Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 10.pdf/272

 The Great Seal.

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THE GREAT SEAL. PART I. — FROM SAXON TIMES TO THE COMMONWEALTH. (Note.— This article originally appeared in the "Pall Mall Magazine." we are permitted to republish it. — Ed.)

MORE than a thousand years of his tory have passed during the evolu tion of the Great Seal of England — from the time of Offa, King of Mercia, to the time of Victoria, Queen of England, whose seals are shown in the frontispiece of this account; and the contrast between these two royal stamps may, perhaps not inaptly, be viewed as symbolical of the contrast between a King of Mercia a thousand years ago and a Queen of England at the present day. In A.D. 790 King Offa confirmed by charter a grant of land in Sussex to the Abbey of St. Denis, and he gave his assent to this grant, at Tam worth, by affixing to the face of the charter the seal shown in No. 2, which is the earliest English King's seal now known; the original charter con taining this seal is preserved in the Archives Nationales, Paris. The word " Rex " can just be read in front of the King's face; the name " Offa " was probably in the space behind the head, but it is not now legible. In the earliest times, writs (framed in the King's name) by which lawsuits were insti tuted, and grants of dignities, of offices, and of lands, made by the King, were verified merely by signature. From the art of writing being little known, seals became common; and the King, according to the fashion of the age, adopted a seal with which writs and grants were sealed. This — says Campbell in his " Lives of the Lord Chancellors" — was called the Great Seal, and the custody of it was given to the Chancellor. The origin of the expression " the seals," to be sometimes read in the newspapers when the office of Lord Chancellor is being

Through the courtesy of the editor

transferred, is that in early days the King used occasionally to deliver to the Chancel lor several seals of different materials, as one of gold and one of silver; but with the same device, and to be used for the same purpose : hence we still talk of " the seals being in commission," or of a famous law yer being " a candidate for the seals," meaning the office of Lord Chancellor, although, with the exception of the rival great seals used by the King and the Par liament during the civil war, in the time of Charles I., there has not been for many centuries more than one great seal in exis tence at the same time. This is Lord Campbell's explanation of the term " the seals," and virtually it still holds good, although, since the passing of the Crown Office Act of 1877, there have been two Seals in the custody of the Chancellor: there is the Great (silver) Seal, and the Wafer Great Seal; the latter is made of steel, for the purpose of stamping paper, parchment, or other material, with the de sign in low relief. Both of these seals are impressed with the same device (see Nos. 1 and 14), but they are used for different pur poses — which I will mention later on. Seal No. 3 is the first seal of Edward the Confessor. This King had three in use during his reign, a number that corresponds with the number of his Chancellors, Leofricus, Wulwius, and Rembaldus. The late Mr. Alfred Benjamin Wyon, and his brother Mr. Allan Wyon, now chief engraver of Her Majesty's seals, suggest that a new seal was made for each Chancellor; and, in their fine work on "The Great Seals of England," they follow another leading authority, Sir