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series advisers Rosemary Horrox and Simon MacLean

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Andrew Brown and Graeme Small Court and civic society in the Burgundian Low
Co1111triesc. 1420- l 520
John H. Arnol<I and Pete Biller Heresy a11d i11quisitio11 i11 Fra11ce, 1200-ISOO
Martin Beale Mo11asticism in late me,lieval E11gla11d, c.JS00-1535
David Jones Friars' Tt1les: Thirteenth-century e.rnnpla from the British Isles
Graham Lou<l lloger I/ ,wd the m,1ki11gefthe Kingdom efSici(1·
T.J.H. McCarthy Chronicles efthe fllvestiture Contest: Fruto{fefMichelsberg and his
co11ti11uators
A.K. McHardy The reign ef Uichard II
Simon MacLcan l li.<tory a11d politics in late Caroli11gia11 and Ottoni,w Europe: The
Chronicle efUtgi110 efPriim a11d Adalbert ef ,\.tagdeburg
Anthony Musson and Edward Powell Crime, law and ;wiely iii /he later Middle Ages
Andrew Rabin The political wniings efArchbishop Wu!f,ta11 (!{York
I. S. Robinson Eleventh-century Germany: The Swabit1n Clironicles
I. S. Robinson Tiu Amwls efLampert efHtrsfield
Craig Taylor ./0011 efArc l,a Pure/le
Diana Webb Saints aud ciltes i11 medieval /!al)'
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TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

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TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
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Trevor Dean The loW11s oflia{y III the later Middle Ages
John Edwards The .Jews III Western Europe, I +<X>-1600
Paul Fouracre and Richard A. Gerberdmg Late Merov111gia11 Fra11a: llutory· a11d
hagiography 6#>- 720
Chris Gi\'en-W1lson Chronicles ofthe Revolullon 1397- 1 l-00: Tiu re1g,r of Richard II
P. J.P. Goldberg ll'omm in E11gla11d, r. 1275-1525
Janet Hamilton and Bernard Hamilton Christian duahsl heresies m the Byzanti11e world,
c. 65<>-c. I 1.50
,~ i.h0';;,
Rosemary Horrox The Black Death ~ -9··
Da\'id Jones Fr1ars' Taks: Th1rtemth-renlrtry e.umpla from the British Isles
.::::, ~
Graham A. Loud and Thomas Wiedemann The history oftht ~>·rants ofSiciry fry 'Hugo
Fa/ra11dus', 1153-69
A. K. M,·Hardy The mgr, ofllirhard ll: From m111or1ty to {yran11y 1377-97 .,<.... I\,
Simon Mac Lean H1story and politics III late Carolmgian and Ot10111an Europe:
The Chronicle of Regino ef Priim a11d Adalberl ofMagdeburg
Anthony Musson and EJwar<l Powell Crime, law and $OCitl)' i11 the later Middk Ages
-,0-;.
I\ , ~r, \.\
~ ";'"-l
Janet L. Nelson The A1111al.< ofSt-Berti11: .Vi11th-unl111)' histories, volume l
Timothy Reuter The Annals ofFulda: .Vinth-cmtury histories, volume ll
R. N. Swanson Catholic Ei,gl"11d: Faith, religion a1U! observa11ce before the Reformation
Elisabcth van Houts The Normans i11 Europe
Jennifer Ward H-'omm qfthe 1'~nglish nobility a11dgentry· 1066-1500

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Copyright© Gervase Rosser 201G

The right of Gervase Rosser to be identified as the author oftlus work has been asserted CONTENTS
by hnn in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Published by Manchester UniYcrsity Press Acknowledgements page ix

Altrincham Street, Manchester MI 7JA Editorial note and abbreviations 1K

'
w ww. manchestcrun i versi cypress.co. uk
Introduction
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library I: History and praise S2
I. Legends of the origins of cities S4
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-l'ublit·ation Data applied for 2 . Description of London c.1173 S6
S. Chester's divine plan 44
4. A poem in praise of Winchester c.1400 46
5. The mayor of Exeter appeals to history 1447--48 46
6 . History and civic pride in Bristol 46
ISBN 978 o 7 IHO 4908 8 hardback 7. William Worcester on the cities of England c.1480 48
ISBN 978 o 7190 4909 5 paperback 8. An Italian visitor c.1500 49

First published 20 JG II: Urban growth 51

9. Chester in 1086 55
The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or acn1ra,y of URLs for any 10. Bury St Edmunds in 1086 58
external or third party internet websites referred to in this book, and docs not guaran- I I. Charter of Henry I in fa\'our of the citizens of London 59
tee that any content on such websites i.s, or will remain, arcuratc or appropriate. 12. The liberties and customs oflpswich 1200 61
IS. The foundation of New Salisbury 1228 64
14. Royal foundation of a new town 66
15. A monastic new town: Eynsham 121 5 66
16. Dispute over a guild merchant at High Wycombe 1223-24 68
17. Towns and their associations in the thirteenth century 70

Ill: Economic life 7S

I8. York civic ordmances I SO I 77
19. Admissions to the freedom of York m the fourteenth century 79
20. Craft ordinances of the tailors of York I 386--87 82
21. Ordinances for crafts at Bristol 85
22. Application of the regulations of a merchant guild 89
2S. Partnership between two metalworkers IS80s 89
24. Relations between masters and servants in the cloth trade at
Worcester 90
25. Apprenticeship 91
26. Women's rights to conduct a business 94
27. Women as dealers in the marketplace 94
Typeset in Monotype Bell by 28. Labour for hire 96
Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire 29. Contents of shops in London IS78, IS82 9G
Printed in Great Britain by So. A specialist industry: Nottingham alabaster 98
Bell & Bain Ltd, Glasgow
 CONTENTS CONTENTS
\'I vii

s 1. Advertising a new commodity in London c. I 4i9 100 70. Water supply at King's Lynn JSi8 183
32. Hawkers of goods at Winchester 101 71. Public hygiene in Nottingham 184
S.'S. Unofficial markets in London 102 72. Animals in the town 185
34. Internal trade: Southampton in the mid-fifteenth century !OS iS. Street-cleaning at Salisbury !Si
35. International trade: Hull in the fifteenth century 108 i4. Street furniture 188
36. The business of the merchant: William Cely 148i 11 I 75. Town cattle 189
i6. Fuel 1~9
IV: Social development
Si. A fourteenth-century merchant depicted on his tomb
SS. Two beggars die in London 1253
I JS
119
119
i7. The perception of decline: Winchester in the mid-fifteenth century
78. Paving the city streets :t
39. Child-stealing to aid a beggar I 3iS 120 VII: Tensions and violence 195
40. The life of the student 121 79. Monastery and town: Bury St Edmunds 1197 199
41. The Jewish communities and the crown 121 80. Complaint of the lesser burgesses of Oxford J 25S 201
42. The Jews of Oxford 12..? 81. Urban crime m the late thirteenth century 208
4S. Mo\'able goods ofinhab1tants of King's Lynn c.1285-90 124 82. Dispute between the merchant guild and the abbot of Bury St
44. Tax assessment at Shrewsbury IS 16 125 Edmunds 1304 209
45. The importance of reputation and trust !SI 83. Disturbance of the peace in Oxford 1306 212
46 . Social pretensions of the late fourteenth-century townsman and 84. Violence and crime in London 1s 11 213
woman 132 85. Students and townspeople at Oxford 1355 214
4i. Material values ot a fictional merchant c. 1390 134 86. Attack on Italians in London 1359 215
48. Material desire and spiritual values r. 1400 135 87. A guild at St Albans and the Revolt of 1381 216
49. Foreigners m English towns 1440, 1483 !Si 88. Revolt in Beverley I 38 I 82 2li
50. A poor suitor at Westminster and London 141 89. Interpersonal violence 219
90. Subversive fraternity ofjourneymen sad<llers of London 1396 221
V: Urban government 145 91 . Rebellious weavers of Coventry appeal to the figure of Lady
51. Customs of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the time of Henry I 148 Godiva 1495 223
52. The ward motes of London 151
53. Local jurisdiction in Norwich 156 VIII: Associational life 226
54. Sanctuary in the borough 158 92. A society of poetry and song in London c.1300 229
55. Exemptions from holding office in York 1476-i8 161 93. A penny brotherhood in Nottingham ISOi 233
.16. Defence of the city: the walls of Hereford 161 94. Guilds at Cambridge 234
5i. The town as a political stage: public executions c.1400 162 95 Ordinances of a guild at Lichfield 23i
58. Expenses of the mayor of Leicester 163 96. Building a guildhall in Canterbury 1438 2·1-2
59. The city of Coventry cultivates royal patronage 1451 165 97. Guild of the Lord's Prayer, York 243
60. Diplomatic relations: Hull 1464--65 166 98. Building the Thames bridges at Abingdon 246
61. Preparations for a royal visit to York 1483 167 99. Regulation of games 249
JOO. Festivities of the crafts at Bristol 2.50
VI: The environment and quality oflife 170
62. Building regulations in t\\elfth-century London 172 IX: Religion and culture 2.51
63. Harbour works at Bristol 1240 174 101. The fame ofa city shrine: William ofNonqch 254
64. A skinner commissions a new town house 1308 175 102. The Franciscans come to English towns 25i
65. Houses and shops in Cambridge li6 JOS. Franciscans arrive in Bury St Edmunds 259
66. Building shops at Westminster I .'162--63 liS l04. Rehcs m St Paul's steeple, London 260
6i. Ideas of public nuisance and private space in London li9 105. Urban \\ills
261
68. Clean water at Winchester 181 106. Craft patronage of civic religious ritual 264
69. Water sold in the street !SS 107. Guild charity
265
 CONTENTS
viii

268
108. Civic religion: blessed bread . .
269
109. Urban piety in stained glass: a pansh church m Y~rk
110. The piety of merchants: inscriptions at Long Melford church
270 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
272
111. Customary of the South""ark stews
274
112. Prostitution in London
11s. Moral regulation by secular authority
276 It is a pleasure to set on record my debt to Rosemary Horrox, who,
278 after inviting me to assemble a collection of sources on English medie,s.
114.
1 15.
Civic drama at York
Plays for Corpus Christi at Beverley
279
28S
val towns, extended infinite patience and tact to sustain the projectan1
116. 'Christ and the Merchants' from the Chester play cycle to ensure its eventual realisation. I am grateful both for her kindness
286
and for her shrewd editorial advice. A more extensive obligation is
Glossary 291 owed to generations of archivists who have preserved an invaluable
Suggestions for further reading treasury of medieval urban records, including those who perform this
294
Index service today, in defiance of diminishing resources. Equally selfless and
invaluable have been the labours of those earlier scholars who tran-
scribed and edited many of the sources of which excerpts are included
in the following pages. To them, also, my profound thanks are due. All
historians know that nothing is more important than the preservation
of the historical record, and that a society which loses the critical per-
spective to which history gives access is at grave risk. This book is
dedicated to the present custodians of our medieval archives.
Every effort has been made to obtain permission to reproduce copy-
right material, and the publisher will be pleased to be informed of any
errors and omissions for correction in future editions.
EDITORIAL NOTE INTRODUCTION

All medieval texts have been rendered into modern English. The orig-
inal language of each text is indicated at the end of the introductory
note. Where the immediate source is a manuscript or an untranslated
The urbanised landscape of England in the twenty-first century ls
the heir to a medieval experiment. After the collapse of the city-basdi
modern edition, the editor is responsible for the translation (whether empire of Rome in the fifth century, the medieval town was a fresh
from Latin - the medium of the vast majority of the records in ques- initiative, created and shaped by the cultural and commercial cur-
tion - or French or Middle English). In the case of sources in modern rents of its time. Although this point oforigin is partially obscured by
printed editions with a translated text, the editor has adapted this the subsequent layers of industrial growth and of more recent, post-
where necessary to modernise spelling and syntax and to remove the industrial adaptation, the historical roots of the modern city lie in the
fustian language of earlier versions (noted as 'revised by GR'). '1:he Middle Ages. The publication of this collection of written sources is
glossary on pp. 286-90 has been added to the same end: an astensk intended to encourage and facilitate the study of that medieval phase
against a word indicates its inclusion in the glossary. in the evolution of our towns and cities. The reader who samples the
texts in this volume will be struck by their diversity. In the period
Abbreviations represented by these documents - from the eleventh to the sixteenth
centuries England was already urbanised, in the sense that the pres-
CUHB D. Palliser (ed.), The Cambridge Urban History ef Britain, i, ence of towns was felt in all parts of the country, and touched every
600- I 540, Cambridge, 2000 aspect of life. As a result, the traces of medieval urban experience are
to be found in a great variety of historical sources. Each one of these
classes of evidence presents its own particular problems of interpre-
tation, which are highlighted in the section introductions and in the
notes on individual sources, together with the potential rewards of
casting the historian's net as widely as possible. Much that we should
like to know remains difficult to discern in the record, but, if we take
a multi-faceted approach, we find that the documentation is rich, and
that it invites us to deepen our understanding of this crucial phase in
the history of the city.

The material city

The student who engages with these written records, with a view to
thinking critically about their analysis and interpretation, is contrib-
uting to a distinguished body of scholarship which reaches back to
the antiquaries and local historians of the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries and to the amateur and professional historians of the nine-
teenth to the twenty-first. A new generation has fresh questions to
ask of the past, and imaginative use of the available sources can yield
answers which will add significantly to the field. To facilitate that
2 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION s

task, this volume focuses on the wealth and variety of the textual evi- and by their careful interpretation - than by any other particular mode
dence. But the researcher will not wish to ignore the further testimony of research. The collateral effects of economic boom have granted us a
of material traces of the medieval town, which circumstances have new insight into our urban past.
brought to our particular attention in recent decades, and_ on whi~h
For a longer period than this, of course, material traces of the urban
a preliminary comment is called for here. To awa~en our mteres: m
past have engaged historical imaginations. When, in the aftermath of
the past, there is no stimulus so powerful as a period of destruction.
the French Revolution and its attendant iconoclastic devastation 9f
After the end of the Second World War, the sites of bomb damage
monuments throughout France, Alexandre Lenoir made a collectic!-i
remained for years, for lack of resources, as testimony to the recent
of the remains and housed them in a new Musee des Monumenl<;
conflict. To some of these melancholy places there came, at the end
Franr;ais, visitors recorded a heady excitement in the presence of things
of each working day, crowds of Londoners who queued to see, for a
which seemed, in the romantic culture of the era, to transport them
penny, the latest finds of the archaeologists. Picking their w~y over the
back to 'those chivalric times': an age not only of knights and ladies
rubble - scattered with the purple flowers of the rose-bay willow-herb
but of the imagined glories of Paris and of the other 'bonnes villes' of
- visitors found their hopes for the future reinforced by newly discov-
medieval France. From the 1850s Nuremberg, even before the crea-
ered images of their common past. The greatest sensation was caused
tion of the state of Germany, attracted thousands to the Germanische
by objects from the Roman period; but thes~ :xcavations i~ adv~nce of
Nationalmuseum which, through displayed objects of all kinds, from
rebuilding multiplied immeasurably, in add1t1on, the material evidence
baronial and civic banners to a cast of the bronze lion in the market-
for London's history in the Middle Ages.1 Phoenix-like, the city's com-
place of Brunswick, aimed to mspire an as yet disunited population
plex past arose from the ruins of its conflagration. Con~erved _in the
with these tangible images of a shared medieval past, most splendid in
Guildhall Museum, these finds offered access to a prev10usly mcon-
its cities, perceived as harbingers ofa common freedom. The Musee de
ceivable urban history. Fresh devastation was brought to other parts
Cluny in Paris - in effect the successor to Lenoir's museum from the
of London, as also to the centres of many provincial English towns, by
1840s - retains to this day the atmosphere of those nineteenth-century
the prosperous last decades of the twentieth century, when the feverish
collections which aimed, by immersing the visitor in the secular and
construction of offices and shopping-centres briefly opened archaeo-
sacred objects of a past culture, from tapestries to forks and from shoes
logical windows on to the origins and sequence of urban develo~ment.
to pilgrim badges, to conjure from these ingredients a certain empathy
In consequence the Museum of London, successor to the Guildhall with the period:~
Museum and numerous sister institutions in the regions now house
collectio~s of material objects which can give substance to a medieval The 'material turn' - a recent call across a range of disciplines for
urban history unimaginable by earlier generations.1 The contents of the close study of material traces of past cultures rnnnot, therefore,
a late medieval musical instrument-maker's shop in Oxford; loaded be said to be wholly original. What has been introduced by recent
dice used by fraudsters in fifteenth-century London; a pet monkey scholar-,hip is a new degree of historical rigour in the interpretation of
discovered in a fifteenth-century merchant's house at Southampton objects, supported by an equal grasp of textual sources.'' The individual
these and countless other surviving objects have the potential, when archaeological find cannot speak unaided: what is needed is a contex-
properly contextualised, to illuminate town life '.n the med'.eval centu- tualised interpretation. Such an integrated approach has informed the
ries.5 Over the past halt~entury our understanding of medieval towns best work of recent decades on English medieval towns. Pioneering
everywhere has been transformed more by archaeological discoveries -
4 F. Haskell, History and Its /magu. Art and the Interpretation efthe Past, Ne" Ha, en and
1 W . F. Grimes, T/ze E.rcavation ef Homan a11d ,Wediaeval London, London, 1968.
London, 199j , pp. 236- 52, 282-7.
;i J. Clark, London 1/00-1600: The Archaeology efthe Capital City, London, !lOl I.
~ A Appadurat (ed.), The Social Life efThings: Commodittes m Cultural Perspecitve,
3 Oxford: B. Durham, 'Archaeological investigations in St Aldatcs, Oxford·, O.ro11iensia, Cambridge, 1986; D, Miller (ed.), Material Cultures: 117/r.v Some Thmgs Matier, Lon~on,
XLII, IH/7, pp. 8,':H.!03, at pp. 163-6 (incl. fig. 39}, 19•1-5: 198. London: M~seum of 1998; T. Hamling and C Richardson (eds), Everyda_y 01:!Jec'-!: M~d1eval a_ n d Early
London accession no. 84. 136. Southampton: C. Platt, Medieval Southampton: The Port Modern Material Culture and Its Meanings, Farnham, 20 I 0, R Gtlchnst, Medieval Life.
and Trading Commrmity, AD 1000-1600, London, 1973, p. 104. Archaeology and the L!fe Course, Woodbridge, •.ZO 12 .
4 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 5

