charters

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charters are grants of privilege. They are of fundamental importance to students of medieval legal, constitutional, and municipal history. But they need to be used with great caution since spurious charters are by no means uncommon, interpolations were frequently made, and contemporary phrases can be difficult to render precisely. The oldest charters appear to be grants made to the church in Kent during the reign of Æthelbert in the 600s. Grants of land to individuals became common and the phrase ‘bookland’ indicated an estate held by charter. Next came charters to towns, giving them the right to hold markets or fairs, to collect tolls, or to elect their own officials. Charters as regular instruments of royal policy seem to have been introduced into Scotland from 1095 during the reign of Edgar. The ‘coronation charters’ of Henry I, Stephen, and Henry II were rather different in character and more like political manifestos, since they promised good government in accordance with the traditional laws of the realm. Though the promises were not always kept, the charters implied some limitation on royal authority and paved the way for Magna Carta in 1215, itself constantly confirmed. Later came charters to guilds and to trading companies. The sanctity of charters was regarded as the very bedrock of property. Consequently the campaigns by Charles II and James II after 1681 to call in the charters of parliamentary boroughs and remodel them roused fierce opposition.