Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiastical, Treated Upon by the Bishop of London, President of the Convocation For the Province of Canterbury, and the Rest of the Bishops and Clergie of the said Province: And Agreed upon with the Kings Majesties License in their Synod begun at London, Anno Domini 1603.

$1,250.00

Item Number: 140232

London: Printed by the Assigns of John Bill Deceas'd: And by Henry Hills, and Thomas Newcomb, Printers to the Kings most Excellent Majesty, 1683.

Rare 17th century printing of the Ecclesiastical Constitutions of the Province of Canterbury. Quarto, bound in full contemporary mottled calf with elaborate gilt tooling to the spine in six compartments within raised gilt bands, engraved armorial frontispiece. In very good condition. Rare.

First issued in January 1164 by King Henry II, the Constitutions of Clarendon defined church–state relations in England. Designed to restrict ecclesiastical privileges and curb the power of the church courts, the constitutions provoked the famous quarrel between Henry and his archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket. When the King presented the constitutions at Clarendon in January, the bishops, led by Becket, reluctantly promised to observe them. Within a year, however, he repudiated his oath and was forced into six years of exile by Henry. Becket’s martyrdom in 1170 forced Henry to moderate his attack on the clergy, but he did not specifically repudiate a single clause of the constitutions. By the 13th century, “criminous clerks” were tried in secular courts for their second offense. First offenders enjoyed “benefit of clergy.”