Latest news with #KingJohn
Telegraph
26-06-2025
- General
- Telegraph
Why Harvard mistook its £16m Magna Carta for £20 knock-off
A British historian has blamed 'post-war chaos' for an original Magna Carta being mis-identified as a £20 copy. It emerged in May that a copy of Magna Carta bought by Harvard University for just $27.50 in the 1940s is actually an original worth $21 million (£16 million), according to scans. Speaking at a meeting of the Pipe Roll Society at The National Archives in London, Prof David Carpenter said the document was probably mis-catalogued by an auction house after the Second World War. 'This was just after the war, there was still a measure of chaos, someone has mis-read the date on it,' said Prof Carpenter, of King's College London. 'This is most likely how it happened.' The document, originally drafted by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal Stephen Langton, in 1215 to make peace between King John and rebel barons, is credited with laying the foundations of many democracies around the world. Although the first version was annulled, it was reconfirmed in 1300 by Edward I, promising protection of church rights, limits on taxes and access to impartial justice. Four of its clauses, including a guarantee of due legal process, are still in law today. There were thought to be only six originals remaining from the final version and Harvard believed it had bought an unofficial replica at auction in 1946. Prof Carpenter was studying unofficial copies of Magna Carta when he came across the digitised version of the document on the Harvard Law School Library website and realised it might be an original document and not a copy. 'Of course, appearances can be deceptive, but the handwriting of the scribe who wrote the document was very similar,' he said. 'I immediately sent the image to my colleague Nicholas Vincent asking him: 'Is this what I think it is?'' Speaking at the same meeting, Prof Vincent, of the University of East Anglia, said: 'I told him immediately, you know what that is.' Harvard's document was in a poor condition and so the two professors needed to use spectral imaging and ultraviolet light to make the text more legible. 'It matched word for word with the other charters confirmed by King Edward in 1300,' added Prof Carpenter. Prof Vincent believes it was issued in 1300 by King Edward I to the former parliamentary borough of Appleby, in what was then Westmorland, and later fell into the hands of the local Lowther family. They passed it to slavery abolitionist Thomas Clarkson and then via his estate it ended up in the hands of Air Vice-Marshal Forster Maynard, who was a pilot in the First World War and served with the RAF in Malta in the Second World War. He then took it to London book dealers Sweet & Maxwell, who sold it on to the auction house where Harvard bought it. Prof Vincent told the meeting: 'It's an extraordinary story, the Harvard Magna Carta has an extraordinary provenance.'
New Statesman
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New Statesman
How not to plagiarise Geoff Dyer
I am close to a complete first draft of a book about England called Anglia, but stare with anxiety at the seemingly convincing and large pile of paper, knowing that lurking in the crisp, regular type is an unviable mix of quite funny jokes and some amazing drunkenly typed rubbish. In order to avoid facing this problem I keep writing more stuff to dilute the terrible stuff. I fear that, in actuality, I am maintaining about the same ratio. The basis for the project was that I could not write a book about Britain from the Middle Ages onwards, as I had for Germany and elsewhere in earlier books, because too much of the story is already well known and so often parodied. I also had to restrict the book to England, as I could only deal with Scotland, Wales and Ireland in such a cursory way as to be offensive. My heart sank at having to write about people like King John. But then I remembered a family story: my mother's grandmother was, as a little girl, present at the hanging of the 'Rugeley Poisoner' in Stafford in 1856. I realised I could start there and make a more detailed book that might have some unexpected information in it. Although flicking through the pile at the moment, an awful lot appears to be about Madame Blavatsky and her circle. County grounds I also thought as a basic writing discipline I should never refer to the royal family, elections or the empire, as these would take up too much space and would make me write filler guff. One further limit was that most of the book should clearly be rooted in specific counties, ideally with two stories from each county to spread the book countrywide, but chucking away some of the smaller bits and bobs (Rutland) to give their votes to London. In any event, with this series of Toytown-Ozymandian arbitrary decisions – an arbitrariness I now see as having deep and lasting roots in English history – I am sitting next to a pile of paper covered with words of variable quality wondering when my life took this wrong turn. Avoiding all Homework I happily had spent some three years writing and researching Anglia, inwardly smiling at some of its little bits of humour, when disaster struck. In May, Geoff Dyer published Homework, his memoir of growing up in England only about five years before I grew up in England. There is no writer I admire more and I felt suddenly that what had been my own rather special England-evoking project was now something like a trodden-on Thunderbird 5 toy facing off against a real-life Death Star. We even both grew up in spa towns and both (I assume) have access to very similar healing-waters jokes. Obviously I could not read Homework. I am drawn into the tractor beam of Dyer's prose style anyway and need to keep well away. And, worse, I saw a headline for a review of Homework that mentioned the word Airfix. I had planned to write about my Airfix model of the Nazi battleship Tirpitz, jokily saying how after hours of flailing effort with knife and glue to stick together my shambolic Tirpitz, it indeed now looked like the real thing, but in the aftermath of the RAF's legendary Operation Catechism. But