MEDIEVAL STUDIES 117: ENGLISH CONSTITUTIONAL AND LEGAL HSTORY Professor Donahue, Mr. Berkhofer March 18, 1991: 10:10 - 11:00 p.m

The following three quotations reflect attitudes about the relationship of the king to the law. You are to write a coherent essay about the relationship of the king to the law over the period from roughly 900 to roughly 1215, making use of these quotations. You may, of course, refer to other material that deals with this issue, but a good essay will make use of all three quotations. Prologue to the Dooms of Alfred (871-901) S&M no. 5 I then, King Alfred, have collected these [dooms] and ordered [them] to be written down--[that is to say,] many of those which our predecessors observed and which were also pleasing to me. And those which were not pleasing to me, by the advice of my witan, I have rejected, ordering them to be observed only as amended. I have not ventured to put in writing much of my own, being what might please those who shall come after us. So I have here collected the dooms that seemed to me the most just, whether they were from the time of Ine, my kinsman, from that of Offa, king of the Mercians, or from that of Aethelberht, the first of the English to receive baptism; the rest I have discarded. I, then, Alfred, king to the West Saxons, have shown these [dooms] to all my @u(witan), who have declared it is the will of all that they be observed. . . . Henry I: Coronation Charter (1100) S&M no. 23 Henry, king of the English, to Samson, bishop [of Worcester], and to Urse d'Abetot [sheriff of Worcester], and to all his barons and faithful men of Worcestershire, both French and English, greeting. [Similar documents were sent to every other county.] Know that by the mercy of God, and by the common counsel of the barons of the whole kingdom of England, I have been crowned king of the same kingdom. And since the kingdom has been oppressed by unjust exactions, I, through fear of God and through the love that I have for you all, in the first place make the Holy Church of God free, so that I will neither sell nor put at farm nor, on the death of an archbishop, bishop, or abbot, take anything from the demesne of a church, or from its men, until a successor enters upon it. And I henceforth remove all the bad customs through which the kingdom of England has been unjustly oppressed; which bad customs I here in part set down. If any one of my barons, earl, or other men who hold of me dies, his heir shall not redeem his land as he did in the time of my brother, but he shall relieve it by a just and legitimate relief. In the same way, furthermore, the men of my barons shall relieve their lands from their lords by just and legitimate reliefs. [There follow twelve more clauses of a similar nature.] Prologue to Glanvill on the Laws and Customs of England (1187-89) Materials p. 5-1 Not only must royal power be furnished with arms against rebels and nations which rise up against the king and the realm, but it is also fitting that it should be adorned with laws for the governance of subject and peaceful peoples; so that in time of both peace and war our glorious king may so successfully perform his office that, crushing the pride of the unbridled and ungovernable with the right hand of strength and tempering justice for humble and meek with the rod of equity, he may both be always victorious in wars with his enemies and also show himself continually impartial in dealing with his subjects.