now seen that the ideas about "constitutional usage," and so forth, imported here by Mr. Freeman, were nothing but a figment of his brain. The Assembly of Winchester no more resulted from "English constitutional law" than did the Assembly of Lillebonne, convened for a similar purpose. William Rufus had to deal with barons who could not be anxious to invade Normandy merely to make him Duke of the Normans. If they had any preference in the matter, it would be rather for Robert than for William, for a weak rather than a strong ruler; but, apart from preference, the barons would be loth to engage in internecine warfare merely for the personal advantage of one brother or the other. This was seen in the peaceful close of the invasion by Duke Robert, as with that of Duke Henry half a century later. The question, in short, that arose in 1066, when a Duke of the Normans asked his barons to make him King of the English, arose once more in the days of his son, when a King of the English asked his barons to make him Duke of the Normans.

It was here no question of "the laws and rights of Englishmen":"5 it was to no folkmoot that William Rufus spoke. When we read of the King in his court, composed of his tenants-in-chief," as surrounded by "no small part of the nation," when we hear of the mass of "the Assembly crying Yea, yea"; when we learn that "a great numerical proportion, most likely a numerical majority, were natives," we are fairly prepared for the astounding statement that

The wide fields which had seen the great review and the great homage in the days of the elder William, could alone hold the crowd which came together to share in the great court of doom which was holden by the younger."

40

For we see that in all these fantasies of a brain viewing plain facts through a mist of moots and "witan," we have what can only be termed history in masquerade.

86 At Salisbury, 13th Jan., 1096.
88 Ibid., 59. 99 Ibid., 57.

40 Ibid., 56.

Chronicles and Records

539

RICHARD THE FIRST'S CHANGE OF
SEAL (1198)

With the superficial student and the empiric politician, it is too common to relegate the investigation of such changes to the domain of archæology. I shall not attempt to rebut the imputation; only, if such things are archæology, then archæology is history.-STUbbs, Preface to R. Hoveden, IV., lxxx.

HISTORICAL research is about to pass, if indeed it

already passing, into a

sphere of Archæology. The central idea of that great advance which the present generation has witnessed in the domain of history has been the rebuilding of the historical fabric on the relatively sure foundation of original and contemporary authorities, studied in the purest texts. Chronicles, however, are not inexhaustible: for many periods they are all too few. The reaper has almost done his work; the turn of the gleaner has come. The smaller quellen of history have now to be diligently examined and made to yield those fragments of information which will supplement, often where most needed, our existing stock of knowledge.

leave the broad highThose precious frag

But this is not our only gain as we ways trodden by so many before us. ments which are to form our spoils will enable us to do more than supplement the statements of our standard chroniclers: they will afford the means of checking, of testing, by independent evidence, these statements, of submitting our witnesses to a cross-examination which

may shake their testimony and their credit in a most unexpected manner.

As an instance of the results to be attained by archæological research, I have selected Richard the First's celebrated change of seal. Interesting as being the occasion on which the three lions first appear as the Royal arms of England-arms unchanged to the present day—it possesses exceptional historical importance from the circumstances by which it was accompanied, and which led, admittedly, to its adoption.

Historians have agreed, without the least hesitation, to refer this event to the year 1194, and to place it subsequent to the truce of Tillières or about the beginning of August. "That Richard I.," writes a veteran student, 1" adopted a new seal upon his return from the Holy Land is a matter of notoriety." Speed, in fact, had shown the way. We are told by him that "the king caused [1194] a new broad seale to be made, requiring that all charters granted under his former seale should be confirmed under this, whereby he drew a great masse of money to his treasurie."" The Bishop of Oxford, with his wonted accuracy, faithfully reproduces the statement of Hoveden (the original and sole authority we shall find for the story), telling us that "Amongst other oppressive acts he [Richard] took the seal from his unscrupulous but faithful chancellor, and, having ordered a new one to be made, proclaimed the nullity of all charters which had been sealed with the old one.' Mr. Freeman similarly places the episode just before "the licenses for the tournaments" (20th August, 1194), and consistently refers to Dr. Stubbs's history."