what if Dyer had made the same joke and I was accused of plagiarism? In order to avoid reading his book I now had to cross out my Operation Catechism joke. The way we Wear Throughout researching Anglia there have been several points where I have found myself having to watch yet again Sunderland on Film, a DVD of documentary clips from the North East Film Archive that span from 1904 to Sunderland's 1973 FA Cup triumph over Leeds. Only an hour long, it has much of the impact of a great realist novel – the faces, clothes, gestures, hard work. The earliest films included as many people on the streets as possible, grinning and waving, as they would subsequently pay to see themselves projected on a screen. A wedding, a grand shop, a skittering horse-and-cart, two men waltzing, Great War commemorations, the Pyrex factory, an astounding scene of men blowing glass to make scientific instruments. The climax of 1973, with all shops shut and the streets empty for the final, had one shop sign stating: 'As a mark of sympathy towards Messrs Bremner, Giles & Company, this shop will be closed at 2pm on Saturday, May 5th.' The editing of the film is sort of a miracle, with shots of the game entangled with crowds watching televisions in shop windows, on a cinema screen, in someone's home, with close-ups of faces distorted and crying with tension. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe It is probably good that we are largely sheltered from watching such material – it is simply too nihilistic, too raw, too long ago, and the viewer has to sit there knowing that much of what made Sunderland great was about to be swept away. [See also: Is Thomas Skinner the future of the right?] Related
The Hill
22-06-2025
- Politics
- The Hill
Good news: We've already been king-free for 810 years. But there's also bad news.
Resistance to tyranny, suspicion of concentrated power, and a firm belief in the democratic ideals that birthed this republic. It's a noble struggle. But for all their passion and theatrical flair, the historical literacy behind the 'No Kings Since 1776' slogan leaves much to be desired. In fact, the protestors missed the mark by several centuries. Yes, the U.S. declared independence from the British Crown in 1776. But the kind of 'king' these protesters seem to fear had already ceased to exist in Britain long before that. By the time George III ascended the throne, British kings were largely figureheads, bound by constitutional limits and dependent on Parliament to govern. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 had already drastically curtailed the powers of the monarchy. And indeed, if you want to pinpoint when monarchs lost their teeth, you need to look even further back, to 1215, when rebellious English barons forced King John to sign the Magna Carta. That document didn't create democracy, but it did begin a centuries-long process of transferring power away from the crown and into the hands of parliaments and assemblies. So, by the time the American colonies revolted, they were not really rising up against a tyrannical king, but against an unresponsive and overreaching Parliament. The rallying cry of the American Revolution — 'No taxation without representation' — wasn't an anti-monarchist slogan. It was an anti-parliamentarian slogan. The colonists didn't object to authority per se — they objected to being taxed and ruled by a body in which they had no voice. And they weren't demanding the abolition of kingship. They were demanding accountability, proportionality, and representation. They were asking for a seat at the table. Fast-forward to today, and that slogan might resonate more than ever. We don't live under a king, but we do live under a political system that often behaves as if it's immune to public influence. Our Congress — designed to be the voice of the people and a check on executive power — is frequently in lockstep with the president, regardless of which party is in office. Whether through partisan loyalty or political cowardice, our legislators often abdicate their role as a balancing force. They don't deliberate. They defer. They don't question. They rubber-stamp. The real issue isn't kingship but representation. And in the absence of real legislative independence, the presidency has become more monarchical than anything George III ever imagined. And this didn't start in 2025 or even in 2017. Every American president in modern history has wielded powers the British monarch couldn't have dreamed of: Executive orders, foreign military interventions without Congressional approval, surveillance regimes, and massive influence over the national budget. If protesters truly want to challenge creeping authoritarianism, the more accurate message would be: 'No taxation without genuine representation.' That would strike at the heart of the issue. If Congress does not act independently, if it does not reflect the interests and concerns of the people, then we are not truly being represented. And if we are not being represented, then why are we funding the machine? Of course, no one is seriously proposing that Americans stop paying taxes overnight. Civil disobedience has its limits. But protest must have a point, and slogans must have meaning. A movement that aims to hold power accountable must aim at the right target. 'No Kings' is, at best, historically inaccurate, and at worst, a distraction from the deeply rooted, troubling democratic predicament in which we find ourselves. A government system that would have the Founding Fathers turning in their graves. Imagine if all that energy, creativity, and public spirit were channeled instead into a campaign to restore Congressional independence, to demand term limits, to break the iron grip of lobbyists, to push for electoral reform, or to hold legislators to account for every vote they cast. That would be a revolution worth marching for. So, to the protesters in the streets: your instincts are right. Power must be kept in check. But your history is off, and your slogan is weak. Don't fear a king who never ruled you. Fear a Congress that no longer represents you. Daniel Friedman is professor of political science at Touro University.
