One of the surviving 1215 copies of Magna Carta, close lines of Latin on parchment
Magna Carta, 1215, British Library Cotton MS Augustus II.106
Marked Runnymede

SubjectIn outline · lessons being written

Magna Carta and parliament

In 1215 King John’s barons forced him to agree a charter limiting his power. It was cancelled within weeks but reissued, and over the next two centuries the first parliaments met, including elected knights and townsmen.

Place
Runnymede · Westminster · LincolnEurope
Laid out as
A theme across timeOne idea followed through the eras it crosses.
Lessons
6 planned, none written yet
Image
Royal chancery scribe, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain

The lessons we plan

Titles may change as they are written

  1. IBad King John?
  2. IIRunnymede, 1215
  3. IIIWhat it actually said
  4. IVSimon de Montfort’s parliament
  5. VThe Commons
  6. VIThe myth of Magna Carta

Still to come

The people and objects these lessons will cover

People

  • King John
  • Stephen Langton
  • Simon de Montfort
  • Edward I

Objects

  • The surviving 1215 copies
  • The Lincoln Magna Carta

Where it sits

All of human history, era by era

Early human ancestryOur species and the Old Stone AgeFarming and the New Stone AgeFirst cities and the Bronze AgeThe Iron Age and growing statesThe classical worldAfter the empiresMedieval networks and empiresOceans crossedRevolutions and the first factoriesIndustry, empire and world warThe world since 1945

1215 to 1430. Each era is drawn the same width, so the earliest are squeezed: era II alone is over 300,000 years.

Nearby in time and place

This page is an outline. The summary above is a starting point; each lesson, when it is written, will give its sources, its pictures and where historians disagree. Spotted a mistake?