A Middle Age Spell that Broke Kings: The Magna Carta

In this article, I share the history of 800 year-old documents known as the Magna Carta.

“Brother Bacon balancing the elements.” Micheal Maier.

To the 13th-century English farmer, magic was real. The reciting of sentences or applying herbs on burial grounds could create mysterious spells. Spells could be positive or negative to those around, presumably influencing their very thoughts. One such spell, believed by many for centuries, was Jure Divino, the Divine Right of Kings. The belief that a King had absolute control over his Kingdom and a right to rule the people because God’s providence had put him in the highest position of the monarchy.

This spell made King's Invincible, that is, until another spell was crafted. Among tired landowners and a priest, the Magna Carta would be written out in ink behind the thick walls of a castle in the middle of a civil war. This great charter, as it is called in English, would break the power of Kings to come and act as a blueprint for the creation of future governments around the world.

“The Signing of the Magna Carta.” Albert Herter.

If you were to go back in time to the fields of Runnymede in 1215, you would be a witness to the start of the end of the divine right of Kings. English landowners known as Barons, led by Robert Fitzwalter, met with King John and Archbishop Stephen Langton to negotiate a peace treaty that would stop the on-going civil war in this very field.

The war started over internal and external issues raging in England’s monarchy. Extreme taxation on land had been placed on Fitzwalter and the barons by King John due to the rising debt incurred by a war with King Phillip II of France. The barons had witnessed the collapse of the Angevin Empire at the end of the war, losing important land in Normandy that was controlled by England (Anatasi).

The failure to keep the lands in Normandy and the on-going pressure to tax his subjects pitted King John against the Barons, resulting in the scene at Runnymede.

The mediator of this exchange was Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury. In support of the Barons, Stephen wanted to have peace upon the land of England and to weaken the power of Kings.

The reason for all these men coming together was not just for a peace treaty, but to lay out the Jus Commune, the law of the land. With the influence and open support of Stephen, the Baron’s set 63 chapters of law before King John’s table.

One can only imagine the reaction of King John while reading such profound laws. The Latin text spilled down the paper in front of King John, lifting the laws of the land above him and cutting straight through his power. As English Historian David Carpenter explains it, the laws were being set out and placed over the king’s authority as he was reading them (Carpenter 18).

Close-up of one of the original copies we still have. British Library.

One can only imagine the scoffs King John gave under his breath while reading such chapters like 61, where the construction of a council of 25 Barons, to protect the rights granted through the Magna Carta, is formed.

The development of this branch in government, as described in Chapter 61, was a new concept in England. The divine rights of kings probably passed upon King John’s mind while reviewing the Magna Carta. Like his predecessors, he believed God gave Kings the authority for total, undisturbed power throughout the Kingdom.

An ancient political philosophy going back to the deification of Julius Caesar and his nephew, Augustine in the Roman Empire. The concept of deified leaders moved throughout history, and evolved to give English Kings an overwhelming amount of power.

Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904), “The Age of Augustus, the Birth of Christ” (c 1852-54), Wikimedia Commons.

King John, Archbishop Stephen Langton and Baron leader Robert Fitzwalter stood on the field knowing the laws on the table would devolve the deification of Kings and weaken King John’s power.

The Magna Carta was poison to a King claiming absolute authority. The establishment of rights for the subjects of a kingdom, Carpenter points out, were of a tradition familiar to the English, as the origins trace back to European countries centuries before like the Roman’s deification of rulers. But, Carpenter continues, “It was in England, however, that they led to the most radical and detailed restrictions on the ruler” (Carpenter 19).

The Seal of King John as shown on the Magna Carta. National Portrait Gallery (UK).

King John would stamp his seal of approval on the Magna Carta that held such radical restrictions in the field of Runnymede, but the contract made with the Barons, as well as the peace treaty, would hastily be destroyed in the coming months.

The first strike at the Magna Carta came from Pope Innocent III of the Roman Catholic Church. Realizing how much power the Magna Carta took from the English King, along with King John’s desperate plea for his support, Innocent III choose to publish a response to the Magna Carta’s authors, describing their work as “shameful, demeaning, illegal, and unjust,” adding that the whole document is “null and void of all validity for ever” (Cotton MS Cleopatra E I, ff. 155-156, Medieval Manuscript Blog).

Outraged by the Pope’s rejection and the King’s plea to the Church, the Barons continued the civil war against King John, culminating into the First Barons War (1215-1217).

Wall painting of Pope Innocent III in Subiaco.

With the Magna Carta rejected by the King and the Pope, the Barons decided upon a shocking path. They would invite Prince Louis of France to invade England and take down King John’s reign. On the news of Prince Louis’ arrival on the isles of Thanet, King John frantically escaped capture, losing personal belongings and his crown while retreating to Newark Castle in Nottinghamshire.

King John would soon pass away in the castle due to a sickness, leaving theories of a plot with poison for centuries to come. The young King Henry III was then crowned, and quickly reissued the Magna Carta in November of 1216, freezing the documents in time to not be lost in history.

After being defeated by Royalist William Marshall, Prince Louis of France would sign the Treaty of Lambeth in September 1217, sending him and his forces back to France and ending his interference with the English Throne (Cavendish).

The 13th Century would see the Magna Carta be reissued multiple times by Kings in order to appease the Barons, making the document a formidable legal weapon against tyrannical kings. It would not be until 1297 though, when the Magna Carta was officially entrenched into the rest of English Law through an act by King Edward I.

Portrait of King Edward I. National Portrait Gallery (UK).

Inside the Magna Carta, the biggest strike against the King's power hides in chapter 61, where the Baron’s set up a committee of twenty-five members who will oversee the application of the laws as well as the protection of them from the King.

“The barons shall elect twenty-five of their number to keep, and cause to be observed with all their might, the peace and liberties granted and confirmed to them by this charter” (Chapter 61 of the Magna Carta, National Archives UK).

The power of the spell/documents that were crafted by 13th-century Barons still affects us today. The precursor of the English Parliamentary system, this chapter not only came to inspire the transformation of the English government but the establishment of governments in the North American Colonies during the 17th and 18th Centuries.

Even though the Magna Carta is 800 years old, it has left behind a supernatural trail of influence that can be seen in constitutions such as ours in the United States.

Works Cited? I embedded links throughout the article that take you to each source as listed.