and exemplary in this respect has been the comprehensive survey of this book is upon the period c. 1200-1500, it is important to be aware
Winchester.6 The potential of detailed topographical reconstruction of that the physical plans of many towns still bear the traces of that ear-
the physical shape of a medieval town and its constituent buildings and lier phase of growth, and that laws and customs recorded in the late
open spaces, drawing at once upon archaeological and documentary medieval centuries may in some cases transmit practices of consid-
evidence, has been further demonstrated by the project on Cheapside erably greater antiquity. There were many discontinuities in the his-
in London before the Great Fire.7 The city of York, whose medieval tory of later medieval towns, whose distribution, forms and functions
past has been no less dramatically brought into view by the revelations were altered by changing demographic and social circumstances. Non'i
of archaeologists, has benefited from collaborative study using similar the less, the student of towns in this later period should be aware df
historical methods.8 Urban geographers have convincingly emphasised their past. The extent of Anglo-Saxon urbanisation has been a revela-
the potential of historic maps to reveal distinct phases in a town's evo- tion of recent archaeology. References in Bede's early eighth-century
lution.9 New scholarship in the related fields of social history and the Ecclesiastical History to Canterbury and London as emporia were once
history of gender relations, economic history and the history of reli- thought to be rhetorical exaggerations: the discovery by excavation
gion has also brought fresh evidence and new questions to the particu- in each case of a substantial middle Saxon settlement, marked by evi-
lar context of urban studies."' The study of medieval towns has become, dence of both industry and international trade, has changed our picture
of necessity, a multi-disciplinary undertaking. Within that project, the both of the economy of pre-Conquest England and of the relation-
written documents which are sampled in this volume remain of funda- ship of emergent central places to political power. London was one
mental importance. of a number of English wics or trading centres at this period, which
also included Ipswich and Hamwic, later to evolve as Southampton:
The early medieval town material finds demonstrate their interconnections with similar places
on the farther side of the North Sea. 11 How far these international
Only from about 1200 do we have written materials concerning towns marketplaces were actively developed by royal decree is still a matter
created by townspeople themselves. Yet recent archaeological discov- for speculation, although royal grants of toll-rights in eighth-century
eries have made it abundantly clear that, by 1200, medieval urban life London indicate commercial awareness, and in a number of laws the
in this country was already old. Although the chronological focus of Saxon kings expressed a keen interest in towns (or burhs), whether
as points for the collection of taxes or as means to implement control
6 See especially: D. Keene, Survey ifMedieval Wmche.,ter, W inchester Studies, 2, 2 , ols,
in the localities. The early tenth-century Burghal Hidage, which in
Oxford, 1985 The survey began in 1961, and is ongoing Significant precedents the context of the Viking raids listed arrangements for the defence
for the topographical work of this project were the model documentary studies of of royal centres (not all of which actually were or became towns) in
W Urry, Canterbury under the Angevm Kmgs, London, 1967; and H. E. Salter, Survey
ifOxfard. I! vols, Oxford, 1969.
the west midlands and the south-west, is a further indication of royal
interest in the potential of such places. After the Norman Conquest,
7 D. Keene and V. Harding, Histoncal Gazetteer if London before the Great Fire, i,
Cheapsule, London, 1987 . the royal Domesday Book of 1086 would reinforce these links, showing
8 S. Rees Jones, York: The Makmg ofa City /086- 1350, Oxford, 2014; P. V. Addymann the crown's deep concern with the construction of urban castles and
(ed.), The Br1t1sh Atlas ifHistoric Towns, vol. 5, York, 2015. with the military obligations of strategically positioned towns [9],
9 D. M. Palliser, T . R. Slater and E. P. Dennison, The topography of towns 600-- [ IO]Y The fortifications imposed on many towns at this period were
1300', in CUHB. pp. 153- 86; M. D. Lobel et al. (eds), The British Atlas if Historic
Towns, London, 1969-.
motivated not by a benign desire to protect urban populations but
I O C. Dyer, Making a Livmg 111 the Middl.e Ages: The Peopl.e ifBritain 850-1 .,20, London,
2002; P. J. P. Goldberg, W o=n, Work, and Lift Cycle in a Medieval Economy: Women 11 G. Astill, 'General survey 60(}-ISO(J'; D. M . Palliser, T. R. Slater and E. P. Dennison,
in York and Yorkshire c.JS00-1520, Oxford, 1992; D. M. Hadley (ed.), Masculinzty 'The topography of towns 600-1 :lO<J'; D. Keene, 'London from the post-Roman
m Medieval Europe, London, 1999; R. H. Britnell, The economy of British towns pe riod to 130(J°, all in CUJIB, pp. 2 7-4H, 153- B(l, 187-2Hi.
1300--1540', in CVHB, pp. s IS SS; N. P. Tanner, The Church in Late Medieval 12 J. Campbell, ' Power and authority 600-1300', CUHB, pp. 51- 78; S. Kelly,
Norwich 1370-1532, Toronto, 1984; T. R. Slater and G . Rosser (eds), The Church in 'Trading privileges from eighth...::entury England', Early Medieval J-;urope, i, 199~.
the Medieval Town, Aldershot, 1998. pp. 3--'28.
6 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 7

by the determination to control them. Typically, the castle mound at documents of a kind not available for the earlier period, as additions or
Oxford, erected after the Conquest by its new Norman lord, rests on overlays in a landscape already well endowed with urban - albeit for
top of the crushed remains of earlier houses and shops. 13 The charged the most part small - central places.I''
political connection between towns and royal power was close from the
beginning, and would remain so throughout the Middle Ages and into
modern times. The Anglo-Saxon nobility, also, whether motivated by The late medieval town as a histon·cal subject
economic or cultural reasons, manifested an active interest in towns, !he source materials gathered in this book, therefore, which rar1ge
anticipating what would be a significant pattern of aristocratic urban m date from the late eleventh century to the early sixteenth, telf a
patronage in the later medieval period.1·1 Whatever the strength of eco- story with a significant prehistory. Although far less well-documented
nomic forces, the character and pace of urbanisation would always be and still only partially understood, the Anglo-Saxon town, in its
conditioned by its political context. diverse forms, would persist as a presence and an influence upon its
The other key to the pre-Conquest development of towns in England post-Conquest descendant. By the thirteenth century, when series of
was the Church. The cities of the Roman hegemony had ceased to func- documents begin to survive which were generated by townspeople
tion by the fifth century, and, where certain of these were subsequently themselves, the post-Roman reinvention of urban life had already
selected by bishops of the Roman Church to establish their sees, it may taken place. In the past generation we have come to realise that the
be inferred that their choice was in part an ideological one, motivated half'.-millennium between 700 and 1200 witnessed one of the most
by the prestige which continued to attach to these largely abandoned experimental and creative periods in the history of the post-classical
yet monumental witnesses to a former power. The ecclesiastical pres- city. But the last medieval centuries of the English town, from 1200 to
ence alone, however, does not appear to have sufficed to trigger the 1500, are also rich in interest; and it is an interest which in this period
urban regeneration of Canterbury, York or Gloucester: royal or aris- can be deepened not only by the finds of archaeology but in the new
tocratic and commercial functions were rather to the fore in these and light of a great wealth of surviving documentation. It is the purpose of
similar cases.1.5 More substantially responsible for catalysing urban this book to present a range of that late medieval evidence, and to draw
growth in the middle and late Saxon period were the new, strategically attention both to the challenges which it presents to interpretation and
situated churches known as minsters. The material needs and pastoral to the potential rewards of its study. The documents introduced here
functions of the small communities of minster priests, often established have been chosen both for the interest of their particular content and
in the first instance by royal and aristocratic patrons, have been shown in order to exemplify some of these issues of historical analysis. The
to have brought into being an extensive network of new marketplaces extracts which are reproduced on the following pages sketch in outline
and centres of population, required in the first instance to sustain the the history of the late medieval English town. Our principal concern,
churches themselves and subsequently taking on a partially independ- however, is to introduce the reader to the variety, the difficulties and
ent urban life of their own. The topographical work which has estab- the potential of the surviving written evidence. The history of medieval
lished the existence of this substantial category of small late Saxon t?wns continues to attract researchers, and the subject is now impres-
towns underlines the need for the historian to see the 'new' town devel- sively served by scholarly monographs on individual places and on
opments of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, which are recorded in particular civic themes. But an accessible collection of printed primary
sources for the study of English towns in the period has been lacking."

13 T. G . Hassall, 'E'lca\'ations at Oxford Castle, 19HS-19iS', OI0111ensia, XLI, l!Ji6, pp.

16 J. Blair, 'Small towns 600-1 SOO', in CUHR, pp. 245-70; J. Blair, The Church in A11glo-
!lS2- S08, at pp. 25 3-4.
Saron Somo , Oxford, 12005, eh. 5.
14 R. Fleming, 'Rural elites and urban communities in late Saxon England', Past a11d
17 l'or a collection of l'.atin. texts on early British urban history see S. Reynolds, W. de
P resent, CXLI, 19!lS, pp. S--'26.
Boer and G: Mac N1oca1ll (~-ds), Select Tuts on British and Irish Urban History before
I 5 I) A. Hinton, 'The large towns 600-l!lOO', in CUHR, pp. 217-4:l; N. Baker and the_mid Th1rte'}ltl, Cent11?'• Elenchus Fontium Historiae Urbanae, vol. ii, part 2 ,
R Holt, Urban Growth and the Meduroa/ Church· Gloucester and Worcester, Aldershot, Leiden, 1988 For a selection of documents on the medieval town in Western Europe
2 00.~. as a whole, see M. Kowaleski (ed.), Medieval Towns. A Reader, New York, 2008.
8 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION
9

A number of the texts included in this book are translated into modern ?fthe m~tropolis of London - was not so much highly concentrated as
English from manuscript sources. Many others were first edited in 1t was widely spread.
the publications of local and scholarly record societies. The point of
gathering them here is to give them greater visibility and to present
them in the wider context of a diverse collection, thereby provoking Legal and constitutionalframeworks
fresh questions about their value and meaning. Medieval towns have Our understanding_of our,subject ,~ill be shaped by the evidence "'le
not lacked the attention of scholars; but their historical records have c~~ose. ~o call to witness. fh~ multi-faceted and pluralistic approac1r
yet much more to reveal about the life experiences of their inhabitants. \\ h1ch 1s recommended by this book has not always been in favouJ.
The definition of a town with which historians work is a settlement The first scholarly i_nvestigations into medieval towns drew primarily
characterised by a concentration of people, of whom the majority are up~n legal records, m order to clarify the distinctions of formal status
dependent on non-agrarian acti,·ity for their living and in which a ~~1ch were taken to d_ifferentiate urban settlements. The approach was
diversity of crafts and professions is practised. Its raison d'etre as a mtormed by ass~mptw~s ab?ut the role which had supposedly been
central place will depend upon particular administrative, economic or played_by towns m the historical development of personal liberties and
military functions, or some combination of these. This is essentially a collective representation. In the work of Charles Gross, Mary Bateson
qualitative, not a quantitative definition, and it allows for a wide diver- ~nd others at the ~urn of the twentieth <.entury, this approach was
sity of scale. While precise figures cannot be known, it is clear that the nnmensely productive, especially in the identification and edition of
size of English urban populations in the late medieval period ranged urban leg~! te~ts, many ?f which still invite closer study.21 The work
from a narrow apex to a wide base. Only the metropolis of London, of ~hese h~st?nans remains of fundamental importance, even though
with a population in 1300 which has been most reliably estimated at their conv1ct1ons about the supposed historical evolution of democratic
eighty thousand or a little more, could be measured alongside the other ~rinciples led them_at times to accord an imaginary precision to par-
great cities of Western Christendom, including comparable centres tlcular_ lega_l terms in the documents.2~ To scholars of their epoch and
in the Low Countries, such as Arras and Ghent, with which London formation, 1t was a natural assumption that what made a town in the
had economic ties. At the same period a small category of still larger first. instance ~as its charter of liberties. There is, after all, some justi-
cities was represented by Paris, Venice and Milan.18 A considerable fication_ for this view in the evident concern of groups of townspeople
gap separated London, which by the thirteenth century had effectively t~ acquire such formal g~ants o_f privilege. The early Anglo-Norman
established its claim to be the capital of the English kingdom, from kmgs ma~e such concessions with great reluctance; but the financial
Bristol and Norwich, each of which is likely to have contained upwards ~eeds of~1chard I and John in the years around 1200 prompted them to
of twenty thousand townspeople in the early fourteenth century. A fur- issue no f_e~er tha~ fifty urban charter grants [12]. Thereafter, Henry
ther dozen English towns numbered between about five thousand and III ~nd his 11nmed1ate successors were wary of urban bids for freedom,
ten thousand inhabitants at the same period. 19 By far the largest cate- until royal weakness in the fifteenth century again opened the door
gory was that of the small towns of fewer than two thousand people:
it has been suggested that there were as many as seven hundred such Verhulst, Ghent, 1995, pp. 169-85; C. Dyer, 'Small towns 1270-1540' in CUiiB pp
505-Si. ' • .
places."0 English medieval urbanisation - with the important exception
21
C. G_ross, The ?ild ,Wtrchant: A Co11tributio11 to Briti.ih M1111icipal History, Oxford,
I 8 D. Kt.-cnc, Cheapside before the GrPat 1-'irt, Lon<lon, I f)85, pp. l!.>-'.lO; D. Kt.-cnc, 1890, M Bateson (ed.), Borough Customs, 2 vols, Selden Society XVIII 190-l ·
'Mc<licval Lon<lon an<l Its n:gion·, I.ondo11 .Jo11n,a/, XIV, 1989, pp. 99-111; D. Keene A. Ballard and J.• Tait (eds), British Borough Charters Jfl/6-/S0i, Ca;nbridg~, 192:l;
in CUHB, pp. 195--n. M._Weinbaum, 1 he lnrorporation of &roughs, Manchester, 1957; M. Weinbaum
Brillsh Borough Charter., 1307-/660, Cambri<lge, 19-lS. '
19 E. Rutledge, 'Immigration and population growth in early fourteenth-century 22
Norwich: evidence from the Tithing Roll', Urban History rearbook, 1988, pp. 15-SO, A dead ~nd of legal analris was r~acl.~cd in _J. ·i:ait, The Medieval English Borough,
proposed a population for Norwich in I S:!5 of 25,000. Man,chcster, 19S6. ~ce G. H Martin, fhe English borough in the thirteenth cen-
~ury [ 1965], rcpr. m R. Holt a~d G. Rosser (eds), The M,dieval Town, London,
!10 C. Dyer, 'How urbanised was medieval England?', in J.-M. Duvosquel an<l E. Thoen
.~90
d: PP· 2 ~ 8 , at PP· S~.l; and S. Reynolds, A11 Introduction to the History ofEnglish
(eds), Peasa11ts and Towmmen i11 Medieval E11ropt: Studies i11 ll011orem Adriaa11 me teval 1 owns, Oxford, 19i7, pp. 91-1 Ii. ·
10 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTHODUCTION
II

to more substantial concessions. The default, at all periods, was strict a ~roto-council. A close reading of the charter texts can discern the
royal control, which the Tudor monarchs, in their turn, would reapply eviden~e- of pre-legal organisation amongst the townspeople. Thus
with avidity. The local desire for a significant measure of autonomy ~he poht1cal leaders ?f Oxford, successfully petitioning for a charter
was manifest not only in the laborious and expensive acquisition of m I I 9 I, already claimed to speak for 'all the citizens·.~• A similar
the charters themselves but in such communal movements as those of ~rgument ~pplies ~o the many late medieval royal charters of urban
London in the 11 S0s, the I I 80s and the 1260s. However, the English mco:porat1on, which supposedly gave the recipient communities a
crown was only too able to extinguish such expressions of resistance s~ec1al legal status, although man~ of the rigl~ts which they specificld
to royal power, and the effectively independent communes of northern \\e:e owned by the towns already.~5 But notwithstanding this qualifl-
Italy and the Low Countries found only distant echoes in this country. cat1on, we should not dismiss the evidence of the charters which were
No royal grant ever conceded complete self-government to a town, evidently desi_rable ~n?~gh to be petitioned and paid f~r. The very
and one that showed itself rebellious was likely to have its privi- process of t~e1r acqu1s1t1?n was a political education for townspeople.
leges remo\'ed. Following its involvement in the rising of Simon de R~cent studies have redirected our attention to the political culture
Montfort, London found itself taken into the king's hands, and its of the towns, where the rhetorical language and the physical form
mayoralty suspended, between 1265 and 1270 and again between 1285 of charters - no less significant evidence, for the attentive historian
and 1299. But despite the difficulties, both London and many other than their constitutional content - helped to structure both the citi~
cities were prepared to fight hard and to pay well for charters which, zens' sens: ofid:ntity and the discourse of public life.~u Paradoxically,
with often finely illuminated initials and impressive seals, would be dis- the very mtr~s•v~ness of the crown's control over the legal rights
played on formal occasions as the material embodiment of the political and fiscal obligations of the late medieval towns was a stimulus to
community [I 1].is With variations in detail, the common ambition of the self-conscious identity and responsibility of the citizens. Self-
townsmen requesting a charter - and it is evident that each case of a goverm~ent in_ t_he k!ng's name could be experienced locally as an
grant originated in such a request, and perhaps a phase of negotiation e~press1on of c1v1c pride. Questioned by royal justices in 122<r-I, the
with the king's legal advisers - was a measure of self-regulation, which citizens of London were round in their response: 'And besides it is the
might be secured through the right to hold a guild merchant: a gath- ~ord's _c?urt, not the lord, who ought to make the judgemen~.'~; The
ering of leading traders to manage the secular affairs of the town. A 1mpos1t10n of royal taxation called for local discussion about the status
guild of this kind commonly preceded the emergence in the thirteenth ~f those who _should be required to contribute, and consequent reflec-
century of a more fully empowered city council, headed in the grander tio~ on_wha~R•~ mean~ to be a q~alified citizen with rights but also with
cases by an elected mayor [16]. A further request of petitioners for obhgat1ons. fhere 1s something for the historian to learn, therefore,
charters was for the right of the 'borough farm' (firma burgz), a com-
pounded regular payment in lieu of miscellaneous dues and obligations 114
R. ~- C. Davis'. "An Oxford charter of 1191 and the beginnings of municipal fre~~
owed to the crown. The desired rights also included a borough court dom, O.romens1a, XXXIII, 1968, pp. SS--65.
for the local settlement of property and trade disputes. What were 25
S. Reyn?lds, The his!o:y of the idea of incorporation or legal personality: a case
sought, in sum, were limited rights of 'self-government at the king's of fallacious teleology, 111 her lckas and Solidarities efthe Medieval Laity, Aldershot,
1995, separately pag111ated.
command'.
!16 C. Liddy, lf'ar, Politirs a11d Finance in Lale Medieval English Towns Bristol rork and
Earlier historians sometimes attributed excessive significance to these the C~own, 1350-1400, Woodbridge, ~005; L Attreed, The King's Towns. Identity and
grants, which can often be shown to have done little more than to Survival in Late Medieval English &rortghs. New York, 200 1.
2 7 S. Reynolds, Kingdoms and Commu11ities i11 Wrstem Europe 900-ISOO 2nd ~n
ratify exi<;ting practice. Behind e\'ery petition for rights there must Oxford, 1997, p. 59. • ' e •
have operated a pre-existing organisation in the form of a guild or 28 C Liddy
. • •'"Bee. war of gyle. ·111 borugI1..: taxation
· an d po1·1t1cal
· discourse in late
medieval Engllsl~ !ow~s·,. m A. Ga111berini, J.-P. Genet and A. Zorzi (eds), The
2S Campbell, 'Power and the state·; D. M. Palhser, To\\ns and the English state, Language~ ef Poltllcal ,\oc!ety: Wes/em Europe, I lth_ t 7'1' Centuries, Rome, 2011, pp.
1066-150Cl", in J. H. Maddicott and D . M Pal11ser (eds), The Medieval Stau: Essays 46l-85; Liddy, 1//ar, Po/tiles and Fi11a11ct, p. 58; Reynolds, Kzngdoms and Communities
Presented lo .James Campbell London, .WOO, pp. 1117-'~.'I p. 180. •
12 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION JS

