"If a typical Englishman were asked in 1215, or even in 1415, what it meant to be free, his answer would most probably have been given in terms of bondage. Freedom was not yet conceived of in terms of parliamentary representation."

 

J.H. Baker, "Personal Liberty under the Common Law of England, 1200-1600," The Origins of Modern Freedom in the West, ed. R.W. Davis (Stanford, California: 1995) 178-202 at 179.