MAGNA CARTA, HEREFORD and GUALA BICCHIERI
It is 804 years since King John of England sealed the first version of the document that has since come to be known as Magna Carta. That charter was effectively a peace treaty between him and rebel barons who could no longer tolerate his increasing abuses of power. One of the people who was instrumental in bringing it about was the Bishop of Hereford, Giles de Briouze. He was the only bishop to join the rebel barons, and bravely led a small delegation to speak with John just a month before Magna Carta was sealed. His tomb is close to the high altar in Hereford Cathedral.
The charter also regulated the proper administration of justice, the raising of taxes, relations between Church and State, freedom of trade, and many other matters which were the causes of friction between John and his leading subjects. But a reading of the 1215 charter quickly reveals how many of its clauses were related directly to the moment, with (for instance) named hostages to be released and named Poitevin favourites to be removed from office
Within weeks the charter was renounced by John. Pope Innocent III supported John’s rejection of the charter because he believed that John had been forced to agree to it, so it had not been granted of his own free will. It was therefore ‘null, and void of all validity for ever’. Civil war broke out between John and his barons; the barons called upon the French for military support. During the war, in 1216, Pope Innocent sent Cardinal Guala Bicchieri to England as Papal Legate. Bicchieri supported John against the barons because it was papal policy to strengthen the monarchy. John died late in 1216 with the war continuing, and his nine year old son Henry III was swiftly crowned. In an attempt to win support for the vulnerable boy king William Marshal (Earl of Pembroke) and Guala Bicchieri, his guardians, quickly issued a new version of the charter. It was a shorter document than the one John sealed at Runnymede in 1215. The 1216 Magna Carta had full papal support because it was ‘freely given’ by the king.
Slowly events and opinion turned in Henry’s favour. With the decisive defeat of the remaining rebels and their French allies at the Battle of Lincoln, and a great sea victory over the French off Sandwich, Guala Bicchieri and William Marshal had secured and firmly established Henry’s rule by the end of 1217.
To consolidate the victory and ensure the loyalty of the barons for the future a third version of Magna Carta was issued in the king’s name by his guardians. It was similar to their 1216 charter, although some additional clauses were added and modifications made. It became the basis for all later versions of the charter. Disputes about the management of royal forests (which involved unpopular forest laws that had been a considerable source of royal revenue) were dealt with in a separate smaller document issued at about the same time, the Charter of the Forest. To distinguish between the two sister charters, the term magna carta libertatum, ‘the great charter of liberties’, was used to refer to the larger document, which in time became known simply as ‘Magna Carta’. So strictly speaking, the 1217 charter is the first that can properly be called Magna Carta.
Hereford Cathedral possesses the best preserved of the four surviving copies of the 1217 Magna Carta. The cathedral is delighted to be able to display it in Vercelli in honour of Cardinal Guala Bicchieri whose efforts in promoting this charter secured the rule of law and established important freedoms for the people of England.
The Revd Canon Chris Pullin, Chancellor of Hereford Cathedral