the Realm. Containing 11 chapters, the terms of the statute were agreed at Merton between Henry and the barons of England in 1235. It was another instance, along with Magna Carta twenty years previously, of the struggle between the barons and the king to limit the latter's rights.
A free warren—often simply warren—is a type of franchise or privilege conveyed by a sovereign in medieval England to an English subject, promising to hold them harmless for killing game of certain species within a stipulated area, usually a wood or small forest. The sovereign involved might be either the monarch or a marcher lord.
Magna Carta Hiberniae 1216 is an issue of the English Magna Carta in Ireland. King Henry III of England's charter of 1216 was issued for Ireland on 12 November 1216 but not transmitted to Ireland until February 1217; it secured rights for the Anglo-Norman magnates in Ireland. The charter was reissued in 1217 as in England. It was in effect the application of Magna Carta to Ireland, with appropriate substitutions.
Nicola de la Haie, of Swaton in Lincolnshire, was an English landowner and administrator who inherited from her father not only lands in both England and Normandy but also the post of hereditary constable of Lincoln Castle. On her own, she twice defended the castle against prolonged sieges. After the death of her second husband in 1214, she continued to hold the castle until she retired on grounds of old age in 1226.
Events from the 1210s in England.
Magna Carta of Chester, or Cheshire, was a charter of rights issued in 1215 in the style of Magna Carta. The charter is primarily concerned with the relationship between the Earl of Chester and his barons, though the final clause states that the barons must allow similar concessions to their own tenants.
Since 2017, the Woodland Trust has led 70 United Kingdom organizations in the call for a Charter for Trees, Woods and People.
