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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 December 2011
Seventy-five years ago the Clarendon press published the first volume of The Constitutional History of England in its Origin and Developments, and its third volume came out in 1878. Those of us in Cambridge who have been responsible for the list of books recommended to the attention of the students of medieval constitutional history have of set purpose placed Stubbs’ book in the category of those recommended for ‘study’—a category in which no other secondary history book is to be found. It is our considered view that no student of the early history of our constitution can dispense with reading it, and this article, is an attempt to justify that opinion, whilst indicating, as far as may be, the directions in which the results of seventy years ‘research and reinterpretation have supplemented Stubbs’ knowledge and modified our attitude to his judgements. I would say at once, with all the force at my disposal, that there is no nineteenth-century historian towards whom it is less possible to be condescending without condemning oneself as unfit to study history. As one who loves Maitland this side idolatry, I can only accept Professor Galbraith's opinion that Maitland's learning fell far short of that of Stubbs—as Maitland himself would have been the first to declare. ‘In the augmentation of knowledge’, he said, ‘Dr Stubbs stood supreme. No other Englishman has so completely displayed to the world the whole business of the historian from the winning of the raw material to the narrating and generalising.’
1 Collected Papers, III, 498.Google Scholar(E[nglish] H[istorical] R[eview], 1901, p. 419.)Google Scholar
2 [Hutton, W. H.], [Letters of William Stubbs] (1904), p. 362Google Scholar.
3 Maitland, F. W., Roman Canon Law in the Church of England (1898)Google Scholar; Brooke, Z. N., The English Church and the Papacy (1931)Google Scholar; Powicke, F. M., Henry III and the Lord Edward (1947)Google Scholar.
4 1, 21-51. (London, 1883.)
5 Hutton, p. 77.
6 Hutton, p. 104.
7 Roger Wendover and Matthew Paris. (Glasgow University Press, 1944.)Google Scholar
8 Plucknett has pointed out (Trans. R. Hist. Soc. for 1918, p. 164) that the Proceedings printed by Nicolas represent Sir Robert Cotton's seventeenth-century selection from the records, and give a somewhat misleading impression of the original material.
9 Hutton, p. 154.
10 Hutton, p. 359.
11 Hutton, p. 361.
12 Hutton, p. 366. An ‘epitome’ of the Constitutional History had been suggested.
13 Petit-Dutaillis, , Studies and Notes Supplementary to Stubbs’ Constitutional History. Manchester Press, 1930), pp. 29 fGoogle Scholar.
14 Petit-Dutaillis, p. ix.
15 Maitland, , Collected Papers, III, 507.Google Scholar(E.H.R. 1901, p. 424.)Google Scholar
16 S[tubbs, ,] Constitutional] H[istory], I, § 30, p. 68.Google Scholar [The paragraphs are given, as they remain constant through all editions; the page references are to the 6th edition of vol. I, the second edition of vols. II and III.] Vinogradoff, , Growth of the Manor (1904, 1911)Google Scholar; Jolliffe, in E.H.R. (1926)Google Scholar; Stenton, , Danes in England (British Academy, 1927)Google Scholar; Douglas, , Social Structure of Medieval East Anglia (1927)Google Scholar.
17 S.C.H. I, § 86, p. 250; Stenton, in E.H.R. (1918)Google Scholar and Anglo-Saxon England (1943), ch. VIIGoogle Scholar.
18 S.C.H. I, § 45, p. 103; Cambridge Medieval History, III, pp. 366 f.
19 Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, pp. 235 f., 693Google Scholar.
20 S.C.H. I, § 96, pp. 284 ff.; Petit-Dutaillis, pp. 59 ff.
21 Stenton, , English Feudalism (1929), pp. 43 ff., 193 ff., 249-55Google Scholar; Powicke, , Stephen Langton (1928), pp. 120–3Google Scholar; Pollock, and Maitland, , History of English Law (1896)Google Scholarpassim; G. B.Adams, Origin of the English Constitution (1920), especially chs. IV and VIGoogle Scholar.
22 S.C.H. II, 294, § 244. Bracton's testimony is expressly cited.
23 Tout, , [Studies in] Admin[istrative] Hist[ory], vols. I, IIGoogle Scholar; Mills, M. H., Trans. R. Hist. Soc. (1925, 1927)Google Scholar; Powicke, , Henry III and the Lord Edward, ch. IIIGoogle Scholar.