1 Canon Raine, Historia Dunelmensis Scriptores Tres (Surtees Soc.), p. 379.

2 Speed's History (1611).

Const. Hist., i. 506.

Norman Conquest, v. 693. Compare The Office of the Historical Professor, pp. 16, 17:—“In a long and careful study of the Bishop of Chester's writings. I have never found a flaw in the statement of

The Change Assigned to 1194

541 Miss Norgate, in her valuable work, our latest authority on the period, assigns the event to the same date, and tells us that "Rog. Hoveden's very confused account of the seals is made clear by Bishop Stubbs."" Mr. Maitland, in his noble edition of "Bracton's Note-book," gives a case (ii. 69) in which a charter sealed "secundo sigillo Regis Ricardi" was actually produced in court (1219), and explains that "Richard had a had a new seal made in 1194," referring to Hoveden for his authority.

6

It should be observed that all these writers rely merely on Hoveden, none of them throwing any light on the process of confirmation, or telling us how it was effected, and whether any traces of it remain. An independent writer, M. Boivin-Champeaux, in his monograph on William Longchamp, discusses the episode at some length, and asserts that the repudiated documents were "assujettis, pour leur revalidation, à une nouvelle et coûteuse scellure." Like the others, however, he relies on the authority of Hoveden, and consequently repeats the same date.

In the course of examining some ancient charters, I recognised one of them as nothing less than an actual instance of a confirmation consequent on this change of seal. But its incomprehensible feature was that the charter was confirmed on the 22nd August, 1198, having originally been granted, "sub primo sigillo," so recently as the 7th January preceding. How could this be possible if the great seal had been changed so early as August, 1194, and if the first seal, as stated by Dr. Stubbs, was "broken" on that occasion? Careful and prolonged research among the charters of the period (both in the original and in transcripts) has enabled me to answer the question, and to prove that (as, of course, the above charter implies) the his evidence. If I have now and then lighted on something that looked like oversight, I have always found in the end that the oversight was mine and not his."

England under the Angevin Kings, ii. 343.

"I have been able to identify this very charter.

change of seal did not take place in 1194, but 1198, and between January and May of that year.

Original charters under the second seal, confirming grants under the first, are distinctly rare. I have found, as yet, but one in the Public Record Office, and only two at the British Museum. But of originals and transcripts together I have noted twenty-eight. The dates of the original grants range from 5th September, 1189, to 7th January, 1198 (1197-8), and of the confirmations from 27th May, 1198, to 5th April, 1199.1

In a single instance there is fortunately preserved not only the text of the confirmation charter, but also that of the original grant. From this we learn that the charter of confirmation did not necessarily give the wording, but only the gist ("tenor") of the original grant. We are thus brought to the instructive formula invariably used in these charters :

Is erat tenor carte nostre in primo sigillo nostro. Quod quia aliquando perditum fuit, et, dum capti essemus in alem[anniâ], in aliena potestate constitutum, mutatum est. Huius autem innovationis testes sunt Hii, etc.. etc.

We may here turn to the passage in Hoveden [Ed. Stubbs, iii. 267] on which historians have relied, and see how far the reasons for the change given in the charters themselves correspond with those alleged by the chronicler.

Fecit sibi novum sigillum fieri, et mandavit, per singulas terras suas, quod nihil ratum foret quod fuerat per vetus sigillum suum; tum quia cancellarius ille operatus fuerat inde minus discrete quam esset necesse, tum quia sigillum illud perditum erat, quando Rogerus Malus Catulus, vicecancellarius suus, submersus erat in mari ante insulam de Cipro, et præcepit rex quod omnes qui cartas habebant venirent ad novum sigillum ad cartas suas renovandas.

'This is the only confirmation I have found later than 3rd March. If the date can be relied on, it is of special interest as being the day before the king died.

Charters to W. Briwere, 22nd June, 1190, and 11th March, 1199 (1198-9), transcribed in the Great Coucher (Duchy of Lancaster).