ANCIENT AND MODERN FORESTRY 9 
when kings were at last evolved and one ulti- 
mately obtained the sovereignty, he found him- 
self the overlord of many forests scattered 
throughout different parts of England. 
There is a sort of general popular opinion 
that the introduction of forest laws into Britain 
only took place with the advent of the Normans, 
but this is probably due to the fact that the 
laws only became harshly stringent and cruel 
under Norman rule. King Ine’s laws are said 
to date back as far as a.p. 690, but the first 
reputed regular Statute relating to forests in 
England is the Norman forgery known as the 
Charta Canuti, or Charter of Canute the Dane, 
said to have been granted at a Parliament held 
at Winchester in a.p. 1016. 
Lord Coke’s suspicions as to the authenticity 
of Canute’s Statute have been shown by Stubbs 
and Liebermann to be well founded. It seems to 
have been a forgery intended to make the harsh 
and cruel Norman laws seem less of an innovation 
than they really were. There was, however, this 
great difference, that previous to the Norman Con- 
quest in 1066 the forests were never held in such 
strict veneration, nor governed by such savage laws, 
