Introduction

A city or town charter regulates the legal status (including its rights and obligations) of an independent urban jurisdiction. It constitutes a proof and symbol of the urban status of the settlement in question. Its granting marks an important phase in the development of a city.

For medieval Holland, town charters have survived from quite a few towns (starting with Geertruidenberg in 1213 and ending with Heenvliet in 1469). On Thursday, 23 November 1245, William II, Count of Holland (1236-1254), granted the citizens of Haarlem a city charter, including a toll exemption in the County of Holland. Despite the count's granting of this privilege - by way of a sealed city charter - the initiative to grant city rights seems to have come in part from the citizens of Haarlem.

The original charter has been preserved and consists of two documents of the same date. These charters contain a large number of provisions written in Latin (69 articles according to a classification introduced by Huizinga (1911) and maintained to this day) covering a variety of areas of law.

The city charter of Haarlem belongs to the so-called Brabant-Dutch affiliation of city charters. When Haarlem received its city charter in 1245, it drew heavily on that of Den Bosch (which in turn drew on that of Leuven). Subsequently, the Haarlem city charter served as an example for Delft (1246) and Alkmaar (1254). Through Alkmaar, it continued to be copied - until the fifteenth century - mainly north of the Spaarne River. In total, there are 24 cities that have approximately the same city charters, both in content and size.

Physical Description

Parchment (L: 22 x W: 35 cm), marred by a sewn tear, inscribed by an
unidentified hand (possibly an Egmond abbey hand) in an ornamental
script (in this case, an unorganic combination of elements from the
diplomatic minuscule, book hand (some lombarde-like majuscules) and notula) and bearing the count’s seal.