not merely from the fact of fiscal burden but from the evidence in galvanised the active involvement not only of the elites but also of the
the records of taxation concerning the way in which neighbourhoods unenfranchised.5 ~
determined how and upon whom the levy should fall [48], [44].
The representation of towns in national assemblies was initiated for
royal convenience, townsmen being summoned regularly to parlia-
Economic.functions of large and small towns
ment from 1275 (separately from the county MPs until JS5S). But If the eviden~~ of ch~rters and urban law tends to give prominenfe
viewed from another perspective, attendance gave opportunities for to those _quaht1es ':h1ch_ s~parated a town from its surroundings, tte
lobbying in the civic interest. Relations between the throne and the sources for economic act1v1ty demonstrate, by contrast, the many waJs
urban periphery could be imperious: Henry VII in 1495 summoned the in which urban society was integrated with its larger environment.
mayor of York to Greenwich in order to inform him that, if he could Earlier historians appreciated that the town was not to be understood
not prevent rioting, ·1 must and will put in other rulers that will rule as autonomous. Marx knew this, and the father of English medieval
and govern the city according to my laws.'i9 But when the common urban history, F. W . Maitland, despite the legal bias of his inter-
council of Exeter was at odds with the dean and chapter of the cathe- est in the subject, placed it firmly in a larger context of fields, rural
dral over jurisdictional rights in the mid-fifteenth century, it was nat- lanclowners and the produce of agriculture.53 Scholars have lately re-
ural that the mayor should ride to London in order to gain audience emphasised the need to set the medieval town within its region. The
with the king's chancellor, at which he reported to his councillors that argument has implications not only for our understanding of the urban
he was greeted 'with laughing cheer' and promises of support [5].30 economy [S4], [75], [76] but also for analysis of social relations in
By adopting an eclectic approach to our sources, and by shifting the towns, which, although differently inflected, were characterised by the
camera-angle to consider them in different lights, we stand to gain an same issues of political hierarchy and class tension which pervaded the
enriched, more textured understanding of our historical subject. population at large. A monograph on Colchester by Richard Britnell
The difficulties of the mayor of Exeter in dealing with the jealously and another on Exeter by Maryanne Kowaleski, together with the pro-
guarded privileges of the cathedral were symptomatic of the universal ject 'Feeding London·, have exploited the evidence of agrarian manors
jurisdictional fact that every town of any size was legally fragmented in order to comprehend the medieval town in its regional setting,
into the various territorial interests of its constituent lords. The char- identifying the hinterland as part of an urban economic area and posi-
ters of a city such as York gave a splendid outward appearance of tioning the towns themselves within a partially integrated network.s-.
unity which was belied by the internal maze of particular rights, and Such 'urban network analysis' has been undertaken for some time
especially by those of the Church. 51 Ecclesiastical urban estates could
be substantial, and built up with secular properties whose occupants
claimed immunity from the laws and impositions of the town council 3'2 G. Rosser, 'Conflict and political community in the medieval to" n: disputes between
[ 54] . The result was a continual wrangling over authority in the town clergy and laity in Hereford', m T. R. Slater an<l G. Rosser (eds), The Church III the
.'lftdieval Town, Aldershot, 1998, pp. '2o--+2.
- a condition which would persist in many cases until the Municipal
S3 'By all means let us study the gilds and all that is commonly regardt-<l as the con-
Reform Act of 1835. Once again our interest in the documentary evi- ~titutional side of hurghal history. But proprietary rights in lands and houses arc
dence of these jurisdictional disputes is justified by the facts that they important; rights of pasture were ,cry important.' F. W . Maitland, Township and
occasioned debates on the theme of political identity, and that they &rough, Cambridge, 1898, p. 50.
34 R. H. Britnell, Growth and Decline i11 Colchester, 1300-J,5.JS, Cambridge, 1986:
M. Kowaleski, Local Markets and Regional Trade i11 Medirval Euler, Cambridge, 1995;
29 A. Raine (ed.), York Civicllecord.<, ii, Yorkshire Archaeological Society Record Series, B. M. S._ Campbell, J. A. Galloway, D. Keene and M . Murphy, A Medieval Capital a11d
CIII, 1941,p. 115. Its Gram Supply: Agraria11 Prod11ctio11 a11d Distributio11 ,n the Londo11 !legion c./300,
London, 1993, J. A. Galloway, 'One market or many? London and the grain trade
:io S A. Moore (ed.), Letters a11d Papers if .!oh11 Sh,llmgford, Mayor if E.reur 1+47-50, of England', in J. A. Galloway (ed.), Trade, Urban H111terla11ds a11d Market Jnugratio11
Camden Society, 2nd series, ii, 1881, pp. 36-9. c./300-J~OO, London, 2000, pp. 23-42; R. H. Britnell, The Commeraalisatwn if
31 E. Miller, 'Medieval York', m The Victoria Cou11ty History if Yorkshire, The City if ~ngl!sh Society, 1000-1500, 2nd edn, Manchester, 1996, p. l ! 5; CUHB, part iv,
York, London, 1961, pp..Ul-1 W. Regional su n ·eys'.
14 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL F.NGLAND INTRODUCTION
15

also by Dutch and Belgian historians of the Flemish medieval cities?b only six hundred or so inhabitants, its court rolls from the late thir-
Northern Italy, which was the other most densely urbanised zone of teenth and early fourteenth centuries reveal a diversity of crafts and
late medieval Europe, invites similar study, although in that case the services and a market which functioned as a centre of exchange for
historiography has tended hitherto to remain more localised and frag- the surrounding countryside.:19 It is similarly from manorial account
mented.~ Even rural records, therefore, may have things of importance rolls that we learn about Buntingford, a small town in Hertfordshire
to tell us about the magnetic pull of the city upon the human and mate- promoted by its secular lords, who vested po~er in their tenants anp
rial resources of the countryside. enabled them to secure a royal market grant m 1360. Containing n)?
The break with a restrictive constitutional model has enabled histo- more than about S50 inhabitants in the early sixteenth century, thl
rians to bring into focus the numerous family of smaller towns, typi- place ~vas n?ne the less both urban and prosperous.'10 As many as half
cally lacking in substantial legal rights, relatively poorly documented, of all inhabitants of towns may have lived in such relatively modest
and therefore unnoticed by previous scholarship [ 15:. The e\.idence centres_oftrade. ~he seigneurial boroughs and urban estates (that is,
for their existence lies typically not in civic archives but amongst those directly subject to lay or ecclesiastical lords), precisely because
the manorial records of the predominantly rural estates of secular they lacked the regulation and by-laws which would have been the
and ecclesiastical landlords.~7 Many of these places were even smaller consequ~nce of a more !ndependent legal status, paradoxically enjoyed
than the urbanised minster settlements of Anglo-Saxon origin, and a potential measure ofhberty for economic initiative which they would
their arrival on the scene made a marked difference to the landscape. otherwise have been denied. Birmingham and Manchester, both of
Following upon initial studies by Eleanora Carus-Wilson and Rodney which grew from medieval industrial origins to their prominence in
Hilton, Christopher Dyer and others have demonstrated the role of the nineteenth century as manorial vills,• are dramatic instances of this
small towns in the economy as a whole, and the witness they bear to large class of unchartered towns:11
the penetration of the market into all parts of the English countryside Once we take account of the smaller towns, we are faced with the strik-
by the thirteenth century.' 8 An instance studied by Hilton is the west ing statistics that as many as one person in ten was a town-dweller in
midlands market town of Halesowen, founded in the mid-thirteenth England in 1200, and double this proportion - one person in five - in
century on its land by a monastic community. Although comprising lS00. The latter ratio may have dropped slightly by 1500; but, for the
period as a whole, the generalisation may be allowed that, given the
distribution of market centres, no part of the country was untouched
35 W . Prcvenier and W. Blockmans, The Burgundian Netherlands, Cambridge, 1986;
P. Stabel, Dwarfi among Gianls: The Flemish Urban Nt!work in tlu, [,al, Middle Ages, by the urban element:•~ Recent work on local markets, on personal
Lou,·ain, I99i. mobility an~ 0~1 communications in later medieval England suggests
56 But see the comparative studies of R. H. Britnell, The towns of England and that, even 1f eighty per cent of people still lived on the land, this
northern Italy in the early fourteenth century', Economic History Rroie-w, 2nd series, was already, to a marked degree, an urbanised society. The statement,
XLIV, 1991, pp. 21-55; an<l G. Chittolini, 'Urban population, urban territories,
small towns: some problems of the history of urbanization in northern and central however, calls for further clarification. This was not the urbanisation
Italy (thirteenth-sixteenth centuries)', in P. C. M . Hoppenbrouwers, A. Janse and
R. Stein (eds), Powtr and Persuasion: Essays on tht Ar/ ef Slate Building in Honour of
W. P. Blockma11s, Turnhout, 2010, pp. 227-ll. S9 Hilton, 'Small town society·.
Si For a critical introduction and selected examples of1nanorial records, see M. Bailey, 40
M. Bailey, 'A tale of two towns: Buntingford and Stan<lon in the later Middle Ages·
The English Manor. Selected Sources, Manchester, 2002. Journal efMediroul Hi.tlory·, XIX, 199:i, pp. 551-i 1. '
SS E. M . Carus-Wilson, 'The first half-century of the borough ofStratford-upon-A\'on· 41 R. A: Holt, The Early History ef the Town of Birmi11gham, Oxford, 1985; J. Tait,
[196 5], repr. in R. Holt and G . Rosser (eds), The Mediroul Town, London, 1990, pp. Medieval Manchester, Manchester, 1904; G. Rosser, 'The essence of ntcdie,·al urban
49-70; R.H. Hilton, 'Small town society in England before the Hlack Death' [1984], communities: the viii of Westminster, 1200-1540' [ I 984], rcpr. in R. Holt and
repr., in ibi<l., pp. 7 I-96; R. H. Hilton, 'Medieval market towns and simple com- G. Rosser {t-ds), The Medieval Tow11, London, 1990, pp. \! 16-Si.
modity production·. Past and Present, CIX, 1985, pp. S-23; E. Miller and J. Hatcher, 1-2 C. Dyer, 'A summing up', in J. A. Galloway (t-d.), Trade, Urban Hinterlands and
Medieval England. Towns, Commerce and Cr,ifls, London, 1995, p. 25i; C. Dyer, 'Small Market l~legralion c.1.'100-1600, London, 1!000, pp. IOS-9; Dyer, 'How urbanised
places with large consequences: the importance of small towns in England, ioc»- was_ medieval England~·; R. H. Brit nell, Britain and lrela11d 1050-J530. Economy and
1540', Historical Research, LXXV, 2002, pp. l-'24. Soaely, Oxford, 2004, pp. !148-50.
16 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 17

of central and north Italy in the period, characterised as these areas and thirteenth centuries were a time of increasingly rapid expansion
were by effectively autonomous cities enjoying extensive control and of both rural and urban settlements, building to a peak at which the
powers of exploitation over their respective hinterlands. Nor was it limitations of agricultural technology and the unequal distribution of
similar to Sicily, whose comparative deregulation gave effective licence its produce caused mounting social tension (instances are presented in
to localised urban investment and industrial innovation.45 The pros- Sections II and VII). For some, this age of urban opportunity brought
perity of the urban network in the late medieval Low Countries owed not only personal prosperity but the rewarding experience of contri~-
much to the relatively light hand of the Flemish counts and later of uting to collaborative public purposes in the civic sphere. To othe$.,
the Burgundian dukes.H In England, by contrast, the establishment the period of town growth brought disillusionment and suffering. Tlfe
before the Conquest of centralised royal power meant, as we have custumals• of English towns in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries
seen, that the towns would never acquire either the political liberties regularly note the arrangements for a burgess compelled by poverty
or the economic resources available to cities elsewhere. On the other to sell his town houses. 16 The majority, of course, never owned such
hand, the ability of secular and ecclesiastical landlords to exploit their property in the first place. As population mounted, food prices rose,
territorial resources as they pleased - a capacity strongly encouraged and those without ready access to cash - a condition which all too
from the thirteenth century by increasingly insistent royal demands readily befell the wage-labourers who made up a large proportion of
for taxation - made possible the proliferation of those small, seigneu- urban society - found themselves crushed by debt and hunger. As the
rial towns which, taken together with the rest, resulted in an urban documentary record makes clear, this was a boom time for the founda-
presence which was felt throughout the country. The relative density tion and enlargement of markets and towns - but (as has been the case
of this small-scale urbanisation seems to have been a distinctive fea- in other periods of rapid economic expansion) this did not necessarily
ture of central and southern England - the same level was not found make these places comfortable for the majority of their inhabitants.
in France, for example - and future research may bear out the sug- Once more, the historian needs to consider the evidence from more
gestion that it was a significant precondition of the later Industrial than one vantage point.
Revolution :'5 The ensuing demographic downturn would also impinge sharply on
the lives of the inhabitants of towns. Relatively crowded urban popu-
The quality of life lations were especially vulnerable to famine and plague, both of which
soon struck with horrific effect. The Great Famine of Is 15-21 carried
We should not, of course, blithely equate the multiplication of towns off an unknown but large proportion of town-dwellers.47 The Black
with the happiness and prosperity of their inhabitants. To say that Death which arrived in 1348 is agreed to have killed between a third
living conditions during the three centuries from 11200 were unstable and a half of those Ii\ ing in towns. ~ The plague remained endemic
is a euphemism. This period of shifting fortunes hinges on the crisis- throughout the rest of the medieval period, and this must be the princi-
ridden fourteenth century. The years around 1300 marked the climax pal reason that both global and urban population levels were kept stag-
of medieval population growth in Europe. By this time the urban struc- nant until the turn of the sixteenth century brought indications of what
ture in England was in place: particular centres would flourish or would be a lasting recovery:~' The variable but locally severe impact
decay, partly in response to regional shifts of the economy, but the
distribution of towns in the landscape by the late thirteenth century 46 Bateson (eel.}, Borough Cu.,tom.,, ii, pp 61-1-1.
was not to alter greatly before the Industrial Revolution. The twelfth 47 B. Harvey, 'lntroeluct,on: the "crisis" of the t!arly fourteen th century', in B. M. S.
Campbell (eel.), &fort the Black Death: Stt,dies 111 the 'Cmts' ef the Early Fourtemth
Century, Manchester, W9 I, pp. 1-2-l; \V. C. Jord!ln, The Great Famine: Northern
43 S. R.Epstein, 'Town anel country: economy anel institutions in late nwdieval Italy', Europe in the Early Fo11rtee11th Cmtury, Princcton, l 996.
Economic History Review, 2nd series, XLVI, 199S, pp. 453-77. 48 1. Hatcher, 'England in the aftermath of the Bla('k Death', Past a11d Presmt, CXLIV,
44 Prevcnier anel Blockmans, The Burgu11dia11 Netherlands; Stabel, Dwa,:ft among Gian/J. 1994, pp. ~ S5.
45 R. H. Hilton, English and Frmch Towns in Feudal Society. A Comparative Study, 49 For a critical review ot the sources, sec R. Horrox, The Black Death, Manchester,
Cambridge, 1992. 1994.
18 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 19

of warfare; a fifteenth-century shortage of precious metal for coinage; evidence may, however, lead us to question both this and indeed any
and a late medieval period of cooler summers and sharper winters each such crude generalisation. The picture is varied, and significance lies in
contributed further to the difficulties of the towns, although no single the detail of individual urban experiences. The economic consequences
generalisation can be made about the fortunes of all. Paradoxically, of urbanisation were, at any rate until the fifteenth century, more lim-
the first impact of the plague stimulated an unprecedented flood of ited than might be expected. Certainly, these concentrated, dependent
migration to the towns on the part of those who sought ~o benefit populations made their presence felt. The research on the sources ~f
from rising wage levels: the property records of most E_nghsh tow~s grain needed to supply the London market has shown the existence~
between !350 and the turn of the next century bear witness to this 1300 of a metropolitan zone which affected agricultural systems eve'1
pressure of demand, evident in rising rents and specula~ive building so far away as the east midlands. Evidence from Exeter and Newcastle
[66]. But from early in the fifteenth century the same senes of sources suggests that provincial towns had, to this extent, their own more local
show that the growth could not be maintained: falling revenues and spheres of economic influence. 5~ But the economic evidence in general
gaps in rentals tell an unequivocal story of a reduc~d and ~tagnant does not indicate that levels of consumption in English towns (most
population. Civic petitions for relief from royal taxation, which were of these being small, as we have seen) sufficed by that date to bring
naturally exaggerated and must be read with due caution, tell a partly about major changes in agrarian organisation. Nor did the age of major
convincing story of decayed houses and failing industry. Archaeo~ogy urban expansion, to 1300, see marked specialisation of urban crafts:
and archives bear out the truth of at least some of these complaints. there were regional differences of emphasis but, although larger towns
The petition of the citizens of Winchester in 1452 appears to ~ound had more crafts than others, the diversity of recorded trades is broadly
up the number of houses alleged to have been abandoned, but gives a similar across the range (see the examples in Section III). Before the
fair impression of their distribution, and a 'remarkably accurate' list fifteenth century, also, there is only very limited evidence of urban
of seventeen ruined churches in the city [77]:'0 There can be no easy production of goods for di1,tant markets or for significant profits. The
generalisation about 'urban decline' in the late ~iddle Ages, ~nd the export of cloth during the long thirteenth century made the personal
problems of the period are best explored und~r different he_admgs, as fortunes of a mercantile elite. But for the most part the craftsmen and
they are in this book. None the less, the halving of the na~10nal pop- women of the earlier towns operated at a modest level of production,
ulation between the early fourteenth century and the mid-fifteenth for low levels ofreturn.58 We should be careful, therefore, while recog-
unquestionably reduced overall productivity:~1 The questions which nising their micro-economic significance, not to exaggerate the differ-
should concern the historian who scans the late medieval evidence are ence which the towns made at the macro-economic level before 1300.
how far adaptation to changing circumstances may have enabled some The fifteenth century, by contrast, would see at least a relatively
town-dwellers to exploit new opportunities for material gain; and what greater differentiation of urban industry, especially in the cloth trade.
effect these changes in demography and economy may have had upon The older cloth-producing towns adapted to contracting and shift-
urban culture. ing markets by concentrating on better-quality woollens: York would
In very broad terms, the circumstances might seem on the face ?f become known for its broadcloths, Norwich for its worsteds, Coventry
things to have favoured the economic strength of th~ tow~s more m for its blue woollen cloths and its caps. Some of these products were
the years before 1300 than afterwards. Closer consideration of the ~raded over long distances: russet cloth from Colchester found buyers
m the towns of the Baltic and the Mediterranean. To follow such devel-
.SO Keene, Wi,uhester, i, pp. 97-8; CakndarefPatent Rolls 1+16-52, p. 80; \V. H. Stevenson opments, the historian must consult the records of customs officials
(ed.), Calendar ef Records efthe Corporation efGloucester, Glouc:ster, I ~9S, nos 58-9, at the sea-ports, and the correspondence of agents working on behalf
cit. B. Dobson, 'Urban lkclinc in late medieval England' [1977.J, rcpr. rn R. Holt and
G. Rosser (eds), The Medieval Town, London, 1990, pp. 265- 86, at p. 2i6.
51 D. M . Palliser, 'Urban decay revisited', in J. A. F. Thomson (ed.), To= and 52 Galloway, 'One market or many?'; Kowaleski, Local MarA·ets and Regional Trade;
Townspeople in the Fifteenth Century, Glouccste_r, 1988, pp. 1- 21; S. R ~ig,by,..Urba~ M. Threlfall-Holmes, Monts and Markets Durham Cathedral Prio')· H60-1520
Oxford, 2005 , p. 226. '
population in late medieval England: the evidence of the lay subs1d1es, Eamomu
History Review, 2nd series, LXIII, 2010, pp. S9S-417. 5S Britnell, Britai11 a11d Ireland, pp. 15 l-'2.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION
20 21

