“Copy” Of Magna Carta Bought For $27.50 Turns Out To Be A 1300 CE Original

In 1946, the Harvard Law School Library spent $27.50 (around $440 in today’s money) on a document known as “HLS MS 172”. According to the auction catalogue where the manuscript was purchased, the item was a “copy” of Magna Carta made in 1327 CE and was “somewhat rubbed and damp-stained”. The “copy” had been purchased just a few months before that for £42 (about £2,250 today, or $2990) from a Royal Air Force hero, according to a King’s College London press release.

For nearly 80 years, the manuscript lay at Harvard. Eventually, the document was digitized, and it was in this digital form that Professor David Carpenter, Professor of Medieval History at King’s College London, first stumbled upon it.

“I pressed the button to see the digitized image that they put up,” Carpenter explained in a video. “I just thought, this looks so much like a 1300 original.”

“David pinged me through an email saying, ‘Have a look at this. What do you think it is?'” Professor Nicholas Vincent, Professor of Medieval History at the University of East Anglia, added. “And I think it took all of 30 milliseconds for me to reply, ‘You know what that is, and I know what that is. It’s an original Magna Carta.'”

Carpenter and Vincent of course wanted a closer look at the document, using images taken by Harvard Law School librarians via ultraviolet light and spectral imaging, and comparing them to known originals issued in 1300 in the reign of King Edward I. According to their analysis, the document’s wording, handwriting, and dimensions were a perfect match for the original.

“This uniformity provides new evidence for Magna Carta’s status in the eyes of contemporaries,” Professor Carpenter explained. “The text had to be correct.”

 

“Magna Carta is one of the most famous constitutional documents in the world because it asserts a fundamental principle that the king, the ruler, is subject to the law,” Carpenter explained. “1300 was the last time that the king of England actually confirmed the 1225 Magna Carta, which is the definitive version.”

The two historians found that World War I flying ace Air Vice-Marshal Forster “Sammy” Maynard CB sent the manuscript for auction at this apparently very undervalued price, after inheriting it from Thomas and John Clarkson, who were leading campaigners against the slave trade in the late 18th century. In the early 19th century, the Clarksons inherited the manuscript from William Lowther, hereditary lord of the manor of Appleby, a local friend in England’s Lake District.

Now the document is on display at Harvard, where it has been preserved well during its nearly 80-year stay.

“Congratulations to Professors Carpenter and Professor Vincent on their fantastic discovery,” Amanda Watson, Harvard Law School’s Assistant Dean for Library and Information Services, added. “This work exemplifies what happens when magnificent collections, like Harvard Law Library’s, are opened to brilliant scholars. Behind every scholarly revelation stands the essential work of librarians who not only collect and preserve materials but create pathways that otherwise would remain hidden.”