I have chosen as the subject of this paper a study of the relations of Oliver Sutton, bishop of Lincoln from 1280 to 1299, with the University of Oxford, and I should like to begin with a quotation from the work of one of the great medievalists of our generation. In his book, Henry III and the Lord Edward, Sir Maurice Powicke says: ‘It is a great pity that we know so little about these people.’ That is profoundly true. Many of the inhabitants of thirteenth-century history are little more than names to us. We know a few facts about the chancellors of Oxford at this period, and the information that we can gain about Sutton is slight enough. Yet I think that sufficient material has survived to enable us to find out something about his dealings with the university and to understand from them what kind of a man he was.

In 1870 the Government of the day had behind it the stronger party in the country; and among its followers in Parliament were the two members for the City of London. Pass a quarter of a century, and come to the Government brought into power by the general election of 1895. Exactly the same two things may be said of it; it too had behind it the stronger party in the country; it too numbered among its followers in Parliament the members for the City of London. Only, whereas the Government of 1870 was Liberal, the Government of 1895 was Conservative. That quarter of a century had witnessed the transfer of the City of London's political allegiance from Liberalism to Conservatism; and therein the City's opinions corresponded to those of the business and moneyed classes generally. So it was, not only in the south of England, but also in the Midlands and Lancashire; though not yet at all to the same extent in Yorkshire, the north-east coast, or Scotland.

The type of economic organization known as the manor existed in the north of Gaul, including the regions which were later to be known as the Low Countries,1 in the Merovingian period and even in Roman times, but it is not till the eighth century that evidence regarding it becomes relatively abundant. The little that can be said of its structure and diffusion before the Carolingian period can only be of an introductory character. We have no evidence as to the relative proportions of large, middle-sized, and small estates, but there can be no doubt from texts of the seventh and early eighth centuries that large, indeed very large, estates existed at this period.

In 1811 the Solicitor-General of Ireland was prosecuting at Clonmel some members of two agrarian societies of the Ribbon type, the Caravats and the Shanavests.

What (he asked) is the first object of these savage associations, to enforce the commands of which you are nightly plundered of your arms? It is the regulation of landed property and its produce, it is the vain and idle attempt to fix a maximum for rent and to prescribe the price of labour, it is the frantic project to prevent the transfer of property and to frustrate the exertions of industry. The nature of things, still more than the operation of positive law, has decreed that property should find its own level; and it is the first principle of a commercial country, and the first consequence of national prosperity, that property should be in a state of perpetual transfer and circulation.

Vernacular poetry of the Anglo-Saxon period survives in considerable bulk—nearly thirty thousand lines. It is certainly a mere fraction of what once existed. What chance has preserved is not always just what one would have chosen, and its historical value is by no means proportional to its extent. It has not been neglected as a source for Anglo-Saxon history, and I do not claim that this paper is about to add to our knowledge of the period. Nevertheless, it may be of some interest to historians to consider both the value and the limitations of Old English verse literature as historical material. I am not concerned to-day with its literary merit, and I propose to narrow my subject by confining myself to English history. The importance of Beowulf and Widsith for the student of Scandinavian history is quite another story.

A feature of English social life in the sixteenth century which aroused the curiosity of foreigners and the bitterness of Englishmen was the royal right of wardship and marriage. Since 1540 this right had been safeguarded with the full apparatus of a specially constituted court of law under the direction of a high official as its master and judge. Twenty years after the creation of the Court of Wards and Liveries, William Cecil, later Lord Burghley, became its master; and he held that office from January 1561 until his death in August 1598, a period of more than thirty-seven years. The court itself remained in existence, in spite of an increasing volume of criticism, until the Civil War, when it was formally abolished by the Long Parliament in 1646. Thus, for more than a third of its existence of 106 years Burghley was its master; and since, after an interregnum of nine months, he was succeeded by his son Robert, the Cecil family in effect controlled its destinies for more than half a century. In the process they, and the court they directed, left their mark upon the society and economy of their age.

It is well known that, in contrast to the nineteenth century, the Middle Ages, and especially the later Middle Ages, suffered from great coinage instability. Now that we, in our turn, are confronted with identical difficulties, some historians would explain the currency manipulations of the Middle Ages by motives of the same kind as those that have inspired some devaluations in the twentieth century. They ask themselves if perhaps the princes of that time were not trying, as some modern governments have tried, to influence economic life and in particular to stimulate international commerce by devaluation of the currency.

Giraldus Cambrensis observed that the interdict laid on England in 1208 inflicted a double wound, involving as it did both the withdrawal of divine service and the plundering of the clergy's possessions. The eagerness of King John in exploiting the situation for his financial profit does not admit of doubt. The estimate of reparations for ablata and dampna arrived at in 1214 was 100,000 marks; this did not satisfy the clergy, and probably the sum was too small to cover all that the king had received by confiscations, prolonging of vacancies, dona, and fines. Although even an approximately correct estimate is now unattainable, an enquiry is still worth while to discover the king's policy and his methods of exaction during the interdict. This paper is primarily concerned with his general seizure of church property in 1208.