of international merchant companies [85], (86]. Newly emergent mas_s of demand for the products of industry. But it has been com-
cloth towns in the W est Riding (Halifax and Leeds), the south-west pellingly argued that, amongst the reduced population of both town
(Stroud and Mells) and East Anglia (~avenham _and Long Melfor~) and ~ountryside in fifteenth-century England, there was emerging a
can be cited as instances of commercial adaptation and technologi- relatively prosperous class of peasants and artisans who, if they could
cal advance. In these and other cases, the new centres of production, not amount to a mass market, none the less provided a stimulus for the
although initially rural in character, soon developed the characteristics diversificatio~ of_ production of material goods. For this economicall3
(including the documentary records) of small _tow!"1s. Bot_h older and successful mmonty, the reduced demographic pressure created ne\'
newer cloth-producing towns made some contribution durmg the long possibilities for financial investment and social self-advancement: \
5
fifteenth century to the early stages of proto-industrialisati~n. ·• Yet development noted with some irony by contemporaries [ 46]. With the
even in this sector, there did not appear a class of merchant investors reduction of demographic pressure, basic living costs (both food and
willing or able to make structural changes to the organisa~ion of indus- rents) became lower, freeing cash for the purchase of small material
try. For a variety of reasons, including the demo~raph1c slump a~d luxuries beyond the reach of men and women of similar status in pre-
the reorientation of European trade, the most prominent merchants m vious generations. The increased value of labour is evident in a broad
fifteenth-century English towns struggled to expand their c~pital ~r increase in craftsmen's wages: to give an indication of this, whereas
to establish lasting dynasties.55 It is possible that the economic ~on:11- around 1300 a carpenter typically earned 4d a day, a century later, in
nance of the metropolis, to which it is noticeable that many_provmc1al the cont~xt of population decline, the rate was more commonly 6d. At
merchants migrated in the later Middle Ages, may have d1scourage_d both periods, Id would suffice to keep a single individual for a day with
urban enterprise elsewhere.56 London itself, however, although it a dish of meat or fish. It seems possible that the urban craftsmen and
boasted a more dazzling range of specialist crafts and s_hops t~an any women of the fifteenth century who, as we learn from both written
other English city [8], continued to foster sm~ll-scale_ m?ustrial pro- im'.entori_es and archaeology, manufactured belts with metal clasps,
duction for largely local and regional consumption, while its m~rcha~t kmves with elaborate handles, pewter vessels, glass for domestic win-
class showed, with individual exceptions, limited entrepreneurial flair. dows or painted hangings for domestic decoration were able to profit
Although its importance in the distrib~ti~e trade endu~ed througho~t from the increased spending power - and the social aspirations - of
the Middle Ages, local industry was prmc1pally responsive to London s some of their neighbours. The great diversity of specialist shops in the
57
diverse and relatively wealthy consumer market. late medieval capital speaks to this, and the contents of a particular
If there was no English take-off to industrial devel?pment on a l~r~er London 'shop with haberdasher's ware' in 1486 can be used to illustrate
scale within the medieval period, this was partly for lack of a cr1t1cal the argument: buckles and horse tackle, thimbles, needles and pins,
combs and hat-bands, diverse belts, beads and handkerchiefs, and spec-
tacles - of which last item the owner had almost five hundred in stock. sR
54 Britnell, Britain and Ireland, p. 352; Britnell,_ Colchester, pp. 167-71; ~- Munro, 'The It is important to emphasise that such an isolated example cannot
symbiosis of towns and textiles: u~ban i~s11tut1on_-~ and the changing, fortunes of
cloth manufacturing in the Low Countries and England, 1270-1570 , Journal of prove the existence of a trend, and indeed the inventory of another
Early Modem History, Ill, 1999, pp. l-i4. London haberdasher from a century earlier reveals no less diverse
s.s J. Kermode, Medieval Merchants. York, Beverley and Hull i11 the Later Middle Ages. ~nd te_mpting a stock [29]. But cumulative archaeological evidence,
Cambridge, 1998, pp. 305-12; S. Thrupp, The Merchant Class ef Medieval Londo11, mcludmg that for the fifteenth-century renewal of the housing stock in
1300-1500, Chicago. 1948.
the smaller towns, together with domestic inventories from the period,
56 R. H. Britnell, The English economy an<l the government. l4.~0--1550'. in J. L.
Watts (ed.). The Enil efthe Middle Ages?, Stroud, 1998, pp. 89-116.
5; A. L. Beier. "Engine of manufacture: the trades of London',. in A. L. Beier aod 58
R. Finlay (eds). Londo11 1500-liOO: The Making eflhe Metropol1s. London. l986~:
141-67; C. M . Barron, 'London IS00-1540', in CUHB. pp. 395--440, at PP· 42 •
~g:~
C. Dyer, An Age ef Transition? Eco11omy and Society in England in the Later M1ddlt
Oxford, 2005,_PP, 148, 154; C. Dyer, Standards ef Living in the Later M1dd~
g s. Social Change m England c.l!J00-1.1$20, revised e<ln, Cambridge, 1998. For the
5
C. M . Barron. London in the l.,aler Middle Ages. Govenzme~/ and People 120<>-~__! appea~ance and proliferation from the late fourteenth century of one craft of impor
Oxford, 2004, p. 76; A. Sutton, Tht. Merrery of Londo11: fradt, Goods a11d P,.,,-, lance m this connection, that of the pewtcrers (mainly citing evidt'nce from y ork)
11.~0-1578, Aldershot, 2005. see H. Swanson, Medieval Arti.,a11s, Oxford, I !189, pp. 76-8. ·
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 2S

give at least some substance to the idea that, within the context of a to compound the difficulties of adaptation to the town, especially in
reduced population and hence a restrained economy, a redistribution the over~r~wded _thirteenth century. With the exception of the grand-
of resources in the fifteenth century saw modestly improved material est, patr1c1an residences, which were adapted from the model of the
conditions in some parts of the urban network. What individuals chose rural aristocratic house, urban accommodation was broadly divided
to do with the resources freed up by reduced economic pressure will, between two distinct categories. For those who could afford it, new
of course, have varied. The improvement of social standing by the timber-framing technology, first recorded in London around 1180 and
acquisition of domestic goods may have been a priority for some, while spreading subsequently to other towns, brought into being the housi
others may have preferred to spend their money on the attractions of of several rooms for diverse purposes: a structure within which it was
commercialised leisure, such as archery butts and tennis courts, which possible at least partially to distinguish the workplace from the home,
appear in the record from the mid- to late fifteenth century [99::; . and where some measure of privacy could be enjoyed [ 64] , [ 65].
Others, again, may have patronised bookshops (and haberdashers, for Meanwhile the majority of town-dwellers - and not only the very poor
spectacles) [SIJ.59 - crowded into comparatively tiny houses of just one or two rooms,
Careful assessment of our evidence warns repeatedly against totalising with no privy or kitchen and no privacy whatever.1;o Some inhabitants
generalisations. If some town-dwellers of the late Middle Ages could of shops with cramped living quarters on the High Street in Oxford
boast of clothes and dinner-services which would have impressed their in the later Middle Ages got by in no more than a few square feet. 61
grandparents, in the general conditions of the era most lives were at Shops on Cheapside in London could be as little as six feet wide and
constant risk of illness, unemployment or debt, any of which could ten or twelve feet deep.,;~ In a central ward of Norwich in the early
turn modest prosperity into indigence overnight. The quality of life, ~ourteenth cent~ry, seventy-five per cent of the population was living
moreover, depended upon more than mere material sufficiency. The m accommodat10n rented from exploitative landlords, much of this
greatest challenge of the towns, throughout the length of our period densely occupied."5 Such crowding on commercial frontages reflected
(and indeed well beyond it), was to create a viable and satisfying human a certain economic prosperity, but living conditions could be unpleas-
life for crowded communities of diverse origins and resources. A gener- ant. From as early as the twelfth century we have evidence of town
alisation which can be ventured in this context is that no easy solution
60 F. Riddy, 'Looking closely· authority and intimacy in the late mcdic\'al urban town
to the problem was found. Personal relationships were strained by house', in M. C. Erler and M. Kowaleski (eds), Gmdering the Master Narrative:
life at dose quarters; by unequal working relationships; by the selfish Women an.1 Power" in the 1\liddl~ Ages, lth~<:a and London, 1!003, pp. I! 11!-'..!8;
exploitation of their power by the citizen and mercantile elite. Each F. R1ddy, Burge1s domest1c1ty m lat<.~mcd1e,·al England', m M. Kowaleski and
'; J. I'. Goldbcrg:(cds), .Heditval Domesticity. Home, Housing a11d Household m Med,roal
of these occasions for conflict was liable to trigger hostility between ~ng/,,~1d, ~amhndge, I!<>?!!, pp. I 1-36: S. Rees Jones, ·Building domesticity in the
groups of diverse cultural background. Measures, both official and city: _English urban housmg before thc Black Death', in ibid., pp. 66-9 J: J. Schofield,
informal, were invented and refined in order to address the issues as Medteval Lo11do11 llouses, New Ha\'cn, 1995; S. Pearson, 'Medieval houses in English
towns: form and location', Vemacular Architecture, XL, 1!009, pp. 1--'21!.
they were perceived. Experimental and never more than partially effec-
61 A_shop near the corner of the High Street and Cornmarket comprised a cellar ( 10 ft
tive though they were, these are amongst the most creative and lasting 6 m. sq~are), a shop ( II! ft 7 in. by 15 ft 6 in.) and a solar or upper room ( 1:i ft J in. by
achievements of medieval urban populations. 15 ft 4 tn.). In 15 I 5 the ~r.operty was let to a goldsmith for the relatively substantial
rate of 1-0~ ~r annum. ( I h_e meas11remcnt~ were taken in the seventeenth century,
but the bu1ldmg was csscntially unaltered smce the fourteenth century.) H. E. Salter,
Ideas and practice ef the common good SuroeyefO.rford, I! rnls, Oxford Historical Society, new series, XIV, XX, 196()-69, i,
pp. 99-100.
Environmental and hygienic issues were the first to demand consid- 6:2 D. K~ne, 'Shops and shoppmg in medie\'al London', in L. Grant (ed.), Medieval Art,
eration at the level of public discourse and legislation, and thereby to Architecture and A__rchaeolog)' in Londo11, London, 1990, pp. 29-1-6; D. Keene, Cheapside
btfo~e the Great ~ire, London, 1985; D. Clark, 'The shop \\ithin? An analysis of the
enter the historical record [62]. The material conditions of life tended architectural cY1dence for medieYal shops' Architectural History XLIII 1!000 pp
58-87. , , ' ' .

59 G. Rosser, 'Urban culture and the Church JS00-1 540', in CVI-IB, pp . .~SS--69, at PP· 6~ E. Rutledge, 'Landlords and tenants: housing and the rented property market in
365-i. early fourteenth century Norwich', Urba11 History, XXII, 1995, pp. 7--'.H.
24 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 25

communities establishing procedures to address the contentions which to attend not merely to the ostensible practical purposes served by the
arose. In Northampton around 1190, whenever a dispute erupted over material and written evidence but to the language and resonance of
a party wall or a gutter, the bailiffs of the town, the jurors of the its rhetoric. City walls are a case in point. The security of urban pop-
town court and the neighbours were together to assess the question ulations did not call so consistently for civic defences as it did in less
and make a judgement.64 London's assize* of nuisance, whose records effectively governed parts of Europe. But although their construction
begin in 130 I but which had earlier origins, tells a long and vivid and maintenance was sometimes resented locally as a costly royal impo,
narrative of dripping gutters and leaking cess-pits, to which the legal sition, such walls did not have the same functions of local mastery at
procedure offered some practical redress [67]. The general issue of had the early Anglo-Norman royal castles, and town populations along'
sanitation was an inevitable catalyst of public debate, generating ded- the south coast or close to the Welsh or Scottish borders had occasion
icated officers for overseeing the removal of waste and rubbish [71 ], at diverse periods of the Welsh and Hundred Years Wars to be glad of
[ 7SJ.65 The London assize of nuisance also documented a recurrent them [56]. Moreover, they came to be seen as symbols of civic pride,
concern about the creation of windows which allowed people to see being frequently represented on civic seals.68 This is especially clear in
into their neighbours' properties, expressive of a heightened sensitivity such a case as that of Coventry, where the walls, which had no military
concerning privacy in the urban context in which personal space was function, were inaugurated by the mayor in 1356 and erected over a pro-
at a premium."0 These sources record a sense of moral discretion which tracted period, as resources allowed, to be completed only in the 1530s.
attempted to limit prying intrusion into the space of the household. Many towns at a distance from the periphery of the country never had
We should be wary, however, of suggestions that medieval urban space walls at all. But most were motivated to erect gates, as practical and
was segregated between feminised interiors and a masculine outdoors. even more as symbolic markers of the city's claim to monitor the pas-
If there was ever a prevailing concept of the clearly separated female sage of people and goods.69 Town halls were no less the embodiment of
and domestic sphere - an ideological concept which had some currency political ambition on the part of the mercantile elites who dominated the
in the nineteenth century but which, even then, was complicated by the councils held within these buildings, and yet they also contributed to
realities of gendered experience - it was far from the medieval situa- the prestige and the civic pride of the larger urban population. The most
tion, in which labour and domesticity tended to be intermixed.67 splendid of all, the London Guildhall, was erected in the fifteenth cen-
The density and diversity ofurban populations in the thirteenth century tury on the model of the recently renovated royal hall ofWestminster. 70
generated social tensions which in turn gave rise both to conflict and Public works undertaken in the smaller towns tended to be less grandi-
to an emergent concept of public responsibility. To see this, we need ose and to engage the active involvement of a larger proportion of the
townspeople. The construction in the mid-fifteenth century of two new
64 Bateson (ed.), Borough Customs, i, p. 245.
stone bridges across the Thames at Abingdon was the collaborative
65 E. L. Sabine, 'Latrines and cesspools of medieval London', Speculum, IX, 1984, pp. project of the secular population at large, all of whom stood to gain both
808-'2 I; E. L. Sabine, ·city cleaning in medieval London', Speculum, XII. 1987, pp. from the consequent increase of trade and from the sense of personal
19-48; D. J. Keene, 'Rubbish in medieval towns', in A. R. Hall and H. K. Kenward moral worth which flowed from an enterprise that benefited rich and
(eds), Environmental Archaeology in an Urban Context, Council for British Archaeology
Research Reports, 48, 1982, pp. 26-80; Barron, London. pp. 261-2. poor alike [98]. Careful attention to the documentary evidence reveals,
66 H. M. Chew and W. Kellaway (eds), London Assize ef Nuisance /301-1481, London
Record Society, X, 1978, p. xii and passim. 68 For examples, see G . Pedrick, Civir Seals ef the Gothir Period, London, 1904 For
discussion ofthe iconography ofmed1e\'al urban seals, see B. Bedos Rezak, When Ego
67 P. J. P. Goldberg, 'The fashioning of bourgeois domesticity in later medieval Was Imago: Signs ef Identity III the Middle Ages, Leiden, 20 I o, pp. 288-42
England: a material culture perspecti,·e', in M. Kowaleski and P. J. P. Goldberg (:<ls),
Medieval Domesticity. Home, Housing and Household in Medieval England, Cambridge, 69 0 Creighton and R. Higham, Meditval Town Walls. An Archaeolo,:y and Social H,slory·
2008, pp. 12+-+4; P. J.P. Goldberg, 'Space and gender in the later medieval English ef Urban Defence, Stroud, 2005, p. 82 and passim; H L. Turner, Town Defences 111
house', Viator, XLll, 201 J, pp. 20.5-!12; S. Rees Jones, 'Women's influence on the England and Wales, London, 1970.
design of urban homes', in M. C. Erler and M. Kowaleski (eds), Gendering the Master iO J. Schofield, The B11ilding efLondonfrom the Conquest to the Great Fire, London, 1984,
Narrative: Women and Power in the Middle Ages, Ithaca and London, 2003, pp. 190-211; pp. I 07-8; C. M. Barron, The Meditval Guildhall ef London, London, 1974. On civic
A. Vickery, 'Golden age to separate spheres? A review of the categories and chronol- gmldhalls or town halls m general, see R. Tittler, Archite1:ture and Power. The Town
ogy of English women's history·, Historical Journal, XXXVI, 1998, pp. 883-414. Hall and !he English Urban Communil), c. l 50<>-l 640, Stanford, '200 I
26 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND !NTRODl!CTION 27

once again, that a project of this nature, beyond its pragmatic purpose, relief, however limited in their overall effect, deserve attention for what
could become the catalyst of shared experience and ideals amongst the they can tell us about moral and civic attitudes. The grandest gestures
urban population. Of universal concern was the safe provision of fresh emanated from great patrons, such as the bishop of Norwich who in
water to all parts of the town, and this involved town assemblies in civil I Q56 founded the hospital of St Giles in that city, with thirty beds for
engineering projects for public fountains which could be both complex poor sick people. Managed by leading townspeople, this hospice offered
and expensive, yet at the same time prestigious expressions of civic at least some relief to the indigent, the aged and the unwell, at the samf
ambition [70].'1 At Lichfield, another small town in the shadow of a time rais~ng civic consciousness and consciences about the presence of.
powerful ecclesiastical interest in the form, in this case, of the cathe- the poor.· • More modest foundations commonly originated with groupl
dral, a group of five secular residents gave property in I 305 to endow of neighbours or guilds, whose members would typically play a prac-
a communal aqueduct. By the end of the Middle Ages and probably for tical part in the provision of care : 107] . Such was the almshouse in
a considerable time before, the civic water-supply was managed by the Stratford-upon-Avon, rebuilt at the start of the fifteenth century by the
town guild, whose members included a wide range of the local popula- local guild of the Holy Cross. Poor people, not members of the guild,
tion and which acted, in the absence of more formal municipal rights, as were taken in on request, including, in 1475- 76, 'Agnes, a girl in the
a surrogate town council. The former property of the guild, suppressed almshouse', and Robert Scot and John Dunseprowe, for whose attend-
at the Reformation, continued to be used to fund the civil water works ance Margaret Myller received a reward from the guild.~6 Larger towns
until modern times [95].'~ Here and elsewhere, the provision of clean offered a range of provision: York at the same period contained five hos-
water was an index of good government, evidence of the moral no less pitals and eighteen small almshouses known as maisonsdieu."; The later
than the material worth of the town. Middle Ages saw such provi~ion undertaken by certain town govern-
A further index ofcivic consciousness can be considered in arrangements ments as a public responsibility.r 1 The challenge of poverty could not be
made to care for the poor and the sick, of whom medieval towns knew adequately met by the resources made available in medieval urban soci-
only too many. It is impossible precisely to quantify the number of the ety, which thereby stands indicted.;H But ifwe read the texts not merely
indigent poor, but scattered evidence suggests that in the larger towns with a view to quantifying the outcome in welfare terms but with sensi-
this figure may have represented as many as a third of the total popu- tivity to what the sources can tell us about mutual collaboration, we may
lation. The difficulty of establishing exact levels of mendicancy means note how the \'arious ways in which townsmen and women involved
that historians have had to approach the subject obliquely, through the themselves in such measures of support as they knew - not least in the
evidence of personal and institutional charitable provision. The issue guilds, of which a great many were members ~94] , C95J- were schools
concerns not simply absolute needs and their provision but the variable of citizenship. Without idealising their goals, it is reasonable to suggest
perceptions of those who at different times defined themselves as poor that these urban charities helped to cultivate in their participants a sense
and those who did not.'' In addition to the permanently mendicant poor, of moral responsibility for the larger body of the townspeople.'''
those periodically in need of support included many artisans, whom
a crisis could readily reduce to temporary or long-term penury and 74 C. Rawcliffe, Mediane for the Soul. The L ift, Death and Resurrecllon ef an E11glidi
dependence. Their presence was a constant reminder of the inequality Medieval Hospital, Stroud, 1999.
and lack of unity of urban society. Yet the measures instituted for their 75 Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, MS. BRT 1/ 3 / 88.
76 P. H. C~llum and P. J.P. Goldberg, 'Charitable pro\·is1on in late medieval York: "To
the praise of God and the use of the poor"', Northern H1story, XXJX, 1993, pp. \!4-:19.
71 J. S. Lee, 'Pipt.>d water supplies managed by ch·ic bodies in medieval English towns', 77 S. Sweetin.burgh, T iu R_ole ef the Hospital m Med1nral England. Gifl-Gtvi11g and the
Urban History, XLI, 2014, pp. 369-93; Barron, Lo11don, pp. 255--61. Spmtual Econom), Dublin, 2004; N. Ornk: and M Webstt,r, The E11gltsh Hospital,
1070-1570, London, 1995.
;2 G. Rosser, 'The town and guild of Lichfield in the late Middle Ages', 1'ransactionsof
the South Stafferdshire Archaeological and Ilislorical Society, XXVI I, 1987 for 1985, PP· 78 C. Dyer, 'Poverty and its relief in late mt.>die\al England', Past and Present, CCXVI,
39-47, at pp. 46-7. 2012, pp. 41- 78.