24 The Independent Review (1904).
25 S.C.H. III, § 321, p. 72; § 373, p. 275.
26 Letters on a Regicide Peace (ed. E. J. Payne), p. 49. But see below, II. 105.
27 S.C.H. I, § 108, p. 329; Stephen Langton, pp. 107-16.
28 Hutton, p. 162.
29 For a survey of the literature, see Lapsley's Introduction to Maitland's, Selected Essays (Cambridge University Press, 1936)Google Scholar, and Cam, H. M., ‘Legislators of Medieval England’ (British Academy, 1945)Google Scholar.
30 Trans. R. Hist. Soc. (1940).
31 Bulletin of Institute of Historical Research (November 1930), pp. 72–7Google Scholar.
32 Origines de la chambre des communes (1914), translation by Laffan, (Cambridge, 1925), pp. 184 f., 201.Google Scholar Cf. Haskins, G. L., E.H.R. (1938)Google Scholar.
33 Stephenson, in Haskins Anniversary Essays (Cambridge, Mass., 1929)Google Scholar; Edwards, in Oxford Essays presented to Salter (Oxford, 1934)Google Scholar; Clarke, M. V. in Medieval Representation and Consent (London, 1936), chs. XII, XIIIGoogle Scholar.
34 S.C.H. II, § 244, p. 291.
35 Bulletin of the Historical Institute (Nov. 1928), p. 75.Google Scholar Cf. S.C.H. 11, §245, p. 307; ‘Both sides look to the commons for help, and while they employ the commons for their own ends, gradually place the decision of all great questions irrevocably in their hands.’
36 S.C.H. II, § 244, pp. 291, 295, 296.
37 S.C.H. II, § 244, p. 296.
38 S.C.H. II, § 244. p. 304
39 Unwin, G., Finance and Trade under Edward III (1918), pp. 179–255Google Scholar; Wilkinson, B., Studies in the Constitutional History of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries (Manchester, 1937), ch. IIIGoogle Scholar; Power, E. E., The Wool Trade (Oxford, 1941), ch. IVGoogle Scholar
40 See Rayner, D. in E.H.R. (1941)Google Scholar.
41 S.C.H. III, § 440, pp. 461 ff.
42 S.C.H. III, § 442, pp. 467-76.
43 S.C.H. III, § 301, p. 8.
44 Richard II (Cambridge University Press, 1941), p. 92Google ScholarPubMed.
45 The passages cited from speeches made on behalf of the Crown at the opening of parliaments in § 364 are no more than medieval commonplaces which might have been uttered at any period from the thirteenth century onward.
46 S.C.H. II, § 260, p. 418.
47 S.C.H. II, § 258, p. 384.
48 S.C.H. II, § 25s. p. 368.
49 S.C.H. II, § 300, p. 5.
50 S.C.H. II, § 363, p. 234.
51 S.C.H. III, § 363, p. 235.
52 S.C.H. III, § 373, p. 273.
53 Eulogium Historiarum [R.S.], in, 369; Chron. Adae de Usk (ed. Thompson), pp. 30 f., 182-6.
54 S.C.H. II, § 269, p. 507.
55 Richard II, p. 92.
56 Trans. R. Hist. Soc. (1944), pp. 53–73Google Scholar; Bulletin Inst. Hist. Research (1945), pp. 161–80Google Scholar.
57 French Chronicle of London (Camden Series), p. 46; Knighton, I, 426; Calendar of Close Rolls, 28 June 1323. Flores Historiarum, III, 213.
58 Foedera II, ii, 707 (8 June 1327)Google Scholar; Rot[uli] Parl[iamentorum], II, 84 (1334)Google Scholar; Cal. Papal Petitions, 1392-1429, p. 271Google Scholar.
59 Rot. Part. II, 7; Foedera, II, ii, 695 (Feb. 1327); II, ii, 782 (March 1330); II, ii, 814 (April 1331).
60 Historia Anglicana (R.S.), II, 195. Thomas’ name occurs in the Ada Sanctorum for 22 March amongst those who are praetermissi et alios dies rejecti.
61 Political Songs (Camden Series), p. 270
62 Stubbs, , Seventeen Lectures on Medieval and Modern History, p. 474Google Scholar.
63 Historia Anglicana, I, 288.
64 Chron. Abbreviatio (ed. J, I. Smith, Camb. Antiq. Soc, Quarto Series, 1840), p. 10Google Scholar.
65 S.C.H. III, § 341, p. 131; § 538, p. 211.
66 Tout, , Admin. Hist, III, 10 ff., 35, 47, 136, 288, 302Google Scholar; Clarke, M. V., Fourteenth-Century Studies (1937), pp. 36 ff.Google Scholar; Wilkinson, B., The Chancery under Edward III (1929), p. xxviii and ch. v passimGoogle Scholar; Chrimes, S. B., Constitutional Ideas of the Fifteenth Century (1936), pp. 5 fGoogle Scholar.
