
MAGNA CARTA By Permission of [...the named...] Trustees of the Cottonian Library. This Plate being a Correct Copy of King John's Great Charter... Engraved Facsimile of the 1215 Magna Carta, ENGRAVED BY JOHN PINE AND PRINTED ON VELLUM, Sold by J. Pine... and by the Booksellers of London and Westminster, [1733]
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MAGNA CARTA
Footnotes
A FINE COPY OF THE FIRST PRINTING OF THE ORIGINAL TEXT OF MAGNA CARTA, the most celebrated legal document in the English-speaking world, "a sacred text, the nearest approach to an irrepealable "fundamental statute" that England has ever had" (Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law).
This attractive engraving was taken from one of the two original copies owned by Sir Robert Cotton, now in the British Museum. John Pine (1690-1756) was a publisher, print- and mapseller, as well as Bluemantle Pursuivant at the College of Arms, and Engraver to the King's signet and Stamp Office. It is thought that one of the motivations for publishing this facsimile in the present form was the fire on 23 October 1731 in which one of the two Cottonian originals was damaged.