73 M. Mol!at, The Poor in the Middle Ages, transl. A. Goldhammer, New Haven and 79 G. Rosser, Tiu Art ef Sol1darity in the Middle Ages. Guilds 111 England 1250-1550,
London, 1986, pp. 148-66, 178- 7 and passim. Oxford, 2015, eh. 2.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION 29
28

While there were certainly different degrees of vulnerability, it is choice which they offered in forms and objects of devotion. Some of the
important to realise the extent to "".hich e~eryone living in :11edieval older towns presented the densest parochial provision, from London's
towns was at risk. Because of relatively high urban mortality rates, one hundred parish churches, through Norwich's fifty and the thirty or
town populations could sustain themselves only as a result ofa const~nt more of York, to the ten of Gloucester, Worcester and Cambridge.8~
influx from elsewhere: the majority of young men and women seekmg The numerous market towns, such as Ludlow in Shropshire on the
work in the late medieval town were either first- or second-generation We_lsh March, ~endal in Cumbri~ or Banbury in Oxfordshire, wer~
settlers. The larger the town, the greater was its attraction to hopeful typically se~ved m each case by a single parish church. The cathedral,\
migrants, who often left their native families and villages far behind and monastic churches added further variety of architecture, liturgicaP
them.so The newcomer might arrive with an introduction to a relative style and preaching. 83 The wills of townspeople confirm, in the range
or former neighbour from his or her place of origin; but the primary of their bequests, their appreciation of this diversity, which was itself
challenge of settlement in the city was that of winning the acceptance the creation of secular patronage [105]. In the centre of Carlisle there
and trust of others without which survival would be impossible. Few was a chapel of St Alban, which was especially popular with the local
artisans owned all the necessary tools of their trade, and to find accom- population. In the mid-fourteenth century the bishop discovered that
modation and work or to set up a shop required both social and finan- the building had never been consecrated, and ordered its closure. But
cial credit to gain the support of landlords, employers, fellow workers the ban was ineffective, and bequests in the testaments oflate medieval
and customers. A commonly employed means to establish the neces- townspeople reveal its enduring status as a focus of civic religion.84
sary degree of credit-worthiness was to join one of the many religious Religious culture in the city was expressed in the potent language of
and social guilds which, although not exclusively urban, were particu- the universal Church; but it was open to appropriation at the local level
larly concentrated in the towns [94]. Most called for only modest by townsmen and women even of the most humble status, who could
financial contributions, but all set moral criteria for membership which invest it with particular meaning of their own.
lent to the men and women who joined a standing which could help City governors, too, clothed themselves in the reflected splendour of
them to make their way in the new environment. For many, enrolment locally venerated saints and civic cults [101]. Yet these devotions were
81
in a guild marked the beginning of a new life in the town. always more than political tools, or they would not and could not have
been used in this way. The evidence tends to reveal, rather, a conver-
gence of governmental strategy with popular devotion. An instance is
Faith in the city the way in which the cult ofOsmund, the popular protector of Salisbury
Hospitals and guilds apart, the records of other religious bodies also venerated locally as an unauthenticated saint, was taken up by the
have much light to shed on our subject, although once again we need to secular rulers of the town who were prepared, even at considerable
be prepared to read the sources not merely as the imprint of particular expense, to secure his official canonisation.85 Similarly, the adoption of
institutions, with their respective possessions and legal privileges, but
in order to discern the needs and aspirations expressed by those who 82 M. D. Lo~! _(ed.), The British Atlas ef Historic Towns, iii, The City ef London from
animated them. The overwhelming impression conveyed by the evi- Prth1sloric TtTTU!s to c.l5fJO, London, 1989, map of parishes c.1520; J. Finch, 'The
churches', m C. Rawcliffo and R. Wilson (eds), Medieval I\/orwich, London, 2004, pp.
dence for urban religious life in the later Middle Ages is of its rich diver- 49-72; D M. Palliser, Medieval York 600-1540, Oxford, 2014, p. 216; N. Baker and
sity (see Sections VIII and IX). For the most part within the scope ofa R. Holt, Urban Growth and the Medieval Church: Gloucester and Worcester Aldershot
Catholic orthodoxy which allowed for considerable variety of spiritual 2004, chs 4 and i and plans on pp. 103, 199; C. N. L. Brooke, The church~s ofm~dic.'.
val Cambridge·, in D. Beales and G. Best (eds), History, Society and the Churches: Essays
expression, the towns were distinguished from the countryside by the Ill Ho,wurefOwen Chadwick, Cambridge, 198.5, pp. 69-72.

SS For London, Norwich and York: C. M. Barron and M. P. Davies, The Religious
Houses ef Loudon and M1ddlese.r, London, 2007, Tanner, Church in Late Medieval
80 P. McClure, 'Patterns ofmigration in the late Middle Ages', Economic History Review. Norwich; Miller, 'Medieval York'.
2nd series, XXXII, 1979, pp. 167-82.
84 H. Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, 2 vols, Kendal, 199S, i, pp. 355--{l, ii, p. 610.
81 G. Rosser, 'Crafts, guilds and the negotiation of work in the medieval town', Past and 85 A. R. Malden, The Cano11ization '![Saini Osmund, Wiltshire Re<:ord Series, II, 1901.
Present, CLIV, 1997, pp. S-31; Rosser, Art '![Solidarity, eh. 5 and passim.
80 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND INTRODUCTION SI

the Virgin Mary as the official patroness of the city of Carlisle, where than half of the earth's population lives in an urban area and in which
she appeared on the civic seal in addition to that of the cathedral priory, all natural resources have been commandeered into the service of the
was inspired by a popular story that in 1385 she had saved the town megalopolis_w. We learn the arts of survival in the city, adapt ourselves
from destruction by the Scots. Indeed, she was said to appear often to to its spaces and its rhythms, and we naturalise these capacities so that
inhabitants of Carlisle, which further encouraged the civic officers to they appear to us to be the es~ence of human life. On the planet of the
vie with the cathedral canons for the role of the Virgin's chief advocate global city, it is impossible to find the distance and the vantage point
in the city. In 1451 the canons, for their part, displayed a new image from which our present condition of urbanisation may be observeq
of the city's patron in order to satisfy 'the devotion of Christ's faithful and critiqued. We can only live on the inside; nowhere else exists. Ifl
people daily flocking there on pilgrimage'. This was described as 'an we wish to comprehend the age in which we live, and to gain a critical
image of the Blessed Virgin covered with plates of silver and overlaid perspective on its qualities, positive and negative as these may be, our
with gold, gems and precious stones'.8' 1 Our sources tend, in the way of sole recourse must be to history. The world in its time has seen diverse
much historical evidence at all periods, to record an elite perspective. ages of great cities: so many different experiments in the organisation
That perspective was real: the hierarchical organisation ofurban society of human lives. Ours is one in this sequence, no less and no more. If,
was shored up by wealth and privilege, as well as by the trappings of before the end of its cycle, we want to make the most of it, we need to
political rhetoric and religious iconography. But if we read our sources understand how we have arrived at our present state of dependence
against the grain, they tell us also about other visions of urban life. upon our own particular, seemingly all-powerful, urban machine. The
world city of today has diverse roots, and no single narrative can
What insights we may gain into our own urban lives by the study of account for it. But a vital key to that lineage lies in medieval Europe.
these medieval sources remain to be seen. But as a matter of analytical Following the collapse of the highly urbanised empire of Rome, in the
method, their careful reading should sensitise us to the presence of context of what had reverted to become a predominantly rural society,
diverse voices. Urban elites demand to be heard; but we do not need new ventures in civilisation brought into being the towns and cities of
to confine our attention to them. Medieval towns were characterised the modern continent, and a model of urbanisation which empire and
by inequality and exploitation, and we should no longer expect to find economy have more recently exported to the remainder of the globe.
that their populations were guided by modern democratic values. But Our lives today are still conditioned by those first, medieval, steps in
their culture was neither rigid nor monolithic, and the creative, exper- city-building. No historical subject has more claim on our attention
imental quality of a number of its forms - such as the neighbourhood than the medieval European town. The subject calls for continuing
courts [52], [5SJ, or the guilds [94], [95], or the universities [40], study, both for its intrinsic interest and as a place from which we may
[85], or the civic drama of the 'mystery plays' [I 14], [115], [116] - review with some detachment the character and values of the cities we
remind us that towns, in the Middle Ages and at all periods, are made inhabit today.
by people. The sense of powerlessness in the face of an impersonal
force is a comprehensible reaction to the urban experience. Yet the
very challenge of creating a modus vivendi with unfamiliar others is
an invitation, as medieval townsmen and women knew, to step up to a
shared responsibility.
Most of us live for a significant part of our lives in towns and cities.
It ,vould be vain to attempt to avoid them, in a world in which more

86 R. B. Dob5on, 'Cathedral chapters and cathedral citie5: York, Durham and Carlisle
in the fifteenth century', Northern History, XIX, 19 8S, pp. 15-44, at pp. 41-2; G H.
Martin (ed.), Knighton's Chronicle 1877-1896, Oxford, 1995, p. SS6; Summerson, 87 ~ince 2007 more than half of the world's population resides in urban areas, accord-
Carlisle. i, p. S59. mg to the World Health Orga111zat1on. "''"'·.who.int/ kobe centre/ measuring/ en/.
 HISTORY AND PRAISE SS

with administrative functions within their respective cities. Exeter's

mayor turned to convenient histories in vindication of his council's
I. HISTORY AND PRAISE position in its battle over jurisdiction with the cathedral [5]. It fell
in particular to clerks such as Robert Ricart of Bristol to combine the
custody of urban records with the composition of glorificatory histo-
ries [6]. In other instances the business of compiling and ordering
As much as it was a tangible construction of stone, wood and plaster, the records became a historically creative process in its own right. A
the medieval town was an idea in the minds of its inhabitants and case in point is that of John Carpenter, the common clerk of the city
of its visitors. Mythologised or romantic as they might be, ideas of of London who around 1419 assembled the extensive records which
the town's prestigious origins and present eminence influenced the he copied into the 'Liber Albus· or White Book, adding in the process
ideals and actions of its population. The sources gathered in this sec- some original writing of his own [52]. 1 In William Worcester we
tion include examples of the currency and expression of such ideas. encounter an early instance of a different figure: the antiquary. Like the
They also exemplify some of the ways in which a distinguished history officers of the town, Worcester had become used to finding historical
and idealised image of the town circulated and became embedded in precedents in his legal and administrative work for Sir John Fastolf.
local culture. Stories told to children, rhymes and song, sermons deliv- But with his retirement and more extensive travels, he became fasci-
ered in honour oflocally venerated saints, mythical tales of kings and nated with the past for its own sake [7].
giants, antiquarian researches by town clerks, all enriched the shared What was the relationship between each of these written accounts
memories of townspeople and conditioned their actions. and the memories, traditions and legends which during the same
The clerical authors of the three twelfth-century texts represented centuries circulated amongst the wider population of the towns? On
below each wrote with an agenda, although in each case the writer's the one hand, these writers claimed authority: the power of spiritual,
purpose is not completely transparent. Geoffrey of Monmouth flat- political or intellectual eminence. On the other, to the extent that
tered the Angevin monarchs with the idea that they belonged to a they were not simply inventing the material of their histories, these
regnal tradition which had seen their predecessors populate the coun- authors were drawing inspiration from a wider, and largely oral, his-
try with fine cities [l]. At the same time he provided tovmspeople torical culture. When the town council of Colchester in the fifteenth
themselves with the materials to imagine the greatness of their ori- century commissioned a set of ci\'ic annals which incorporated the
gins. William fitz-Stephen contributed to a proliferating literature of legend of the city's foundation by King Cole, that story was already
praise for the martyred Thomas Becket, killed in front of the high widely known. At Coventry, the tale of Lady Godiva and her naked
altar of Canterbury cathedral in 1170 by soldiers of the cro\\n, a text ride through the town to win freedom from toll for the citizens from
which underlined Thomas's London roots and celebrated the saint as her husband was common knowledge. The town council in the late
a hero and protector of the metropolis no less than of Canterbury [2]. fourteenth century had an image of her placed in a window of the
Liberally strewn with allusions to the antique world of Rome, fitz- municipal church of St Michael. But on the other hand, in the fol-
Stephen's text joins Christian hagiography to a classicising emulation lowing century the poor weavers of Coventry invoked Godiva in
of pre-Christian writers in praise of cities. Lucian, the monk of Chester, their cause against the town council's imposition ofa new tax [91]. 1
combines a narrowly parochial focus on the pattern of his local streets When in Henry VIII's reign the antiquary and royal topographer
with a universal vision: indeed, thi"> paradox is resolved in the way in John Leland came to Stamford, he asked local people about the his-
which Lucian finds the macrocosm mirrored or epitomised in the plan tory of the town, and was shown buildings which had supposedly
of his city ;::s:::;.
At the end of the period the celebratory allw,ions to the history of I C.M Barron, Lond011 111 the u ttr Mu/JI, Ages Government and People moo- I 500,
Oxford, 2004, pp 186- 8
Exeter and of Bristol come from civic officials: a mayor and a town
2 G. Rosser, 'Myth, image and social process 111 the English medic\'al town', Urbal'I
clerk. The role of encomiast had passed by this time to secular figures Hutory, XXIII, 1996, pp. 5 -'l S, at p. 8.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 35
S4

once housed the university that had briefly existed in the thirteenth as if they had been written. Whilst I was intent upon these and such
century.~ The holders of political power and learned writers did not like thoughts, Walter, archdeacon of Oxford, a man of great eloquence,
and learned in foreign histories, offered me a very ancient book in the
have a monopoly on the creative use of history, and civic memory was
British tongue, which, in a continued regular story and elegant style,
available for anyone to invoke.
related the actions of them all, from Brutus the first king of the Britons,
down to Cadwallader the son ofCadwallo ... ,
I. Legends of the origins of cities [Brutus, of Trojan descent, after many adventures landed in England)
at Totnes.J The island was then called Albion, and was inhabited by
Geoffrey of Monmouth compiled his pseudohistorical account of none but a few giants. Notwithstanding this, the pleasant situation of
British history in c.1136. He was a scholar, and probably a canon of the places, the plenty of the rivers abounding with fish, and the engag-
St George's chapel in Oxford castle. Beyond his debt to Bede and to ing prospect of its woods, made Brutus and his company very desirous
the few known early Welsh historical writings, it is hard to know to fix their habitation in it ... Brutus, having at last set eyes upon his
what proportion of his work was invented by the author. Geoffrey was kingdom, formed a design of building a city, and with this in view, trav-
criticised by some of his earliest readers as a writer of fiction, and no elled through the land to find out a convenient situation, and coming to
modern scholar would rely upon him for the early history of British the river Thames, he walked along the shore, and at last pitched upon
towns. 4 But his work became a vital element in late medieval urban a place very fit for his purpose. Here, therefore, he built a city, which
culture, being appropriated and reworked in history-writing [6], ico- he called New Troy; under which name it continued a long time after,
5
nography and civic pageants [61]. till at last, by the corruption of the original word, it came to be called
Trinovantum. But afterwards when Lud, the brother of Cassibellaun,
J. A. Giles and A. Thompson (ed. and transl.), The British History of who made war against Julius Caesar, obtained the government of the
Geeffrey <ifMonmouth, London: J. Bohn, 1842, pp. 1, 22--4, 29, s 1. Latin, kingdom, he surrounded it with stately walls, and towers of admirable
transl. by the editors. workmanship, and ordered it to be called after his name, Kaer-Lud, that
is, the City ofLud.
Whilst occupied on many and various studies, I happened to light upon Ebraucus was the first after Brutus who invaded Gaul with a fleet, and
the History of the Kings of Britain, and wondered that in the account distressed its provinces by killing their men and laying waste their
which Gildas6 and Bede,7 in their elegant treatises, had given of them, I cities; and having by these means enriched himself with an infinite
found nothing said of those kings who lived here before the [ncarnation quantity of gold and silver, he returned victorious. After this he built
of Christ, nor of Arthur and many others who succeeded after the a city on the other side of the Humber, which, from his own name, he
Incarnation, though their actions both deserved immortal fame, and called Kaerebrauc, that is, the city of Ebraucus [York], about the time
were also celebrated by many people in a pleasant manner and by heart, that David reigned in Judaea, and Sylvius Latinus in Italy; and that
Gad, Nathan, and Asaph prophesied in Israel.
s L. T. Smith (ed.), The Itinera') ef John Le/011d in or about the Years 1535--1543, 5
vols, London, 1906- 10, iv, pp. 89-90; G. Rosser, 'Urban culture and the Church [King Hudibras] built Kaerlem or Canterbury, Kaorguen or
IS00-1540', CUHB, pp SS5-69, at p. S47.
Winchester, and the town of Mount Paladur, now Shaftesbury. At this
4 M. Otter, Invenllo11es: Fiction and Riferentialzty in Twe!flh-Century English Historical
Writing, Chapel Hill, 1996, E. van Houts, 'Historical writing·, in C. Harper-Bill and
place an eagle spoke, while the wall of the town was being built; and
E. ,an Houts (eds), A Compa111011 to the Anglo-Norman World, Woodbridge, 2002, PP· indeed I should have transmitted the speech to posterity, had I thought
I OS-'2 I, esp. pp. I 14--15. it as true as the rest of the history.
J On Geoffrey's mytlucal account, m the passage below, of the origins of London, see
J. Clark, 'Trinovantum - the origin of a legend', Journal ef Medieval History, Vil,
1981, pp. 135-51
6 The sixth-century clerical author of On the Ruin and Conquest ef Brilain.
7 Bede"s Ecclesiastical I-lzstory eflhe English Peopk was completed c.7SO.
86 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 87

2. Description of London c.11 7 S and kind. In the church of St Paul there is the episcopal seat. Once it
was metropolitan, and some think it will again become so, if the citi-
This rhetorical description of London in the time of Henry II is the zens return to the island,9 unless perhaps the archiepiscopal title of the
prologue to William fitz-Stephen's Life of Thomas Becket. A Londoner blessed martyr, Thomas, and the presence of his body preserves that
like Becket himself, fitz-Stephen presented a double celebration of dignity for ever at Canterbury where it is at present. But as St Thomas
the city and its patron saint. Replete with classical allusions, the text has made both cities illustrious, London by his rising and Canterbury
advertises its artifice. An educated writer, who served the archbishop by his setting, each can claim advantage of the other with justice i~
in the I 160s as a legal adviser, fitz-Stephen drew on his reading of respect of that saint. As regards the practice of Christian worship, therl
ancient Roman texts in praise of cities in order to show twelfth-century are in London and its suburbs thirteen greater conventual churches
London in a similar light. He was also able, by underlining the piety and, besides these, one hundred and twenty-six lesser parish churches.
of its citizens and its association with Constantine, the first Christian It has on the east the Palatine castle [the Tower of London], very
emperor, to imply that its Christian identity made London superior to great and strong: the keep and walls rise from very deep foundations
its classical predecessors. At the same time, the circumstantial detail and are fixed with a mortar tempered by the blood of animals. On the
of particular passages is evidently based on direct experience. In flow- west there are two castles very strongly fortified, and from these there
ery language, fitz-Stephen gives concrete information about the social runs a high and massive wall with seven double gates and with towers
composition of the city {note the presence ofrural aristocrats and peas- along the north at regular intervals. London was once also walled and
ant vendors, and the clerical population), its cosmopolitan trade, and its turreted on the south, but the mighty Thames, so full of fish, has with
intellectual and sporting culture.ij The text is therefore of value both the sea's ebb and flow washed against, loosened, and thrown down
for its descriptive content and for the claims implied by its rhetorical those walls in the course of time. Upstream to the west there is the
composition. royal palace [of Westminster] which is conspicuous above the river,
a building incomparable in its ramparts and bulwarks. It is about two
D. C. Douglas and G. W. Greenaway (eds), English Historical Documents, miles from the city and joined thereto by a populous suburb.
ii, J042-JJB9, 2nd edn (copyright© 1981), London: Eyre Methuen,
1981, pp. 1196-201. Latin, transl. by the editors. Reproduced by per- Everywhere outside the houses of those living in the suburbs, and adja-
mission of Taylor and Francis Books UK. cent to them, are the spacious and beautiful gardens of the citizens, and
these are planted with trees. Also there are on the north side pastures
Among the noble and celebrated cities of the world, that of London, the and pleasant meadow lands through which flow streams wherein the
capital of the kingdom of the English, is one which extends its glory turning of mill-wheels makes a cheerful sound. Very near lies a great
farther than all the others and sends its wealth and merchandise more forest with woodland pastures in which there are the lairs of wild ani-
widely into distant lands. Higher than all the rest does it lift its head. mals: stags, fallow deer, wild boars and bulls. The tilled lands of the
It is happy in the healthiness of its air; in its observance of Christian city are not of barren gravel, but fat Asian plains that yield luxuriant
practice; in the strength of its fortifications; in its natural situation; in crops and fill the tillers' barns with the sheaves of Ceres. There are also
the honour of its citizens; and in the modesty of its matrons. It is cheer- outside London on the north side excellent suburban wells with sweet,
ful in its sports, and the fruitful mother of noble men. Let us look into wholesome and clear water that flows rippling over the bright stones.
these things in turn. Among these are Holywell, Clerkenwell and St Clement's Well, which
are all famous. These are frequented by great numbers and much vis-
If the mildness of the climate of this place softens the character of its ited by the students from the schools and by the young men of the city,
inhabitants, it does not make them corrupt in following Venus, but when they go out for fresh air on summer evenings.
rather prevents them from being fierce and bestial, making them liberal
9 The phrase echoes the 'Prophecies of Merlin' as reported by Geoffrey of Monmouth
8 For a comment see C. N. L. Brooke and G. Keir, London 800-1216: The Shapi11gof4 m his H1story(see [I]). These alluded vaguely to a brave new world which would be
City, London, 1975, pp. I 12--21. inaugurated when 'citizens returned to the island·.
S8 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PHAISE
S9

