Note 251 — PART IV. HISTORICAL SEQUEL TO MAGNA CARTA.

The Forest Charter, preserved in the archives of Durham Cathedral, bears this date, and that, in itself, affords some presumption that the Charter of Liberties (undated) to which it forms a supplement was executed at the same time. M. Bémont accepts this date; see his Chartes, xxviii., and authorities there cited. Blackstone, Great Charter, xxxix., gives the probable date as 23rd September. Dr. Stubbs, always catholic in his sympathies, gives both dates, 23rd September in Sel. Charters, 344, and 6th November in Const. Hist., II. 26. This Charter of Liberties of 1217, originally found among the archives of Gloucester Abbey and now in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, still bears the impression of two seals—that of Gualo in yellow wax, and that of the Regent in green. See Blackstone, Great Charter, p. xxxv. The existence of the separate Forest Charter was only surmised by Blackstone, Ibid., p. xlii.; but shortly after he wrote, an original of it was found among the archives of Durham Cathedral. For an account of this and of its discovery, see Thomson, Magna Charta, pp. 443-5.