Geoffrey de Mandeville: A study of the Anarchy

by John Horace Round

[72] Select Charters, 114 (cf. Will. Malms.).

[73] Ibid.

[74] Ibid., 96.

[75] Confirmation Roll, 1 Hen. VIII., Part 5, No. 13 (quoted by Mr. J. A. C. Vincent in Genealogist (N. S.), ii. 271). This should be compared with the argument of his friends when urging the primate to crown him, that he had not only been elected to the throne (by the Londoners), but also "ad hoc justo germanæ propinquitatis jure idoneus accessit" (Gesta, p. 8), and with the admission, shortly after, in the pope's letter, that among his claims he "de præfati regis [Henrici] prosapia prope posito gradu originem traxisse."

[76] Select Charters, 115. But cf. Will. Malms.

[77] As further illustrating the compromise of which this charter was the resultant, note that Stephen retains and combines the formula "Dei gratiâ" with the recital of election, and that he further represents the election as merely a popular "assent" to his succession.

[78] Compare the clause in the Confirmatio Cartarum of 1265, establishing the right of insurrection: "Liceat omnibus de regno nostro contra nos insurgere."

[79] See inter alia, Hallam's Middle Ages, i. 168, 169.

[80] "Fama per Angliam volitabat, quod comes Gloecestræ Robertus, qui erat in Normannia, in proximo partes sororis foret adjuturus, rege tantummodo ante diffidato. Nec fides rerum famæ levitatem destituit: celeriter enim post Pentecosten missis a Normanniâ suis regi more majorum amicitiam et fidem interdixit, homagio etiam abdicato; rationem præferens quam id juste faceret, quia et rex illicite ad regnum aspiraverat, et omnem fidem sibi juratam neglexerat, ne dicam mentitus fuerat" (Will. Malms., 712). So, too, the Continuator of Florence: "Interim facta conjuratione adversus regem per prædictum Brycstowensem comitem et conestabularium Milonem, abnegata fidelitate quam illi juraverant, ... Milo constabularius, regiæ majestati redditis fidei sacramentis, ad dominum suum, comitem Gloucestrensem, cum grandi manu militum se contulit" (pp. 110, 117). Compare with these passages the extraordinary complaint made against Stephen's conduct in attacking Lincoln without sending a formal "defiance" to his opponents, and the singular treaty, in this reign, between the Earls of Chester and of Leicester, in which the latter was bound not to attack the former, as his lord, without sending him the formal "diffidatio" a clear fortnight beforehand.

[81] Const. Hist., i. 338, 340.