Good indeed is this city when it has a good lord! The city is honoured Those engaged in business of various kinds, sellers of merchandise,
by her men, glorious in its arms, and so populous that during the terri- hirers oflabour, are distributed every morning into their several local-
ble wars of King Stephen's reign the men going forth from it to battle ities according to their trade. Besides, there is in London on the river
were reckoned as twenty thousand armed horsemen and sixty thousand bank, among the wines for sale in ships and in the cellars of the vint-
foot-soldiers, all equipped for war. The citizens of London are regarded ners, a public c~ok-shop. There daily you may find food according
as conspicuous above all others for their polished manners, for their to the season, dishes of meat, roast, fried and boiled, large and small
dress and for the good tables which they keep. The inhabitants of other fish, coarser meats for the poor and more delicate for the rich, such
towns are called citizens, but those of London are called barons. And as venison and big and small birds. If any of the citizens should unex-
with them a solemn pledge is sufficient to end every dispute. pectedly receive visitors, weary from their journey, who would fain not
The matrons of this city are very Sabines.10 wait until fresh food is bought and cooked, or until the servants have
brought bread or water for washing, they hasten to the river bank and
In London the three principal churches (that is to say, the episcopal
there find all they need. However great the multitude of soldiers and
church of St Paul, the church of the Holy Trinity, and the church of
travellers entering the city, or preparing to go out of it, at any hour of
St Martin) have famous schools by special privilege and by virtue of
the day or night - that these may not fast too long, and those may not
their ancient dignity. But through the favour of some magnate, or
go out supperless - they turn aside thither, if they please, where every
through the presence of teachers who are notable or famous in phi-
man can refresh himself in his own way. Those who would cater for
losophy, there are also other schools. On feast-days the masters hold
themselves fastidiously need not search to find sturgeon or the bird
meetings for their pupils in the church whose festival it is. The schol-
of ~frica or the. Ionian god wit. For this is a public kitchen, very con-
ars dispute, some with oratory and some with argument; some recite
venient to the city, and part of its amenities. Hence the dictum in the
enthymemes;* others excel in using perfect syllogisms. Some dispute
Gorgias of Plato that the art of cookery is an imitation of medicine and
for ostentation like wrestlers with opponents; others argue in order
decorates a quarter of civic life.
to establish the truth in its perfection. Sophists who speak paradoxes
are praised for their torrent of words, while others seek to overthrow Immediately outside one of the gates there is a field which is smooth
their opponents by using fallacious arguments. Now and then orators both in fact and in name [Smithfield]. On every sixth day of the week,
use rhetoric for persuasion, being careful to omit nothing essential to unless it be a major feast-day, there takes place there a famous exhibi-
their art. Boys of different schools strive against each other in verses, tion of fine horses for sale. Earls, barons and knights, who are in the
or contend about the principles of grammar and the rules governing town, and many citizens come out to see or to buy. It is pleasant to
past and future tenses. Others use epigrams, rhythm and metre in the see the high_-stepping pal:reys with their gleaming coats, as they go
old trivial banter; they pull their comrades to pieces with scurrilous through their paces, putting down their feet alternately on one side
licence: mentioning no names, they dart abuse and gibes, and mock together. Next, one can see the horses suitable for esquires, moving
the faults of their comrades and sometimes even those of their elders, faster _though less smoothly, lifting and setting down, as it were, the
using Socratic wit and biting harder even than the tooth of Theon opposite fore and hi~d feet: here are colts of fine breed, but not yet
[a carping Roman grammarian] in daring dithyrambics. Their hear- accustomed to the bit, stepping high with jaunty tread; there are the
ers, ready to enjoy the joke, wrinkle up their noses as they guffaw in sumpter-horses,• powerful and spirited; and after them there are the
applause. war-horses, costly, ~legant of form, noble of stature, with cars quickly
tremulous, necks raised and large haunches. As these show their paces,
the buyers first try those of gentler gait, then those of quicker pace
10 According to ancient Roman historians, the greatness of Rome began with a union whereby the fore and hind feet move in pairs together. When a race is
between the Romans and the women of the Sabines, a people who inhabited the
centre of the Italian peninsula. The Sabine women were held to be wise, strong, about_ to begin among such chargers that are so powerful to carry and
and morally irreproachable. The allusion by fitz-Stephen makes a pointed analogy so_sw1ft to run, a shout is raised, and orders are given that the inferior
between London and Rome. See below, however, for the author's claim that London animals should be led apart. Three jockeys who mount these flying
was the more ancient of the two.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 41
4-0

steeds (or at times two, as may be agreed) prepar~ themselves for the To this it may be added that almost all the bishops, abbots and mag-
contest; skilled in managing them, they curb their unta~1ed '.11ouths nates of England are in a sense citizens and freemen of London, having
with bitted bridles. To get a good start in the race is the1r chief con- their own splendid town-houses. In them they live, and spend largely,
cern. Their mounts also enter into the spirit of the contest as they are when they are summoned to great councils by the king or by their met-
able· their limbs tremble, and so impatient are they of delay that they ropolitan, or drawn thither by their private affairs.
can~ot keep still. When the signal is given. they stretch their limbs to We now come to speak of the sports of the city, for it is not fitting tha~
the uttermost and dash down the course with courageous speed. The a city should be merely useful and serious-minded, unless it be als1
riders, coveto~s of applause and ardent for victory, plu~ge th~ir spurs pleasant and cheerful. For this cause on the seals of the supreme pon-
into the loose-reined horses, and urge them forward with their shouts tiff, down to the time of the last Pope Leo (IX, 1048-54), on one side
and their whips. You would agree with Heraclitus that all things are !n of the lead was engraved the figure of Peter the fisherman and above
motion! You would know Zeno to be completely wrong when he said him a key, as it were, held out to him from heaven by the hand of God,
that there was no motion and no goal to be reached! and around it was inscribed the verse, 'For me didst thou leave the
By themselves in another part of the fi~ld st~nd the goods of the co~n- ship, receive now the key.' And on the other side was engraved a city
tryfolk: implements of husbandry, swme with long flanks, cows with with the inscription 'Golden Rome'. Moreover, it was said in honour
full udders oxen of immense size, and woolly sheep. There also stand of Augustus Caesar and Rome, 'It rains all night, games usher in the
the mares 'fit for plough, some big with foal, and others with brisk day; Caesar, thou dost divide dominion with Jove.' Instead of shows in
young colts closely following them. the theatre and stage-plays, London provides plays of a more sacred
character, wherein are presented the miracles worked by saintly con-
To this city from every nation under heaven merchants delight _to
fessors or the sufferings which made illustrious the constancy of mar-
bring their trade by sea. The Arabian sends gold; th~ Sabaean spice tyrs. Furthermore, every year on the day called Carnival* - to begin
and incense. The Scythian brings arms, and from the rich, fat lands of
with the sports of boys (for we were all boys once)- scholars from the
Babylon comes oil of palms. The Nile sen~s pr~cious stones_; the men different schools bring fighting-cocks to their masters, and the whole
of Norway and Russia, furs and sables; nor 1s Chma absent with purple morning is set apart to watch their cocks do battle in the schools, for
silk. The Gauls come with their wines. the boys are given a holiday that day. After dinner all the young men of
London, as historians have shown, is a much older city than Rome, the town go out into the fields in the suburbs to play ball. The scholars
though it derives from the same Trojan ancestors. It was founded by of the various schools have their own ball, and almost all the follow-
Brutus before Rome was founded by Romulus and Remus. Wherefore ers of each occupation theirs also. The seniors and the fathers and the
they still have the same laws from their comm~n ~rigin. This city is wealthy magnates of the city come on horseback to watch the contests
like Rome divided into wards; it has annual sheriffs instead of consuls; of the younger generation, and in their turn recover their lost youth:
it has its senatorial order and lower magistrates; it has drains and the motions of their natural heat seem to be stirred in them at the mere
aqueducts in its streets; it has appointed places for the hearing of ca~es sight of such strenuous activity and by their participation in the joys
deliberative, demonstrative and judicial; it has its several courts, and its of unbridled youth.
separate assemblies on appointed days. Every Sunday in Lent after dinner a fresh swarm of young men go out
I do not think there is a city with a better record for church-going, into the fields on war-horses, steeds foremost in the context, each of
doing honour to God's ordinances, keeping feast-days, g!ving aln:s and which is skilled and schooled to run in circles. From the gates there
hospitality to str angers, confirming betrothals, ~o~tracting marriages. sallies forth a host of laymen, sons of citizens, equipped with lances
celebrating weddings, providing feasts, entertamm_g guests, and also. and shields, the younger ones with spears forked at the top, but with
it may be added, in care for funerals and for the _bu~ial of the dead. The the steel point removed. They make a pretence at war, carry out field-
only plagues of London are the immoderate drmkmg of fools and the e~ercises and indulge in mimic combats. Thither too come many cour-
frequency of fires. tiers, when the king is in town, and from the households of bishops,
41! TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 4S

earls and barons come youths and adolescents, not yet girt with the or a bolt shot from an engine of war. Sometimes, by mutual consent,
belt of knighthood, for the pleasure of engaging in combat with each two of them run against each other in this way from a great distance,
other. Each is inflamed with the hope of victory. The fiery steeds neigh and, lifting their poles, each tilts against the other. Either one or both
with tremulous limbs and champ their bits; impatient of delay they fall, not without some bodily injury, for, as they fall, they are carried
cannot stand still. When at last their trampling hooves ring on the along a great way beyond each other by the impetus of their run, and
ground in rapid flight, their boy riders divide their ranks; some pursue wherever the ice comes in contact with their heads, it scrapes off the_
those immediately in front of them, but fail to catch up with them; skin utterly. Often a leg or an arm is broken, if the victim falls with i~
others overtake their fellows, force them to dismount and fly past them. underneath him; but theirs is an age greedy of glory, youth yearns for
At the Easter festival they play at a kind of naval warfare. A shield is \'ictory, and exercises itself in mock combats in order to carry itself
firmly bound to a tree in mid-stream, and a small boat, swiftly impelled more bravely in real battles.
by many an oar and the current of the river, carries on the stern a youth Many of the citizens take pleasure in sporting with birds of the air, with
armed with a lance with which to strike the shield. If he breaks the hawks, falcons and such-like, and with hounds that hunt their prey in
lance by striking the shield, and yet keeps his footing, he has achieved the woods. The citizens have the rights of the chase in Middlesex,
his aim and gratified his wish, but if he strikes the shield firmly and Hertfordshire, all the Chiltern country, and in Kent as far as the river
the lance remains unbroken, he is thrown overboard into the flowing Cray. The Londoners, who were then known as Trinobantes, drove
river, and the boat, impelled by its own motion, rushes past him. There back Julius Caesar, whose delight was to wade through paths steeped
are, however, two other boats moored, one on each side of the target, in blood. Whence Lucan wrote, 'To the Britons whom he had sought
with several youths on board to seize hold of the striker who has been he turned his back in flight.'
engulfed by the stream, as soon as he comes into view or when he rises The city of London has given birth to several men who have subdued
on the crest of the wave for the second time. On the bridge and the ter- many realms and even the Roman Empire to their dominion, and also
races fronting the river stand the spectators, ready to laugh their fill. many another whose \'alour has raised him to the gods as lord of the
On feast-days throughout the summer the young men indulge in the world, as was promised to Brutus by the oracle of Apollo. 'Brutus,
sports of archery, running, jumping, wrestling, slinging the stone, beyond Gaul, beneath the setting sun, there lies an isle washed by the
hurling the javelin beyond a mark and fighting with the sword and waves of the ocean. Thither direct thy course, for there shall be thy seat
buckler. Cytherea* leads the dance of the maidens, and until the moon for ever. This shall be to thy sons a second Troy. Here from thy stem
rises, the earth is shaken with flying feet. shall kings arise, and the whole world shall be subject to them.'
In winter on almost every feast-day before dinner either foaming boars, Afterwards in Christian times this city produced that noble emperor
armed with lightning tusks, fight for their lives 'to save their bacon', Constantine, son of the empress Helena, who bestowed the city of Rome
or stout bulls with butting horns, or huge bears do battle with the and all the imperial insignia on God and St Peter and on Sylvester, the
hounds let loose upon them. When the great marsh that washes the Roman pope [AD 314-35], to whom he dispensed the office ofa groom,"
north wall of the city is frozen over, swarms of young men issue forth no longer rejoicing to be called emperor but rather the defender of the
to play games on the ice. Some, gaining speed in their run, with feet holy Roman Church; and, lest the peace of the lord pope should be
set well apart, slide sideways over a vast expanse of ice. Others make disturbed by the uproar of secular strife occasioned by his presence, he
seats out of a large lump of ice, and while one sits thereon, others with himself altogether abandoned the city which he had bestowed upon the
linked hands run before and drag him along behind them. So swift is lord pope, and built for himself the city of Byzantium. And in modern
their sliding motion that sometimes their feet slip, and they all fall on times also London has given birth to illustrious and noble monarchs,
their faces. Others, more skilled at winter sports, put on their feet the
shinbones of animals, binding them firmly round their ankles, and,
holding poles shod with iron in their hands, which they strike from 11 I e. the emperor walked before thl' pope, leading his horse in procession, as a mark of
time to time against the ice, they are propelled swift as a bird in flight honour.
44 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 1-5

the empress Maud, King 'Henry m·,1~ and the blessed Archbishop waters now g ive fish to the population and a living to the fishermen . ..
Thomas, that glorious martyr of Christ, than whom she bore no purer It has two straight and excellent streets which traverse the city in the
saint nor one more dear to all good men throughout the Latin world. form of the holy cross, each one beginning at one of the gates. By this it
is seen mystically and wonderfully that the city has within it the grace
of God, who showed in the four Gospels how his double law of the
s. Chester's divine plan Old and New Testament was fulfilled m the holy cross ... Nor in this
interpretation do I fear the contradiction of a just judge, since it must '
The author of this celebration of Chester was a monk of the Benedictine be a solid truth, being passed down in written memory . .. It should
abbey of St Werburgh (founded by Hugh d'Avranches, the earl at the also be understood that in the middle of the town, equitably positioned
time of Domesday Book [9]). Lucian wrote in c.1195. The transla- for all, is a market of copious goods, especially food, frequented by local
tion omits some of the text's redundant repetitions. Like William fitz- people and outsiders who bring cash and return with provender. This
Stephen [2], Lucian employed a rhetoric which elevated his subject. is doubtless an image of the eternal bread which came from heaven to
Yet he reveals some historical awareness by his allusion to the Roman be born, as the prophets said, 'in the centre and umbilical knot of the
Empire and to the exclusion of the Britons from the Roman culture of earth', thereby appearing equally to all the nations of the world . .. If
the city. This evidence of a twelfth-century memory (however confused) one stands in the middle of the marketplace and turns one's face to the
of the Roman past is precious, as is Lucian's precise indication of the rising sun, the churches are aligned in such a way that one sees St John
commercial coordinates of a twelfth-century city ofno mean importance. the forerunner of Christ to the east, St Peter the Apostle to the west,
St Werburgh the Virgin to the north and the Archangel Michael to the
M. V. Taylor (ed.), Liber Luciani de Laude Cestrie, Lancashire and south. No truer thing has been written than that 'over your walls, O
Cheshire Record Society, LXIV, 1912, pp. 45-7. Latin, transl. by GR. Jerusalem, I have placed guardians·_,..

First it is to be seen what Chester is, how it was built as a city, what
aspect its position gives it. It was placed in the west of Britain as a 4. A poem in praise of Winchester c.1400
place of rest and shelter for the legions who once came from far away
and, guarding the border of the Roman Empire, to hold, as I might say, Local pride is expressed in concentrated form in these verses. While
the keys to Ireland. For lying opposite the northern tip of Ireland, it their survival depends upon their having been written down, they have
opens a passage for ships and sailors bringing goods at all times. To the form and tone of an oral and probably sung - tradition. For pop-
the east its view extends not only to the Roman see and to the Empire, ular urban rhymes of a different kind, see [ 91 : .
but to the whole world, such a sight being to the eyes as "heroic deeds
of the forefathers, a long series of exploits',13 so that whatever occurs C. Sisam (ed.), The Oxford Book ef Medieval English Verse, Oxford:
in the world may be seen, and the good known, the evil eschewed. Clarendon Press, 1970, p. 374. English.
From the four winds it has four gates: the east looks towards India, the
Me likcth ever the lengerc the bet lake more pleasure
west towards Ireland, the north towards Norway, the south towards By Wingester, that joly cite:
Wales, which is the narrow corner left to the Britons by divine justice The town is good and we] y-set; situated
on account of their unnatural civil wars .. . By God's provision our The folk •~ comely on to see. to look al
Chester has below the city walls a beautiful and fish-filled river, and The air is good bothe inne and oute;
a harbour on the south side into which ships arrive from Aquitaine, The cite stont under an hille; stands
Spain, Scotland and Germany [with wine and other merchandise]. The The rivere~ renneth all aboute; nm all around it
The town is ruled upon skille. wisely
12 'Henry Ill' was 'the Young King', son of Henry II.
IS Virgil. Ameid, I, I. 641.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 47
46

