Introduction — Magna Carta: Women’s Rights or Wrongs?

Abstract

In 2015 Magna Carta turned 800. A treaty between king and barons, today Magna Carta is claimed as a fundamental statement of rights. No woman was at Runnymede. Women appear in Magna Carta as attached to men — widows and daughters. So, asks Scutt, does Magna Carta speak for women? Some women spoke independently in medieval Britain, although church and aristocracy circumscribed all women’s sphere. Little is written of women and Magna Carta historically or in women’s rights campaigns. Mary Wollstonecraft demanded rights, and some campaigns reflect Magna Carta’s terms without invoking them directly. For men, Magna Carta is ‘adaptable’, a ‘speaking statute’ encompassing new rights and supporting contemporary claims. Scutt asks if Magna Carta thus promotes women’s rights, or does it symbolise wrongs done to women?