This is a fully revised and extended edition of J. C. Holt's study of Magna Carta, the Great Charter, which sets the events of 1215 and the Charter itself in the context of the law, politics and administration of England and Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
The author has added to the first edition (1965) further comment on the development of local liberties, the significance of the famous provision nullus liber homo, the political manoeuvres of 1215, and the later history of the Charter, and many other matters. The book is broadened by the addition of an extensive chapter on justice and jurisdiction which embodies an entirely new approach to some of the most crucial and longest-lasting provisions of the Charter.