5. The mayor of Exeter appeals to history 1447-48 exceptions, largely unquestioned before the sixteenth century. Perhaps
it was natural for a town clerk to interest himself in such matters,
Locked in dispute over his jurisdiction with the cathedral and canons, but Ricart held that it was 'right convenient and according to every
the mayor of Exeter made, in the city's case before the royal chancellor, burgess of the town of Bristol' to know these things. It is plausible to
an appeal to history. Churches could always claim ancient foundation imagine a version of this narrative being read aloud at meetings of the
and supernatural sanction. To compete, civic rulers needed to be able town council.
to point to a no less prestigious past. Shillingford drew for political
purposes on stories which may well have had popular currency. The L. Toulmin Smith (ed.), TM Maire of Bristowe is Kalendar, Camden
example illustrates how conflict fostered appeals to (and the invention Society, 2nd series, V, 1872, pp. 8-10. English, revised by GR.
of) civic history.
For as much as it is right convenient and according to every burgess
S. A. Moore (ed.), Letters and papers ofJohn Shillingford, Mayor ofExeter of the town of Bristowe, especially those that be men of worship, for
1447-SO, Camden Society, 2nd series, II, 1871, pp. 75- 6. English, to know and understand the beginning and first foundation of the said
revised by GR. worshipful town. Therefore let him read the old chronicles of Brutus,
and he shall find how soon after that Brutus had set and built the city
The said mayor, bailiffs and commonalty say that the said city of of New Troy, which now is London, in remembrance of the great Troy
Exeter of right old time is called Penholtkeyre, the most, or one of the that he and all his lineage came from, then Brutus reigned 20 winters
most ancient cities of this land, of whose beginning no man can find nor and more, and was buried in the New Troy. And he had S manly men to
read; the which city before the incarnation of Christ was a city walled, sons, Lotryn, Albanac and Kambor. Brute ordered Lotryn to be king of
and having a suburb to the same, of most reputation, worship, defence this land called the great Britain, Albanac king ofScotland, and Kambor
and defensible of these parts, and yet is in time ofneed, and most favour king of Wales. And after the decease and occisioun [killing] ofLotryn
and succour to all the king's people of the land, especially in time of and Albanac, reigned Madhan 30 years. And after Madhan, reigned
war repairing thereto. The which city, upon the Passion of Christ, was Memprys 22 years. And after Memprys reigned his son Ebrac 60 years,
by [ Emperor] Vespasian besieged by time of eight days; the which a noble prince and a manly, which by his prowess and manhood and
obtained not the effect of his siege, and so went forth to Bordeaux and with the help of his Bretons conquered all France and got there great
from Bordeaux to Rome and from Rome to Jerusalem, and there he riches, so that when he came home he made and built a noble city and
with Titus besieged Jerusalem and obtained [it], and sold 30 Jews for called it after his name Eborac, that now is Evirwyk, alias York. And
a penny, as it appears by the Chronicles: and always the said city of also he built the castle of Maidens, which is Edinburgh in Scotland.
Exeter [was] whole and undivided in worship as it is above said, unto And after this Ebrac reigned his son Brut Greeneshall so years. And
the time of the coming thither of the bishop and canons. after him reigned King Leil, which built the city of Carlisle, in whose
time King Solomon reigned in Jerusalem, which built the Temple of
Our Lord. And after this King Leil reigned his son Ludludubras 13
6. History and civic pride in Bristol years, which built the cities of Winchester and of Canterbury. And
after this King Ludludubras, reigned his son Bladud 21 years, a great
Robert Ricart was town clerk of Bristol from 1479. He compiled his necromancer, which built the city of Bath and devised there the hot
'Kalendar', a collection of customary, historical and legal material baths. And after this King Bladud reigned his son Leire, which built
about the city, while in office. He may have known William Worcester the town of Leicester and called it after his name. And soon after this
[7], who came to live in Bristol. Ricart's situation is comparable with King Leir, by occasion of great wars the land was departed in four: that
that of John Carpenter, town clerk of London and author of the 'Liber is to say, England to one Dowalyn, Scotland to one Seater, Wales to
Albus'. For his account of early British history, Ricart was indebted one Hudak, and Cornwall to one Cloton. This Cloton by just title was
to Geoffrey of Monmouth [I], whose authority was, with one or two right heir to all these lands, and he had a son called Dondbaude. This
48 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND HISTORY AND PRAISE 49

King Donebaude had 2 manly men to sons, that one Belin, and that Julius Caesar was not the first builder of that castle, but he caused
other Brynne, which after the decrees of their father departed the land various fortifications to be made there, as he did in every city whose
between them as their father had commanded and ordained. That is to name includes 'Chester·, as one may suppose Chichester, Winchester,
say, Belin the eldest son had all the land on this side of the Humber, Rochester, and others.
and Brynne had all the land beyond the Humber into Scotland. And for Hampton [Southampton] was named by Arviragus, king of the Britons,
as much as Belin had the more part and the better part, Brynne waxed who slew the Roman Hamon by the sea-shore in the place where the
wroth and would have had more; but Belyn would not suffer him, so town of Hampton stands. On this account it was called Hampton in
they began to war. But Brynne the younger brother had no force nor the time of Gwyder, king of the Britons, who refused to pay tribute
power against his brother Belin, so Brynne, by counsel of his people, to the Romans and who was afterwards slain by Claudius Caesar the
voided [departed] into France and there abode a long time, and got Roman at Portchester town.
there great lordships by marriage ...
Cirencester town in the county of Gloucester. Grismond's Tower by
And then Brynne first founded and built this worshipful town ofBristut the chapel of St Cecilia, where King Arthur was crowned, lies west of
that now is Bristowe, and set it upon a little hill, that is to say, between Cirencester town, which anciently was called the City of Sparrows.
St Nicholas' gate, St John's gate, St Leonard's gate, and the New gate.
And no more was built until many years after.
s. An Italian visitor c.1500
7. William Worcester on the cities of England c.1480 A Venetian visitor to England focuses on the one metropolis, London,
as worthy of comparison with Venice. Being used to Venetian society,
While working for the Norfolk knight Sir John Fastolf, William dominated by a patrician class of ancient nobility, he is particularly
Worcester developed a personal fascination with English history and struck by the absence from London of such an aristocratic elite. The
topography, which he pursued through both reading and travel. The concentration of goldsmiths' shops in Cheapside, next to St Paul's
scholarly rhetoric of his text lends a spurious authority to a series cathedral, and along the Strand (which to the visitor sounded like
of stories, part history and part myth, about the supposed origins of 'Strada', or 'the Street') which linked the city of London to the courtly
various towns. Its content and tone announce the antiquarian. But the suburb of Westminster, is documented in contemporary property
fact that allusions to such legendary civic histories were incorporated records.w
into pageant performed on the occasion of royal visits shows that these
ideas had a wider currency.•~ C. A. Sneyd (ed.), A Relation ... ofthe Island ofEngland, Camden Society,
XXXVII, London, 1897, pp. 41- S. Italian, transl. by the editor, revised
J. H. Harvey (ed.), William Worcestre: Itineraries, Oxford: Clarendon by GR.
Press, 1969, pp. 211,273. Latin, transl. by the editor.
Eboracum (Boraco) was in ancient times the principal city of the island,
Of Norwich. Edward the Elder, son of King Alfred, a most victorious and was adorned with many buildings by the Romans, in their elegant
prince, among other noble works restored the burh which in Saxon was style; but, having been sacked and burnt in the reign of King William
formerly called Burghchesterand now Norwich, but which in the British the Conqueror, she never afterwards could recover her former splen-
tongue is named Kaergwelyn after King Gwytelinus who first founded dour; so that, at present, all the beauty of this island is confined to
that city with its castle, and gave it the name of'the blanch flour castel' London. Which, although sixty miles distant from the sea, possesses all
from its beauty.

15 G . Rosser, 'Myth, image and social process in the English medie,al town', 16 D. K~ n~ and V. Harding, l/1stoncal Gazetteer ef London before the Great Fire,
l.}rban Hutory, XXIII, 1996, pp. ~ 5 ,, C~apsuie, London, 1987.
50 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

the advantages to be desired in a maritime town; being situated on the

river Thames, which is very much affected by the tide, for many miles
(I do not know the exact number) above it; and London is so much ben- 11. URBAN GROWTH
efited by this ebb and flow of the river, that vessels of 100 tons burden
can come up to the city, and ships of any size to within five miles of
it; yet the water in this river is fresh for twenty miles below London.
Although this city has no buildings in the Italian style (a l'usanza This collection of textual sources opens in the long twelfth century, '
italiana), but of timber or brick like the French, the Londoners live but its earliest contributions make clear that the story of some English
comfortably, and, it appears to me, that there are not fewer inhabitants towns is much older. Regime change at the Norman Conquest produced
than at Florence or Rome. It abounds with every article of luxury, as unprecedented forms of documentation; but the findings of Anglo-
well as with the necessaries of life; but the most remarkable thing in Norman administrators, even while they express the shift of political
London, is the wonderful quantity of wrought silver. I do not allude power, at the same time underline continuities in urban life reaching
to that in private houses, although the landlord of the house in which back well before 1066. As is noted in the Introduction, archaeology
the Milanese ambassador lived, had plate to the amount of 100 crowns, has recently filled out the written record of Anglo-Saxon boroughs, to
but to the shops of London. In one single street, named the Strand show that central and southern England were significantly urbanised
(che si chiama la Strada), leading to St Paul's, there are fifty-two gold- well before the Norman invasion. The Domesday Book is not a simple
smiths' shops, so rich and full of silver vessels, great and small, that source for the historian to use [9] , [10]. It was drawn up not to pro-
in all the shops in Milan, Rome, Venice, and Florence put together, I vide a rounded description of English towns or society but to record
do not think there would be found so many of the magnificence that the rights of the king. Much that we should like to know is therefore
are to be seen in London. And these vessels are either salt cellars, or omitted. None the less this extraordinary record sheds at least a flick-
drinking cups, or basins to hold water for the hands; for they eat off ering light on the state of urbanisation at the time of the Conquest. We
that fine tin [pewter], which is little inferior to silver. These great should be struck, in the first place, by the extent ofroyal involvement
riches of London are not occasioned by its inhabitants being noblemen in the towns by this date. What mixture of political ambition and fiscal
or gentlemen; being all, on the contrary, persons of low degree, and policy motivated that involvement? The financial value ofroyal rights
artificers who have congregated there from all parts of the island, and was an evident priority of the officials; at the same time, the crown's
from Flanders, and from every other place. No one can be mayor or dues were clearly also a matter of honour and prestige. Already in the
alderman of London, who has not been an apprentice in his youth; that late tenth century Chester's role as a theatrical stage for the ritual of
is, who has not passed the seven or nine years in that hard service ... royal power had been demonstrated by King Edgar 'the Peaceable'.
Still, the citizens of London are thought quite as highly of there, as the In 973, following his coronation at Bath (another urban setting with
Venetian gentlemen are at Venice. its own particular distinction as a former Roman place and cult centre
associated with the hot springs), Edgar sailed to Chester and held there
a meeting with Celtic and Scandinavian rulers. Although accounts of
this diplomatic gathering were elaborated later, scrutiny of the evi-
dence confirms that the strategically significant port of Chester [SJ
had on this occasion been the setting for an international summit.1 The
use by English monarchs of their towns as frames for the spectacular
display of royal power would have a long history [59], [61]. The dif-
ferent case of Bury St Edmunds exemplifies the potential of a monastic

I D E. Thornton, 'Edgar and the eight kings, AD 97:3: textus et dramatis personae',
Early Medieval History, X , >'001 , pp. 49-79
52 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GROWTH 53

establishment to act as a catalyst of urban growth [10]. Although to their new charter by instituting new civic officers and procedures.
the religious settlement probably originated as early as the seventh Also notable in the record is the evident appreciation of the symbolic
century, the foundation of the Benedictine monastery in 1020 created a value of the copy of the civic customs in what was, somewhat porten-
substantial community of monks entirely dependent upon the services tously, christened the 'Domesday' of the town, and of the splendid new
of others. That the religious were also endowed with extensive estates, seal of the community. As towns in this period became more bureauc-
the produce of which neeed to be brought to market, was an additional ratised in their government, they expressed their new-found identities
boost for the growing town at the monastery gates. The record's com- in the very form of their official records. 4
parison between Bury as it had been before the Conquest and in 1086 The documents which follow exemplify the variety of 'new town'
gives a glimpse of the enterprise of the monastic landlords in a context developments which characterised the long thirteenth century.5 By
of expanding demand and economic opportunity. no means all such initiatives represented wholly new creations on
A further reflection of urban growth in the Anglo-Norman period green-field locations; but the period was unquestionably marked by
are the bids by local groups of merchants for increased autonomy the planned erection of thousands of houses and shops on previously
and scope to manage their affairs, free from the daily meddling of unbuilt sites, and by the issuing oflocal charters to incentivise settlers.
royal officials. By the charter which they were probably granted in The latter, indeed, in return for marketing privileges, were largely
the early 1 IS0s by Henry I, the Londoners secured remarkably exten- expected to build their own homes on plots newly made available by
sive rights of self-government [11].2 The farm or annual payment enterprising landlords. A spectacular instance of urban promotion was
of £soo into the king's exchequer which was agreed by the citizens the bishop of Salisbury's project to relocate both his cathedral and its
must have seemed attractive to the royal treasurer at the time of the surrounding city from the dramatic hilltop setting of'Old Salisbury' to
charter, but the inflationary period of population growth and rising the foot of the escarpment, where advantage could be taken of a greatly
prices which followed will soon have rendered this an economically superior water supply and - following the strategic realignment of
unrealistic return - a bargain for the townspeople. That the leading roads in the vicinity - lines of communication [is]. While archae-
townsmen were concerned to have confirmation of their hunting rights ology has revealed traces of earlier settlement on the site of 'New
in the forests outside the city is a hint concerning the culture of the Salisbury', the grid-planned and partially fortified town laid out in
urban elite: as has been demonstrated for other towns in the period, it is the thirteenth century is a dramatic instance of ecclesiastical involve-
likely that the leading investors in London's expanding trade included ment in the urban expansion of the period.6 By the time of the grant
the owners of substantial rural estates. A charter of liberties distin- of the royal charter, it is evident from this text that much practical
guished a town from other places. None the less urban populations work had already been accomplished. The townspeople themselves,
comprised both aristocrats and socially more modest immigrants who perceiving the economic advantage in the town's relocation, must be
all shared roots in the country. The English kings did not tend natu- envisaged as willing collaborators in the project. With the passage of
rally to extend the pri\. ileges which were enshrined in London's first time and increased prosperity their collaboration might not always
charter; nor did they ever allow the development of fully independent be so easy to secure. In 12 17 the bishop had obtained from the crown
communes such as were becoming familiar at this period in parts of the the right to levy a 'reasonable aid' from the citizens of'New Salisbury'
Italian and German territories.s But King John's financial weakness
helps to explain the success of the burgesses of Ipswich in securing 4 G. H. Martin, The English borough in the thirteenth century', repr. in R. Holt and
similar, if less extensive, rights [I!l]. In this instance we are able, in G. Rosser (eds), The Medieval Town. A Reader in English Urban History, London,
1990, pp. 29-48; C. Liddy, War, Politics and Finance in Lau Medieval English Towns.
accompanying documentation, to witness the townspeople responding BrisJol, York and the Crown, 1350.1-1-00, Woodbridge, 2005, pp 56-7
5 In general see M. Beresford, The New Towns efthe Middle Ages, Leicester, 1967.
I!See further C. N. L. Brooke, G. Keir and S. Reynolds, 'Henry I's charter for the City 6 K H. Rogers. 'Salisbury·, 111 M. D. Lobel (ed ), AtlasefHistoric Towns, i, London, 1969,
of London', Journal efthe Society ef Archivists, IV, 1970-73, pp. 558-78. pp. 1-.S; Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England, Salrsbury. The
3 J Tait, The Medieval English Borough. Studies on Its Origins and Constitutional Growth, Houses efthe Close, London, 1993, pp. 1-6, RCHM, Ancient and Historical Monuments
Manchester, 1936, pp. 154-61. in t~ C,ty efSalisbury, London, I 980-.
54 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GROWfH
55
whenever the king tallaged his domains. This right was enshrined in of those inhabitants. The n d ,.
the 1228 charter. When, however, the bishop later, in 1305, attempted dent m• ee 1or a communal • .
the towns of this . d organisation was evi-
to raise such a tax from his citizens, they revolted, and forced him to .l . . peno not only w'th
o order within the walls b . I respect to the keeping
renounce the right. According to the frustrated lord, the townspeople High Wycombe, a to,vn ;°'~: tou repel J:alous lords. In the case of
had 'grown wanton with fatness•.; by the late twelfth centu~y be g !
o~ this secular estate had already
en euect1vely d ·
Edward I's new town foundations were often shaped by military and the townspeople. Yet a I t l d grante into the hands of
• a er or resented the ,
strategic considerations, whether along the south coast, in north and d enied the merchant ·1d . . communes autonomy
gui its right toe ,· t [ .
Wales or on the border with Scotland. But the writ quoted here refers eventual outcome was a vict r. h x1s 16]. In this case the
. ory ior t e burgesses b t I .
also to an intention to benefit trade (14]. The same document implies un d er1mes the fragility ot· . ' u t ieir experience
. communal right · h
the emergence, in the context of multiple ventures of the kind, of spe- cratlc power. The final text 10 . h' . _s m t e presence of aristo-
cialists in the arts of town foundation. All lords were reviewing their 1.,st of the reputations of man t diffi is section 1s · fc
an i_n ormal and personal
estates and considering their potential for urban development.8 The England [l 7]. It records y erent t~wns m thirteenth-century
Iand of many towns, marked! a contemporary m •
monks of Eynsham in Oxfordshire, by designating certain fields for div . ipress,on that this was a
building and offering attractive terms to settlers, created a new street Corfe, cattle of Nottingham tIf . erse one from another: 'marble of
·· ·1·t·
· somed of the noted associations • .
of houses and workshops [15].9 Whereas many small town founda- Iess grounded in economic re seem
tions of the period were located on virgin sites - for example, the new a J ies an more J'k I be
personal experience - 'girls of H fc d I e y to the trace of
borough of Stratford-upon-Avon, created around I 220 by the bishop should acknowledge that such imere o~ ' beggars of Chichester· - we
of Worcester10 - this initiative at Eynsham represented an early thir- personal. press,ons were no less real for being
teenth-century addition to an existing borough around a marketplace
(the Sunday market is first recorded in the time of King Stephen; Henry
II added two annual fairs), which had probably first grown up prior to 9. Chester in 1086
the Norman Conquest before the gates of the abbey. A survey of I 366
records thirty-one houses in Newland. Newland Street still exists, and Do!11esday Book is a problematic so r
a map of I 782 shows the houses evenly spaced along its length, each torian.11 Ostensibly a full d - . . u ce, not least for the urban his-
. d
kmg escript1on of the n t . I
with a garden extending for I 10 yards, as described in the charter. om ruled by the new A I 1a ena resources of the
· - ng o-Norman mo I •
Unlike the cathedral town of Salisbury, Eynsham was more typical of m rea 1ity was limited Its . ·1 narc 1y, its perspective
C . · comp1 ers were pr· -1
ecclesiastical new towns [ 10] in having a primary function of serving rown rights, and, despite the Con< , - iman_ y c~ncerned with
as a market for the produce of the monastic estates, with the result much escaped the royal 1· 1ueror s extensive views of these
nventory A pee r h l . ,
that it would never grow beyond modest proportions. But it appears t~eatment of lordship under disti~ct h u _1ar c a _lenge is caused by the
from the distinct court rolls for Newland that the inhabitants elected rights of diverse lords in . I eadmgs, with the result that the
d a part1cu ar town ma
their own reeve; and the charter itself already refers to the 'commune' rate pages of the Domesday Bo k F I . Y_ appear on widely sepa-
extraordinary source contains va~ . bra _l~ts difficulties, however, this
7 Rotuli parlia=ntorum, 6 vols, London, 1832, i, pp. 174--6; J. S. Davies (ed.), Thi Domesday Book entry is unusua~~ e ev, e_nce of urban life. Chester's
Trapentll Cartulary, 2 vols, De,·izes, 1908, i, pp. I 89--98. customs in use in the city Cheste ,m ~~or~mg a set of pre-Conquest
8 For a regional study focused on Wales and the Marches, sec R. A. Griffiths, 'Urban the city indicates that es.tates h ~so h~at1on for tax on land outside
colonisation in England and Wales in the later Middle Ages: examples and impli- maintenance (whether in food o; :~ev1ously been assigned for the
cations', in M. Boone and P. Stabel (eds). Shaping Urban Identity in Late Med1ewl
Europe, Leuven-Apeldoom, 2000, pp. 221-34. should note not only th . ihtary defence) of the town. We
e crowns entitlement to the proceeds of urban
9 J. Blair, 'Small towns 600-1270', in CUHB. pp. 1145-70. fig. 11.4.
JO E. M. Carus-Wilson, The first half~ntury of the borough ofStratford-upon-A,·on·. 11 G H. Martin, The l) .
rcpr. in R. Holt and G. Rosser (t.'C!s), The Medieval Tow11. A Reader in English UrbaJ Boot A !le omcs<lay horoughs· in I' H S
History, London, 1990, pp. 49--70. in J C assessn;ent, London, 1985, pp. 143~~- S . . 'a~, ycr {ed.), Domesda)'
. Holt (ed.. Domesday Studu.r Woodb .<l • . Reynolds, fht- Domesday town'
·• TJ gc, 1987, pp. 19~., 10. '
.. TOWNS l'N MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
URBAN GROWTH 57

