The King Signs Beneath the Law: Magna Carta
1215 · event
In a meadow at Runnymede in June 1215, rebellious barons forced King John of England to seal a document admitting something no ruler had ever conceded: that even the king stands beneath the law.
Most of its 63 clauses dealt with medieval grievances, fish weirs, feudal dues, and the Pope annulled it within ten weeks. But two sentences proved immortal: no free man shall be imprisoned "except by the lawful judgment of his equals," and to no one shall justice be delayed or denied.
Seven centuries later those lines echo in the US Constitution, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and every courtroom where a citizen faces the state as an equal. Four copies survive; the ink is faded, the idea is not.