[MUSIC]

When we've talked about

what was in Magna Carta,
we've seen that it's
quite a long document.
We've seen as well that to modern eyes,
it's quite a rag-bag sort of document.
Can we say anything about
how it was drawn up?
How it was drafted?
How it was written?
Unfortunately, these are rather
difficult questions to answer.
Because, no eye witness account of
the events at Runnymede in the first two
weeks of June 1215 has come down to us.
No one who was a participant
in the events there has written
a day by day diary sort of
account of what happened.
Our main narrative sources were
written by the chroniclers and
the chronicles were writing
in their monasteries at St Albalns or
Bury St Edmunds for example, some years afterwards
and they were relying on hearsay.
They had not been there themselves.
Now we can infer a certain amount.
We know that there was shuttle diplomacy
going on between the two sides.
Remember we saw at Runnymede that
the barons were based Staines,
the king was based at Windsor.
Envoys were going backwards and
forwards between the two sides.
Baronial delegations
were going to Windsor.
It was all a bit like modern
day shuttle diplomacy of
the sort that US Secretaries of
State are so expert at these days.
And the man who in June 1215 played
the part of the American Secretary
of State was Stephen Langton,
the Archbishop of Canterbury.
A very clever and highly
significant and influential figure.
But can we go any further?
Can we go beyond that?
Well yes.
With the aid of this copy of
Magna Carta in particular we can.
Because what is important about this
copy of Magna Carta that was preserved
at Peterborough is that the copy of
Magna Carta transcribed within it, appears
to be copied from a discarded draft
created in the course of the negotiations.
We can picture what was going
on in early June, 1215.

Draft after draft of

the terms was drawn up.
Barons would draw up a draft,
Langton would take it to the king,
the king would say, oh no,
I'm not having that.
I want that clause amended,
I want that clause taken out.
They'd go back,
they'd come up with a fresh draft.
The previous one would be thrown away.
Then they'd argue about the second draft.
And would be disagreements
between the two sides about that.
That second draft would be cast away.
And this went on and on until finally
a compromise was thrashed out
on which the two sides could agree.
And what appears to have happened
is that those discarded early drafts were
sometimes picked up by people involved
in the negotiations, taken back home and
then transcribed into a book of statutes,
a book of laws, like this and that is
what appears to have happened here.
There are quite a number of drafts,
copied into manuscripts a few years later.
Perhaps by people thinking,
in all good faith, that they were
the original agreed version, but
which are in fact, discarded drafts.
And when you look at these discarded
drafts, you can see significant, minor but
significant variations in the wording,
which allows us to
eavesdrop on the negotiations
between the barons and the King.
And just to take an example of
how it works, I'm looking now at
a clause which in the final agreed
version of the Charter became clause 55.
And it relates to the making
of fines with the king.
Now I should explain that the word
fine in the 13th century.
And a different meaning
from the word fine today.
A fine today is a financial
penalty if you do something wrong.
If you go outside into Piccadilly,
and you park your car on
a double yellow line you'll get
a parking ticket and you pay a fine.
Now a fine in the Middle Ages
did not mean that.
A fine in the middle ages meant a sum
of money which you paid to the king
to secure a favour, a concession from him.
And that is the sense in which
fine is employed in Magna Carta.

In the final version of the charter,

it says very simply all fines
which have been made with us
unjustly will be remitted.
That is to say, cancelled.
Now, in this version which preserves a
discarded draft, the wording is different.
It's more specific,
it says all fines relating to dowers and
marriages, which would be made by
us unjustly, will be remitted.
You see, it's more specific.
It says fines relating to dowers,
that's the lands assigned to a widow and
marriages will be remitted.
That was the baron's opening gambit.
And in the final version,
it was watered down.
It became a fudge to mean
something much less specific.
The King had won a significant concession.
So we learned two main things
from looking at the version of
the Charter preserved in this copy.
We learned first of all that
the making of Magna Carta
was just like any political
negotiating process today.
It involved give and take, it involved
one side making a concession, and
another side making a concession, until
finally compromised terms were agreed.
But what we also see, absolutely
fascinating in this is that right at
the last moment, the barons were
making concessions to the king.
We might suppose that it
would be the other around.
That the king, at the losing end of a war,
would be making concessions to the barons.
And yes the King was making concessions,
that happened.
But equally the Barons
wanted a deal as well.
They wanted a quick deal,
they wanted the struggle over.
They were prepared to
make concessions too.
And that is the big lesson we learn
from this clause in Magna Carta.