The Assembly at Winchester took place, as has been said, on the 7th and 8th of April. William of Malmesbury was present on the occasion, and states that it was attended by the primate "and all the bishops of England."[220] This latter phrase may, however, be questioned, in the light of subsequent charter evidence.
The proceedings of this council have been well described, and are so familiar that I need not repeat them. On the 7th was the private conclave; on the 8th, the public assembly. I am tempted just to mention the curiously modern incident of the legate (who presided) commencing the proceedings by reading out the letters of apology from those who had been summoned but were unable to be present.[221] On the 8th the legate announced to the Assembly the result of the previous day's conclave:—
"filiam pacifici regis ... in Angliæ Normanniæque dominam eligimus, et ei fidem et manutenementum promittimus."[222]
On the 9th, the deputation summoned from London arrived and was informed of the decision; on the 10th the assembly was dissolved.
The point I shall here select for discussion is the meaning of the term "domina Angliæ," and the effect of this election on the position of the Empress.
First, as to the term "domina Angliæ." Its territorial character must not be overlooked. In the charters of the Empress, her style "Ang' domina" becomes occasionally, though very rarely, "Anglor' domina," proving that its right extension is "Anglorum Domina," which differs, as we have seen, from the chroniclers' phrase. The importance of the distinction is this. "Rex" is royal and national; "dominus" is feudal and territorial. We should expect, then, the first to be followed by the nation ("Anglorum"), the second by the territory ("Angliæ"). But, in addition to its normal feudal character, the term may here bear a special meaning.
It would seem that the clue to its meaning in this special sense was first discovered by the late Sir William (then Mr.) Hardy ("an ingenious and diligent young man," as he was at the time described) in 1836. He pointed out that "Dominus Anglie" was the style adopted by Richard I. "between the demise of his predecessor and his own coronation."[223] Mr. Albert Way, in a valuable paper on the charters belonging to Reading Abbey, which appeared some twenty-seven years later,[224] called attention to the styles "Anglorum Regina" and "Anglorum Domina," as used by the Empress.[225] As to the former, he referred to the charter of the Empress at Reading, granting lands to Reading Abbey.[226] As to the latter ("Domina Anglorum"), he quoted Mr. Hardy's paper on the charter of Richard I., and urged that "the fact that Matilda was never crowned Queen of England may suffice to account for her being thus styled" (p. 283). He further quoted from William of Malmesbury the two passages in which that chronicler applies this style to the Empress,[227] and he carefully avoided assigning them both to the episode of the 2nd of March. Lastly, he quoted the third passage, that in the Gesta Stephani.
Mr. Birch subsequently read a paper "On the Great Seals of King Stephen" before the Royal Society of Literature (December 17, 1873), in which he referred to Mr. Way's paper, as the source of one of the charters of which he gave the text, and in which he embodied Mr. Way's observations on the styles "Regina" and "Domina."[228] But instead, unfortunately, of merely following in Mr. Way's footsteps, he added the startling error that Stephen was a prisoner, and Matilda consequently in power, till 1143. He wrote thus:—
"Did the king ever cease to exercise his regal functions? Were these functions performed by any other constitutional sovereign meanwhile? The events of the year 1141 need not to be very lengthily discussed to demonstrate that for a brief period there was a break in Stephen's sovereignty, and a corresponding assumption of royal power by another ruler unhindered and unimpeached by the lack of any formality necessary for its full enjoyment.... William of Malmesbury, writing with all the opportunity of an eye-witness, and moving in the royal court at the very period, relates at full length in his Historia Novella (ed. Hardy, for Historical Society, vol. ii. p. 774[229]), the particulars of the conference held at Winchester subsequent to the capture of Stephen after the battle of Lincoln, in the early part of the year, 4 Non. Feb. A.D. 1141.... This election of Matilda as Domina of England in place of Stephen took place on Sunday, March 2, 1141.... Until the liberation of the king from his incarceration at Bristol, as a sequel to the battle at Winchester in A.D. 1143, so disastrous to the hopes of the Empress, she held her position as queen at London. The narrative of the events of this period, as given by William of Malmesbury in the work already quoted, so clearly points to her enjoyment of all temporal power needed to constitute a sovereign, that we must admit her name among the regnant queens of England" (pp. 12-14).
Two years later (June 9, 1875), Mr. Birch read a paper before the British Archæological Association,[230] in which, in the same words, he advanced the same thesis.