On Thu, 20 Aug 2009, Diane Rudin <serena1570 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> said persons should receive a specially-phrased Oak charter
> **from their successors as B&B**
> ***confirming*** (not granting) their status as Oaks, with date and
> precedence from their investiture as B&B, and thus also Principals
> of the Order of the Oak.
With trepidation for entering into the lists held by Serena, I will
suggest that a charter of confirmation need not come from their
immediate successor.
There is a story told in W. L. Warren's _Henry II_, pp. 303 et seq.
I'm not sure why this story has stuck in my mind -- maybe de Lacy's
rhetoric -- but I like it, and I wish the SCA had court business like
this.
Some kinds of business which did not necessarily concern the whole
realm were nevertheless thought to be better done in public. The
abbot of Battle Abbey, founded by William the Conqueror at the
site of his victory near Hastings, came one day to Henry II and
showed him a foundation charter which had decayed with age. The
king said it ought to be renewed. The abbot asked that it be done
by means of a charter of confirmation, but the king said 'I may
not do so without a judgment of my court' (nisi ex judicio curiae
mea). The abbot consulted the justiciar, Richard de Lucy, who
advised him of a proper time to make his request, and promised him
that 'if our judgement is asked you will get the unanimous support
of the whole court'. So the abbot raised the matter again 'when
the king was sitting in the midst of his magnates'. The king
asked for the views of the madnates whether he might do as
requested or not, and Richard de Lucy spoke up and said, 'It would
be proper to renew this charter of Battle, my lord, if it please
you, for even if all its charters had perished, we ourselves ought
to be its charters, for we owe our fiefs to that victory at
Battle. And since you ask for our judgement as to whether you
should do it or not, we adjudge that the charter should be renewed
by a confirmation on your authority ...' So the king called his
chancellor and dictated the form that the confirmation was to
take. [1] ...
[1] Chronicon Monasterii de Bello, 164-5. The king, it is said,
dictated a new form of wording: charters of confirmation normally
incorporated the phrase 'as the earlier charter testifies', but
Henry II ordered this to be omitted, and devised a formula which
made the new charter fully authoritative even if all earlier
charters should perish. The abbot prudently had several copies
made in the chancery.
Of course, Henry II was fourth after William the Conqueror;
William's immediate successor had long since had his
"tragic" fatal hunting "accident" ("O gracious God!").
Is there medieval evidence of someone who no longer held an office
issuing legal documents relating to it? Of course, "the title of a
former king was 'the Late', or if he was lucky,
'the Blinded and Castrated'". The only medieval example I could think
of would be a bishop who had been translated, or a removable official
like a sheriff. I would think it much more likely that the current
holder would issue documents of confirmation in their own name,
perhaps (as above) with reference to previous actions by a
predecessor.
And Aureliane was (last I heard) so gafiated that she would absolutely
never come back, so how would her signature be obtained?
Danel Lincoln
--
Tim McDaniel, tmcd at panix.com