Note 1093 — MAGNA CARTA. (continued 7)

There are no signatures to the document. The frequent references to “the signing of the Great Charter” (e.g. Medley, Const. Hist., 127) are thus inaccurate, if “signing” is taken in its modern sense of “subscribing,” but may perhaps be justified by a reference to signum in its original meaning of “a seal.” To imprint a seal was, in a sense, “to sign.” That Magna Carta, in spite of its mention of its own date as 15th June, was actually sealed on the 19th has already been asserted, supra, 48–49. To the proofs there adduced should be added the testimony of the Annals of Dunstable, III. 43, which report that peace was made between king and barons at Runnymede “die Gervasii et Protasii.”