I.: Protection of Crown Tenants from arbitrary Exactions.

Apart from payments such as reliefs and amercements, the occasions of which were independent of the royal will, feudal exactions were of two types: scutages and aids. By these two expedients the King could arbitrarily increase the burdens of his feudal tenants beyond the letter of the original feudal contract. Recognized usage, however, required the consent of the vassals before they were subjected to extraordinary exactions. The barons were within their rights in seeking to embody this general principle in Magna Carta, although it would appear (from comparison of the versions of 1215, 1216 and 1217) that they had difficulty in devising a proper formula to give effect to it. The present chapter attempts a rough compromise of the question at issue, by requiring consent of the Crown tenants to all scutages and also to aids other than the recognized three.