67 Steel, , Richard II, p. 92Google Scholar.
68 To be found in full in Rot. Parl. I, 281-6 or Statutes of the Realm, I, 157; abridged in Lodge and Thornton, Eng. Const. Documents, pp. 12 ff.
69 Chs. 9, 14, 22, 25, 29, 40.
70 Trokelowe [R.S.], pp. 72-3.
71 S.C.H. II, § 254, pp. 350 f.
72 S.C.H. II, §224, p. 246; § 254, p. 352.
73 S.C.H. II, § 254, p. 349.
74 Place of Edward II in English History (2nd ed. 1936), p. 16Google Scholar.
75 Hughes, D., The Early Years of Edward III (University of London Press, 1915), p. 1Google Scholar; Stubbs, , Hist. Introd. to Jiolls Series, p. 516Google Scholar.
76 Tout, , Admin. Hist, III, 40 f.Google Scholar; Edward II, p. 209; Hughes, pp. 2 f.; Wilkinson, , Chancery, pp. 106–9Google Scholar; S.C.H. II, § 255, p. 361; § 258, pp. 384 ff.
77 Lodge, and Thornton, , op. cit. pp. 18 f.Google Scholar; Clarke, M. V., Representation and Consent, pp. 388 fGoogle Scholar.
78 Arnould, E. J., in Bulletin of John Rylands Library (Oct. 1937)Google Scholar; editor of Le Livre de Seyntes Medicines (Anglo-Norman Text. Soc. Oxford, 1940)Google ScholarPubMed.
79 Fourteenth-Century Studies, p. 36. Cf. Smith, Armitage, John of Gaunt (1904), pp. 146 fGoogle Scholar.
80 S.C.H. II, § 265, pp. 464, 469.
81 S.C.H. II, § 268, p. 500.
82 S.C.H. II, § 269, p. 507.
83 S.C.H. II, § 273, p. 515
84 S.C.H. III, § 364, p. 237.
85 S.C.H. II, § 273, pp. 513-14.
86 S.C.H. III, § 299, p. 2.
87 Cambridge, Mass. 1932.
88 Chrimes, , Constitutional Ideas, pp. 27–31Google Scholar.
89 S.C.H. III, § 360, p. 224; § 361, pp. 228 f.
90 S.C.H. II, §§268-9, pp. 502-9; III, §302, pp. 9-14; Lapsley, in E.H.R. (1934, 1938)Google Scholar; Richardson, in E.H.R. (1937)Google Scholar, and Bulletin of Hist. Inst. (October, 1939)Google Scholar; Wilkinson, in E.H.R. (1939)Google Scholar
91 I owe these suggestions to Mr J. R. Lander of Pembroke College.
92 Trans. R. Hist. Soc. (1944).
93 McKisack, , Representation of English Boroughs (Oxford, 1932), pp. 45–64Google Scholar; Wedgwood, , Hist, of Part. 1439-1309 (1938), Register of Members, pp. cxvi–cxxviGoogle Scholar.
94 For Plucknett see following note; for Chrimes, Const. Ideas, pp. 196 ff.; for Galbraith, History (March 1942), p. 233.
95 Tudor Studies (ed. Watson, Seton, London, 1924), pp. 161–81Google Scholar.
96 Fourteenth-Century Studies, pp. 99-114.
97 De laudibus legum Ahglie (ed. S. B. Chrimes), p. lxxxviii.
98 Studies Supplementary to Stubbs, p. 310.
99 Historical Introductions to the Rolls Series, p. 91.
100 Cambridge Medieval History, VI, p. 220.
101 S.C.H. II, § 178, p. 99; Powicke, Henry III and the Lord Edward, passim.
102 History (1945), pp. 119-32.
103 Studies Supplementary to Stubbs, p. 305.
104 Henry III and the Lord Edward, p. 510.
105 Professor Émile Lousse of Louvain in his valuable account of th e origins of representative institutions on the Continent commends Maitland for his reference to the estates in his Constitutional History, p. 75, condemning Stubbs’ insularity in neglecting the subject. (La societe d'ancien regime, p. 3; Louvain, 1943.) He fails to observe that Maitland refers his audience to Stubbs’ fifteenth chapter, where, §§ 184-201, Stubbs discusses for forty pages the system of estates in Spain, France, Sicily and Germany as well as England.
106 S.C.H. II, § 184, p. 161; § 185, p. 166.
107 Hutton, pp. 378-92.
108 Hutton, pp. 35 f., 53, 409 f.
109 Hutton, p. 16.
