Image: UK Parliament via Flickr CC
The earliest description of the ceremony in which the Commons are summoned to the Lords by Black Rod comes in a notebook that belonged to Sir Thomas Duppa, who filled the position between 1683 and 1694, and had been deputy to his predecessor, Sir Edward Carteret, from 1675. The description is part of a set of procedural notes dated 14 August 1679, presumably given to Duppa in anticipation of his having to fulfil the role at the opening of the new parliament, only recently elected. The note reads:
When the King is sett [seated], either he or my Lord Great Chamberlain gives you Order to call the House of Commons. Then you go immediately, and when you come there, you knock with the end of your rod four or five times, and when the Doors are open, and [you] come in as high as…
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Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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