Читать книгу Magna Carta: A Commentary on the Great Charter of King John. With an Historical Introduction онлайн

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ssss1. Blackstone, however (Great Charter, xv.), speaks of a “conference which lasted for several days, and did not come to a conclusion till Friday, the 19th June.”

ssss1. Miss Norgate, John Lackland, p. 234, acquiesces in the view generally received, fixing Monday as the day on which the final concord was arrived at, but she relies for evidence on a more than doubtful interpretation of what is undoubtedly an error in the copy of a writ by King John appearing on the Patent Rolls. This writ, which as copied in the Rolls bears to be dated 18th June (erroneously as will immediately be shown), is addressed to Stephen Harengod (in terms closely resembling those of the writ already cited from the Close Rolls addressed to William of Cantilupe), announcing inter alia that terms of peace had been agreed upon “last Friday.” Miss Norgate contends with reason that there must be a mistake somewhere, since on the Friday preceding the 18th, negotiations had not even begun. She is confident that "the ‘die Veneris’ which occurs three times in the writ is in each case an unquestionable, though unaccountable, error for ‘die Lunae.’" Yet, it is unlikely that a scribe writing three days after so momentous an event could have mistaken the day of the week. It is infinitely more probable that in writing xxiij. he formed the second “x” so carelessly that it was mistaken by the enrolling clerk for a “v.” The correct date is thus the 23rd, and the reference is to Friday the 19th. This presumption becomes a certainty by comparison with the words of the writ to William of Cantilupe, dated the 21st (of the existence of which Miss Norgate was probably not aware).