rtrapasso
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Year 1215:
The Magna Carta signed at Runnymede in mid-June limits the power of the English monarchy and makes rule of law superior to arbitrary rule that is subject to royal whim and will. John Lackland has antagonized his feudal barons by trying to sell off the country's fisheries and divert revenues from navigational tolls on the Thames to his own benefit; supported by Scotland's new king Alexander II, the lords meet with the English king between Staines and Windsor and exact major concessions, notably tax relief and a reaffirmation of traditional feudal privileges contained in the accession charter signed by Henry I a century ago. John immediately appeals to Pope Innocent III, who issues a bull annulling the charter, and although John imports foreign mercenaries to fight the barons, the Magna Carta will remain the basis of English feudal justice (see Provisions of Oxford, 1258).
German noblemen crown the Hohenstaufen king Friedrich of Sicily their king Friedrich II at Aix-la-Chapelle July 25. The victory of his ally Philippe II Augustus of France at the Battle of Bouvines last year has strengthened Friedrich's hand (see 1218).
England's Magna Carta reaffirms human rights. Chapter 39 of the document states, "No freeman shall be arrested and imprisoned, or dispossessed, or outlawed, or banished, or in any way molested; nor will be set forth against him, nor send against him, unless by the lawful judgment of his peers, and by the law of the land."
Chapters VI and VII in the Magna Carta say, "A widow, after the death of her husband, shall forthwith and without difficulty have her marriage portion and inheritance (maritagium et hereditatem); nor shall she give any thing for her dower, or for her marriage portion, or for the inheritance which her husband and she shall have held on the day of the death of that husband"; "Let no widow be compelled to marry, so long as she prefers to live without a husband; provided always that she gives security not to marry without our [royal] consent, if she holds of us, or without the consent of the lord of whom she holds, if she holds of another." Adult single women and widows in England have for more than a century been the equal of men in all business affairs, with laws of inheritance showing only a small bias toward male heirs, but laws with respect to married women are more complicated, women having their own dowries and property, men having the use of their wives' lands and command over their wives' chattels.
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