Evolution of parliament william the conqueror biography

Building Democracy

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The English Parliament evolved over hundreds of years. The first medieval English Parliaments took important steps toward a more representative and democratic government.

The English monarchy had been around for a long time before William the Conqueror led the French Norman invasion and occupation of England in A.D. 1066. After the conquest, a new line of Norman kings continued the English monarchy.

The English people believed God had blessed the king’s right to rule. They also accepted that his successor, usually his eldest son, inherited that right.

But the king of England also owed duties to the people. At his coronation, he promised to preserve the unwritten “common law” passed down through the generations. He also had a duty to act with “right justice” and defend the realm by leading his army in battle.

From ancient times in England, the king was the only lawmaker and often acted above the law. But things began to change in 1215 when King John lost a war against his powerful barons who forced him to sign the Magna Carta.

This feudal document mainly guaranteed certain rights to the barons, who made up most of the landowning elite. But the Magna Carta also established that the king must obey the law and use only lawful means against his subjects.

Even at the height of their powers, English kings seldom acted without consulting important nobles and church leaders, the Lords of the kingdom. After the Magna Carta, the king increasingly sought the advice and consent (agreement) of the Lords in exchange for their supporting his government’s policies and projects. This was the origin of Parliament.

The

On Thursday evening I was kindly invited on a guided tour of the Houses of Parliament by my local MP, Richard Harrington.  Before I write-up a post about the tour itself I thought this would give a great opportunity to write a little about Parliament itself.

Though there were bodies with some parliamentary like qualities in ancient India and the Middle-East, Athens is often talked of as the cradle of democracy where the Assembly or Ekklesia was the most important institution in public life but whilst citizens were encouraged to vote, to be a fully fledged citizen you had to be an adult male.  The Roman Republic also had assemblies and a Senate which debated issues and dispensed power of the vast majority of peoples who had no voting rights whatsoever.

When it comes to Parliament though, it is fair to say that England is no slouch and many around the world refer to the British Parliament as the Mother of Parliaments or the Cradle of Democracy.  Going right back to the 4th and 5th centuries there was the Witenagemot.  Though these were irregularly held and usually at the behest of the monarch, they gave the opportunity for noblemen and religious figures to discuss matters with the King.  Whilst in many places the monarch was always the supreme power the Witenagemot didn’t just debate and advise the King but also had the power to elect or veto a King and could even replace the monarch if he were deemed.  At this time there were several Witenagemot’s, each for one of the great Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of Northumbria, Kent, Sussex, Wessex and Mercia but as the land was unified the tradition continued with the earliest recorded acts coming from the 6th century.

William The Conqueror brought over some French and Norman traditions but the idea of the Witenagemot basically remained and through events such as The Magna Carta the power of the people grew.  Parliament itself is an English take on the French word  ‘Parler’ or to speak.   The Model Par

The history of the Palace of Westminster began in the Middle Ages – in the early eighth century – when there was an Anglo-Saxon church dedicated to St. Peter the Apostle which became known as the West Minster (St. Paul's being the East Minster). In the tenth century the church became a Benedictine abbey and was adopted as a royal church, which subsequently became a royal palace in the 11th century.

Edward the Confessor, the penultimate Anglo-Saxon king, began the building of Westminster Abbey and a neighbouring palace to oversee its construction. After the Norman Conquest of 1066, William the Conqueror adopted the Palace of Westminster as his own. His son, William II (William Rufus) laid the foundations of the Great Hall (Westminster Hall).

In 1245 the church was rebuilt (under the reign of Henry III and dedicated to St. Edward (Edward the Confessor).

From as early as 1259, the state openings of parliamentary occasions were held in the King's private apartment at Westminster, the Painted Chamber. The English (and subsequently British) Parliament of the United Kingdom has met at Westminster since the 'Model Parliament' was called by Edward I in 1295.

The Palace burned down in 1834 and was replaced by the modern building.

Old Palace

The Palace of Westminster site was strategically important during the Middle Ages, as it was located on the banks of the River Thames. Known in medieval times as Thorney Island, the site may have been first-used for a royal residence by Canute the Great during his reign from 1016 to 1035. St Edward the Confessor, the penultimate Anglo-Saxon monarch of England, built a royal palace on Thorney Island just west of the City of London at about the same time as he built Westminster Abbey (1045–1050). Thorney Island and the surrounding area soon became known as Westminster (a

From Confessor to Conqueror

... it lay hard by the famous and rich town of London and also was a delightful spot, surrounded with fertile lands and green fields and near the main channel of the river, which bore abundant merchandise of wares of every kind for sale from the whole world to the town on its banks.

In addition, the Confessor was a devotee of St Peter, to whom the church was dedicated, so having decided to be buried there, he set about rebuilding it. It was at about this time that he decided to build a royal residence alongside Westminster Abbey.

Little is known of the Confessor’s palace but it probably included a Great Hall and a series of private chambers for the king himself. The Bayeaux Tapestry depicts the Confessor seated in a stylised palace, almost certainly intended to represent Westminster. The combination of a magnificent new abbey (unprecedented by its size and architectural style in England) and palace, elevated Westminster, architecturally at least, to the status of the primary royal residence of the English monarchy.

'William Duke of Normandy ... chose Westminster Abbey for his own coronation on Christmas Day 1066.'

The Confessor died at Westminster and was duly buried in Westminster Abbey on 6 January 1066. On the same day, his brother-in-law, Harold Earl of Wessex became the first English king to be crowned at the abbey. Thus Westminster’s status was increased, not only as the residence and burial place of kings, but also as the site where kings were annointed.

After the Norman invasion and the defeat of Harold at the Battle of Hastings, William Duke of Normandy, the cousin of the Confessor and known to posterity as 'the Conqueror', chose Westminster Abbey for his own coronation on Christmas Day 1066. This was a considered and significant move,