Times
22-06-2025
- Politics
- Times
The wait of the law: justice delayed is an injustice in itself
Eight hundred and ten years ago, the writers of Magna Carta slipped a crucial word into the document they forced King John to sign. The monarch had to promise not to 'deny or delay' justice to his subjects. The law must decide — and, crucially, it must do so promptly. Today we report that the average wait for a case to come to trial at magistrates' courts has reached 346 days. For some people it extends to three years. The price of this indefensible delay is paid by the innocent. First, the victims, who after being traumatised by crime are left in limbo, with that trauma unresolved; second, those who are wrongly accused, living with an unjustified stain on their reputation and a shadow over their future. After eight centuries Magna Carta has no legal force, but its moral authority remains. The government should recognise that, and act accordingly. Justice delayed is not only justice denied: it is an injustice in itself.
The Sun
15-06-2025
- General
- The Sun
Discover Sun Bingo's medieval games on the anniversary of the Magna Carta
ON this day in 1215, the historic document was signed at Runnymede, Surrey. King John I of England was born on 24th December 1166. As the fourth son, he was not expected to inherit lands, leading to the nickname John Lackland. JOIN SUN BINGO NOW AND GET A £60 BINGO BUNDLE TO PLAY WITH * However, after the untimely deaths of his older brothers, without heirs, John became king in 1199. As such, he became ruler of the Angevin Empire, which included the regions of Aquitaine, Normandy and Brittany. However, after a series of unsuccessful wars, King John lost all of his territories in Northern France. In order to fund his futile attempts to regain Normandy and Brittany, the king imposed heavy taxes on the English barons. Failure to comply was severely punished, with barons having their lands seized or male children kidnapped and ransomed. Disquiet grew and, after a particularly humiliating defeat of John's allies in the Battle of Bouvines, the barons rebelled. This commenced the First Barons' War. Their cause quickly gained momentum and they captured London. Forced to negotiate, the king met with the rebels at Runnymede. The resulting agreement was written up and dubbed the Magna Carta (the great charter). It was signed 810 years ago today. This was the first time in English history that rules were imposed to limit the power of the monarch. Previously, it was believed that under the divine right of kings, monarchs derived their right to rule from God and as such were not subject to any other earthly authority. A council of 25 barons was formed in order to uphold the agreement and the rebellion was over… for 10 weeks. The Pope declared the charter null and void, breaking the terms of the peace agreement. As tensions grew once more, King John died on 19th October 1216. When nine-year-old Henry III took the throne, he agreed to honour the charter in order to keep the peace. The Magna Carta was reissued several times over the 13th century before eventually becoming a part of English law. Much of the charter is no longer relevant, having been specifically written to address rights and customs within a feudal system. 1 However, four of the original 63 clauses are still valid in English law today. The most famous clauses are 39 and 40: No free man shall be seized, imprisoned, dispossessed, outlawed, exiled or ruined in any way, nor in any way proceeded against, except by the lawful judgment of his peers and the law of the land. To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay right or justice. This demands a right to due legal process. It has been noted that the expectations of justice and a fair trial inspired elements of the Declaration of Independence and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Battle it out at Sun Bingo Take a trip back to feudal England with our medieval slot games. There's no need to take up arms here at Sun Bingo! Wage stakes rather than war and see what you can win. Knight Hot Spotz Enter the green valleys of an enchanted kingdom. The maximum payout for this 25-payline slot is 2000x your bet. This game has a free spin bonus round that can be triggered by spinning in six scatters during base games. Red Knight Lock & Hit Check out the world of Red Knight Lock & Hit, where spinning in three to five scatter symbols will award up to six free games. There's also the Lock & Hit bonus feature that activates when multiple coin symbols appear on the playtable. For those seeking treasure, there are four jackpots that can be won! What will you win across the 30 paylines? Take a spin and see. Kingdoms Rise: Battle Beast This game allows players to win an army's worth of free spins. That's up to 100 free games! Players will need to spin in six scatter symbols to win that mighty loot. Free spins can also be won by spinning in three, four or five scatters (awarding 8, 12 and 25 free spines, respectively). With 4096 ways to win, a daily jackpot, a power strike jackpot AND an epic jackpot currently worth £116,000, players could be about to experience a mighty victory. *New customers only. Register, deposit £10 and spend £10 on bingo tickets to receive £40 bingo bonus (accept within 48 hours and wager 4x within seven days) and £20 side games bonus (accept within 48 hours and wager 20x within 30 days) on Rainbow Riches in the bingo lobby. Both bonuses must be accepted in the bingo lobby. Only completed games are credited. Debit cards only. Deposits made with Neteller/Skrill/PayPal are not valid for this promotion. 18+. T&Cs apply. Commercial content notice: Taking one of the offers featured in this article may result in a payment to The Sun. 18+. T&Cs apply. Remember to gamble responsibly A responsible gambler is someone who: For help with a gambling problem, call the National Gambling Helpline on 0808 8020 133 or go to to be excluded from all UK-regulated gambling websites.
