Note (34) — Chapter II

This letter, addressed in 1247 to Pope Innocent the Fourth, will be found in Matthew Paris (721, Wats). It is written in the name of “universitas cleri et populi per provinciam Cantuariensem constituti,” and it ends, “quia communitas nostra sigillum non habet, præsentes literas signo communitatis civitatis Londinensis vestræ sanctitati mittimus consignatas.” Another letter in the same form follows to the Cardinals. There are two earlier letters in 1245 and 1246 (Matthew Paris, 666, 700), the former from the “magnates et universitas regni Angliæ,” the other in the name of Richard Earl of Cornwall (afterwards King of the Romans), Simon Earl of Leicester, and other Earls, “et alii totius regni Angliæ Barones, proceres, et magnates, et nobiles portuum maris habitatores, necnon et clerus et populus universus.” The distinct mention of the Cinque Ports, whose representatives in Parliament are still called Barons—the “nobiles” of the letter—should be noticed.