Magna Carta is one of the most celebrated documents in English history but later interpretations have tended to obscure its real significance in 1215. This iconic document was not intended to be a lasting declaration of legal principle. It was a practical solution to a political crisis which primarily served the interests of the highest ranks of feudal society by reasserting the power of custom to limit despotic behaviour by the king.

The majority of the clauses in Magna Carta dealt with the regulation of feudal customs and the operation of the justice system, not with legal theory and rights. It was King John's extortionate exploitation of his feudal rights and his ruthless administration of justice that were at the core of the barons' grievances.

All but three of Magna Carta's clauses have now become obsolete and been repealed, but the flexible way in which the charter has been reinterpreted through the centuries has guaranteed its status and longevity.

Legacy

Only three of the original clauses in Magna Carta are still law. One defends the freedom and rights of the English church, another confirms the liberties and customs of London and other towns, but the third is the most famous:

No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled nor will we proceed with force against him except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land. To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice.

This statement of principle, buried deep in Magna Carta, was given no particular prominence in 1215, but its intrinsic adaptability has allowed succeeding generations to reinterpret it for their own purposes and this has ensured its longevity. In the fourteenth century Parliament saw it as guaranteeing trial by jury. Sir Edward Coke interpreted it as a declaration of individual liberty in his conflict with the early Stuart kings and it has resonant echoes in the American Bill of Rights and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

But the real legacy of Magna Carta as a whole is that it limited the king's authority by establishing the crucial principle that the law was a power in its own right to which the king was subject.

1. Answer the following questions:

1) Why was Magna Carta created?

2) Whose interests did Magna Carta serve?

3) What problems did clauses of Magna Carta deal with?

4) Is Magna Carta valid today?

5) What clauses of Magna Carta are laws today? What do they defend?

6) How is the most famous clause of Magna Carta interpreted?

7) What is the legacy of Magna Carta as a whole?

2. Match the verbs on the left with their definitions on the right:

Look up nouns for these verbs in a dictionary.

3. Give Russian equivalents to the following phrases:

1) power of custom _________________________________

2) extortionate exploitation ___________________________

3) ruthless administration of justice _______________________

4) at the core of the grievances ___________________________

5) particular prominence _______________________________

6) intrinsic adaptability ________________________________

7) succeeding generations _______________________________

8) trial by jury _______________________________________

9) king's authority ____________________________________

10) the crucial principle ________________________________

1. Read the text and match the questions A-I to the answers 1-9:

A) Why is there more than one Magna Carta?

B) What does 'Magna Carta' mean?