56
Whoever committed collusion with a h' . .
commerce but also the extent of royal control over other aspects oflife a reeve of the king or the I. t ie~m the city gave up 10s; but if
ear incurred this penalty, he aid <
in the town, including violence and moral behaviour. While catalogu- Whoever committed robber or thefi . . p 20s.
ing, as its main purpose, the dues owed to the king, the text also refers house was fined 40s for eac/of th t[offirdid v10lence to a woman in a
. ese o ences].
to separate rights of the bishop and the earl.
If a widow had intercourse with an n
but a girl I os for such an offience. yo e unlawfully, she was fined 20s,
P. Morgan (ed.), Domesday Book: Cheshire, C, Chichester: Phillimore,
1978. Latin, transl. by A. Morgan and the editor. Whoever. took possess1on
..· of another's land in h .
prove it to be his own, was fined 40 l"k . t e city, and could not
The city of Chester paid tax on 50 hides• before 1066. s1/~ hides which thereto, ifhe could not prove th t. s.h, I ew1se ~hoever made a claim
a it s ould be his
are outside the city, that is 1 ½ hides beyond the bridge and 2 hides in
Whoever wished to enter ossessio . .
Newton and 'Redcliff and in the Bishop's Borough, these paid tax with paid 10s. But if he could pt , n of lus own, or his kipsman' s land
into the king's hand. no or would not, the reeve received his land
the city.
Before 1066 there were 431 houses in the city paying tax, and besides
Whoever did not pay tn·b ute at the due term was fined 10
these the bishop had 56 houses paying tax. This city then paid 10½
silver marks;* two parts were the king's, the third the earl's. If a*firef burnt the city, the man t·rom whose h . s.
ora o pence and gave 2 t 11·. . ouse it came was fined s
. s o is next door neighbour.
These were the laws there.
T\\ o parts of all sums, forfeit were the kmg's,
earl's. . the third part the
lf the peace given by the king's hand, or by his writ or his commis-
sioner, were broken by anyone, the king had 100s thereby. But if the
king's peace, given by the earl or on his orders, were broken, the earl I'. ships arrived at the city port or left . .
s1on, the king and the earl had 40 fi port w1tho~t the kmg's permis-
had the third penny [one-third of the sum] of the 100s which were . . . s rom each man m the shi s
given for it; and if the peace given by the king's reeve or the earl's Ifa ship arnved against tl k' ' p,.
officer were broken, the fine was 40S and the third penny was the earl's. king and the earl had bo;~ t~:gs~/e~ce and despite his prohibition, the
everything in it. ip itself and the crew, together with
If a free man, breaking the peace given by the king, killed a man in a
house, his land and all his goods were the king's, and he became an But if it came with the kin ..
outlaw himself. The earl had the same [right], but only over his own what they had without i'nt gfis peace and permission, those in it sold
er erence But •h · 1 f: ·
man who paid this penalty. But no one could restore peace to any earl had 4d from each cargo· if th ·k. •,,.. en it e t the king and the
had marten-skins not t 11 e mg s reeve instructed those who
outlaw except the king. to him and he h~d madoe ,hse1·s to a,nyone until they were first shown
Whoever shed blood between Monday morning and Saturday noon · pure 1ase h d'd
instruction was fined 40s. . ' w oever • not observe this
was fined 10s; but from Saturday noon to Monday morning the fine
for bloodshed was 20s. Similarly, whoever did so in the Twelve Days Any man or woman who gave false .
of Christmas, on Candlemas Day [2 February], on the first day of when caught; similarly anyone ,· measure m the city was fined 4s
the dung-stool [cucking-stool]*: io 11_1;de bad beer was either put in
Easter, on the first day of Whitsun [the seventh Sunday after Easter],
on Ascension Day [the fortieth day after Easter], on the day of the the king or the earl received this ;:a'.4s to ~he reeves. The officer of
was, whether the bishop's or an oth em th: c1t~, ~n whoever's land it
Assumption [ 15 August] or of the Nativity of St Mary [8 September],
anyone withheld it for more thy tl er m~n s. S1m1larly with the toll; if
or on All Saints' Day [I November], paid 20s.
Before 1066 th - an 1ree nights, he was fined 40s.
Whoever killed a man on these holy days was fined £4; on other days, k' ere were , moneyers . th .
40s. Similarly, whoever committed breaking and entering or highway mg and the earl, additional to tl m , e city, who paid £7 to the
changed. ie re\enue, when the coinage was
robbery on these holidays and on a Sunday paid out a fine of £4; on
other days 40s.
 U RBAN GROWTH 59
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
58
It has I ½ leagues in length and as much . .
There were then 12 judges in the city; they were from the king's, pa~s_£1 in tax, then 60d goes fr~m her m_w1dth. When the hundred*
the bishop's and the earl's men. If any of them stayed away from the this is from the town as [ it ... b ,. e for the monks' supplies· but
. . · was e1ore 1066 d . . '
hundred* on a day when it sat without plain excuse, he was fined 10s, now a1t hough it is enclosed in a I . . an yet it is the same
ploughed and sown [ but] whe ~ger ~1rcu1t of land which then was
[shared] between the king and the earl. and clerics, and 28 nuns and re now.., there are 30 priests, deacons
For the repair of the city wall and the bridge, the reeve used to call out
an d a11 Ch nstian
. poor75
people. [ Also] persons
b k ' who pray d a1ly . for the kin~
one man to come from each hide in the county. The lord of any man shoemakers, robemakers cook a ers, brewers, tailors, washers
who did not come paid a fine of 40S to the king and the earl. The fine St Edmund's, the abbot ~nd ths, pbortehrs, bursars; all these daily serve
· e ret ren B ·d h
was additional to the revenue. reeves m charge of the land h h . es1 es t ese, there are Is
This city then paid in revenue £45 and 3 timbers* of marten-skins.* under them, 5 smallholders";.;l ':,"e their houses in the same town·
The third part was the earl's and two parts the king's. French and English; under ~hems~~ now S4 men-at-arms, includin~
When Earl Hugh [d'Avranches] acquired it [in 1071], its value was areJ 342 houses in lordship on la~d ~s:~llhholde_:s. Now in all Cthere
before 1066. ... w ic was~ St Edmund's arable
only £30, for it was thoroughly devastated; there were 205 houses less
than before 1066. Now there are as many as he found there.
Mundret held this city from the earl for £70 and I gold mark.
11. Charter of Henry 1 •m favour of the citizens of London

As
tutea historical
new rightssource, this·t·charter
and pra b is. problematic. . Charters could insti-
10. Bury St Edmunds in 1086
. c ices, ut they t·
p~mia~y desire to describe and defend tl were o ten motivated by a
The Domesday Book entry for Bury, although brief, is unusually h1stor1an needs to be s .· . ie status quo. Consequently th
detailed, yielding a rich characterisation of this expanding monas- ens1ttve not onl t h e
ments but also to the value laced b y o t e con:ents of these docu-
tic borough. Significant comparisons are made between the situation form, their visual iconogra~h and\~o~te1~poranes on_their physical
prior to the Conquest and in 1086. At this period the local economy royal charters issued in the d y d ,. e1r ~ erbal rhetoric. Like many
appears to have been dominated by the service trades required by the th·is one .is replete with re,.e eca es iollowm g th e N orman Conquest
Benedictine community: clergy, administration, retailing and clothing. • 11 rences to old · ,
est is anxious to protect in th er_ practices which local inter-
As, over the course of the following two centuries, the cloth trade of new world in which the de,. e conftex~ ~t the new regime - and in a
this Suffolk market town acquired a more than local significance, ten- . . ience o pr1v1leg .
mcreasmgly upon the abil't . e was commg to depend
sions would arise with the monastic lords, whose tutelage came to be This charter probably date1syfito prboduce written evidence of its origin
resented by the townspeople [79]. h b rom etween 1130 d .
as een cast on its authent' ··t an 1133. Some doubt
provisi~ns. However, most~~ t~/r~r~ysbecause of the generosity of its
A. Rumble (ed.), Domesday Book: Suffolk, 2 vols, Chichester: Phillimore, a (certamly genuine) confirn1 t gh t g~anted here were included in
1986, i, 14.167. Latin, transl. by the editor. In a ory c arter 1ssu d b H
any case, the one reproduced here dat e y e~ry II in c. I 155.
tury, and encapsulates the written . pr· ,-1 es fromh. the mid-twelfth cen-
In [Bury St Edmunds], the town where St Edmund the glorious king
townsmen, in London and elsewher I\ i_ eges "". ich groups of leading
and martyr lies buried, Abbot B[aldwin] held 118 men before 1066 for c_rown. Amongst many points of. e, mcreasmgly sought from the
the monks' supplies. They could grant and sell their land. Under them, tton of 'sokes· or islands of . interest, w_e should notice the protec-
52 smallholders (bordars) from whom the abbot could have a certain The h untmg · rights of the urb pnvateI'. secular JUrts · d'1ct1on
· within
. the city
[amount of] aid. 54 free [men], somewhat poor (satis inopes); 43 alms- landed connections (see also [2]). an e 1te are a r emm · d er of their important·
men; each of them has one smallholder. Now 2 mills; 2 ponds or fish
ponds. Value of this town then £10; now £20.
60
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

D. C. Douglas and G. W. Greenaway (eds), English Historical Documents

ll URBAN GRow·rH

about which they make claim to me I .

to the law of the city. And "f ' will do them right accordin
61

the citizens of London th I ~nyo~~ has taken toll or custom fro!

104'2-l 189, 2nd edn (copyright© 1981), London: Eyre Methuen, 1981,
pp. 1012-1s. Latin, transl. by the editors. Reproduced by permission of the borough or village 'whee~ ~o~I ~1t1zens of London may take from
as the man of London gave for toll r custom has been levied as much
Taylor and Francis Books UK. penalty. And let all debtors to the' ~~d mor~ also may be taken for a
debts, or prove in London th t thc1t11;ns of London discharge their
Henry, by the grace of God king of the English, to the archbishop of
Canterbury, and to the bishops and abbots, and earls and barons and
refuse either to pay or t o comeaand eym k o notI owe them·' and if the 1
to ""horn the debts are due ma tak: e sue 1 pr~of,_ then the citizens
justices and sheriffs, and to all his liegemen, both French and English,
from th: borough or from the vflla pledges w1thm the city either
of the whole of England, greeting. Know that I have granted to my
citizens of London that they shall hold Middlesex at farm for £300 debt~r hves. And the citizens shal: o.r fro~ the c~unty in which the
at the account'~ for themselves and their heirs from me and my heirs, and fully as had their predecessors n a\:e th~ir hu~tmg chases, as well
and Surrey. Given at We t . ' amely, m Chiltern and Middlese
so that the citizens shall appoint as sheriff from themselves whomso- s minster. x
ever they may choose, and shall appoint from among themselves as
justice whomsoever they choose to look after the pleas of my crown
and the pleadings which arise in connection with them. No other shall 12. The liberties and customs of Ipswich 1200
be justice over the men of London. And the citizens shall not plead
outside the walls of the city in respect of any plea; and they shall be Ond occasion the grant of a charter can be sh
-
quit of scot* and Danegeld* and the murder-fine.* Nor shall any of a_n immediate consequences Ki J , own to have had practical
them be compelled to offer trial by battle. And if any one of the citi- liberties to the town oflpswi~h ( n)g ohn s grant of a first charter of
zens shall be impleaded* in respect of the pleas of the crown, let him to appoint urban officials and t ~ was promptly followed by meetings
prove himself to be a man of London by an oath which shall be judged
·m oth er such cases the . o issue the fi rst c1v1c
· - ordinances (b) A
. . · , securing of th h . · • s
in the city. Let no one be billeted within the walls of the city, either 1sat1on on the part of the towns e c arte~ m?icates prior organ-
of my household, or by the force of anyone else. And let all the men merchant guild. As a mark fpehople, embodied m this instance in a
d. . . er o t e town, s n
of London and their property be quit and free from toll and passage• 1ssemmat1on by public readin throu . e~ status, the charter's
and lastage* and from all other customs throughout all England and notable, as is the creation of a ~ . lghout neighbouring counties is
at the seaports. And let the churches and barons and citizens hold and to preserve the rights ofth c1v1c se~ and a 'Domesday' roll in which
e community.
have well and in peace their sokes,* with all their customs, so that
those who dwell in these sokes shall pay no customs except to him S._ Re~nolds, W. de Boer and G Ma . .
who possesses the soke, or to the steward whom he has placed there. h1st~rzae urbanae, ii (2), Leiden: Brill c IN1oca11l (eds), Elenchusfontium
98 7
And a man of London shall not be fined at mercy except according to Latin, transl. by GR. ' 8, PP· 101-2 (a), 103- (b).
his were,13 that is to say, up to 100 shillings: this applies to an offence
which can be punished by a fine. And there shall no longer be misken-
Kno': that we have confir;ed 1~ ~~~:e of God king of England.
(a) 25 May 1200. By John b tl
ning• in the husting court,* nor in the folk-moot,• nor in other pleas
within the city. And the husting court shall sit once a week, that is, Ipswich our town of Ipswich wiih all. charter t~ our ~urgesses of
on Monday. I will cause my citizens to have their lands and pledges cu~toms, to be held by them and b itts ~osse_ss1ons, liberties and
and debts within the city and outside it. And in respect of the lands he1rs, paying annually at M" h I y ~e1r heirs from us and our
We grant that all b IC ae mas mto our exchequer 100s
12 This was the •farm of the borough': the right, in return for a regular payment urgesses of Ip · h h ·
stallage,• lastage • pont • sw1c s ould be free of toll
to the royal exchequer, to govern legal and financial affairs within the town and its d h • age, passage• and 11 h ,
ues t roughout our land s and at the ports. a ot er customary
hinterland.
IS Not to be fined at discretion, and only at the level of bis blood-price (a prin-

ciple of Anglo-Saxon justice).

 URBAN GROWfH 6S
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
62 Amisius Bolle, John of St George, John le Mayster, Sayer the son
hall be made to plead• outside
We grant that no_ne of the~~ s shall have their merchant guild ofThurstan, Robert Parys and Andrew Peper. They swore before
the borough oflpsw1c~; that t y t . m et hansam suam); that no the whole township that they would protect and rule the borough
of Ipswich and would maintain to the limits of their power all the
with its privileges (gildam Trn:r~ o::e town ...
one can be billeted by force wit .; th t the said burgesses shall liberties which the burgesses of the town had recently received
We desire and firmly prescn e a. eace J. ust as they are by the king's charter ...
.b · nd free customs m P , d On Thursday after the feast of the Translation of St Thoma~
hold these h ert1es a her free boroughs in Englan '
the Martyr [ 7 July] 1200 the bailiffs, coroners and other chiet'Y
held by the bu~gesse~ ~\ou;ie~\nd free customs owned by our
saving in all things t e I er portmen met to direct the state of the town of Ipswich ... They
ordained that there should be two bedels• sworn to make arrests
citizens of London.
and to carry out the orders of the bailiffs, coroners and chief
. bailiffs and coroners• in Ipswich,
portmen; and that one of the bedels should be in charge of the
(b) On the procedure for electmt J hn On Thursday after the
prisons. They ordained that by common counsel of the township
according to th~ ~harter to;oh:rheOBa~tist [24 June] 1200, the
there should be made a common seal in the borough, to be used
feast of the Nat1v1ty of S I f 1 ·wich gathered (congregata
whole township of the _borou~ l ? tphse cemetery of St Mary at in maj or negotiations touching the community of the town. They
ordained that a suitable man should be elected as alderman of
est tota vzl•1ata burg1· Gzppeswzcz) m b T ffs and four coroners, ·m
. der to elect two a1 I ed the merchant guild; and that he should have four worthy men of
the Tower m or h" h the king recently grant .
accordance with the charter w ic f their town John the son the town as his associates. They ordained that the new charter
d t law worthy men o ' d should be sent throughout the counties of Suffolk and Norfolk,
They electe wo . . - Belines who were sworn to guar
and that it should be read in public, so that the liberties contained
of Norman and Wilham !e h t th;y would treat faithfully and
in the charter should be openly and publicly known everywhere
the goods ~f the town a1~h~ \1so elected on the same da~ ~our
well both nch and poor. y w ·11·am de Belines, Philip of in both counties ...
on of Norman, I I f h On Thursday after the feast of St Faith [ 6 October::! 1200 the
coroners, Joh n t h e s . to hold the pleas o t e
Lew who were sworn . h" bailiffs and coroners, the rest of the chief portmen and the whole
the gate and R oger ' . d t the royal interest wit m
d whatever pertame o h . h community (tota communitas) met together in the church of St
crown an d to o h b Tff: dealt justly with bot rte
the town, and to ensure that t e a1 i s Mary at the Tower. The bailiffs showed the common seal of the
town which had been newly made ... An alderman was elected
and poor. . d b common consent of the town-
On the same day it was agree w?rd be in the town twelve chief by the common counsel of the township, William Gosscalk; and
ship that there should hence~o~ t they are called in other four to be associated with him, Peter Everard, John le Mayster,
'portmen' (capitaks portme~nz }~~~ ~~:: full authority to govern Roger Lew and John of St George ... The twelve chief portmen
free En_glis~ boroughs, w 10 ;~he bailiffs and coroners said that were granted, in return for their labour for the community, the
meadow ofOdenholm for their horses. It was agreed by the whole
and mamtam the ~own .. . A~me to the cemetery on Sunday after
the whole township should \au\ 29 June] to elect these twe~ve community that the laws and free customs of the town should be
placed in a roll called the Domesday; and that this roll should be
the feast of St Peter an!:t the w~ole township of Ipswich bemg
chiefportmen. On that y, f h b •nffs and coroners, the latter for ever kept in the custody of the bailiffs, so that they should
congregated in the presenc:? t he s:1 four worthy and legal men know how to carry out their office. Also that all the statutes of
by the assent of the towns tp c oh e sworn to elect twelve the guild merchant• should be placed in another roll, as is done
. I f the town w o wer elsewhere in towns and boroughs which have a guild merchant;
from each pans l o the best and most discreet and sub-
chief portmen from among h And the J·urors of the and that the alderman should keep this always with him, so that
. "b ) 1en of t e town. he should know how to conduct his office.
stantial (potencwri us n h fNorman William de Belines,
parishes came and chose Jo n so~ o r Evera;d, William Goscalk,
Philip of the gate, Roger Lew' ete
 l ' RBAN GROWTH 65
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
64
respect to all goods which the shall
forbid that anyone should y d. carry by land or water. And w
is. The foundation of New Salisbury 1228 the1r
· Iands or servants cont vex or 1sturb th em, or their possessions ore
of forfeit to us. And w ' rary to the liberty of our charter on ' .
This royal charter ratifies the creation of a new town. With royal . egrantthatth ·d •. , pam
approval, Bishop Richard le Poore removed both his cathedral and the tuity _a!l other liberties and quittan e sat c1t1z.ens shall have in perpe-
town which surrounded it from its previous hilltop location to a new, our c1t1z.ens of Winchester hold. ces throughout our kingdom which
low-lying site. Notwithstanding the earlier Investiture Contest, fol- We grant to the said bishop and his ,
lowing which ecclesiastical appointments were supposed to be free of ands, they may enclose the city ofN s~c~~s;ors t~at, for fear of brigt
secular interference, the king is explicit about his continuing claim to and keep these in perpetuity as th . ew a is ury with sufficient ditchel
influence episcopal elections. ln the royal perspective, both the city and of ourselves and our heirs in th e1r o_wn domain. We reserve the right
the see were the king's possessions. There is no consideration given, in a vacancy, such as we rightly he appd01~tment of the bishop and during
ave urmg va . .
such a document as this, to the practical agency of the secular commu- c urc es of our realm It h 11 canc1es m other cathedral
h1 h . · s a not be la wfi I f◄ I • .
nity of townspeople. Yet the latter must have played a significant role se or misappropriate
. the b urgages• or te u or t 1e c1t1z.ens
. to give,
1
t e same city to churche 1· . nements which they hold .
in the making of the new town. Albeit not formally recognised at this
b.hish op and his successors.s or re 1g1ous m en, wit
. hout the licence of the
m
date, we should envisage some kind of political organisation among the
inhabitants. In addition, we grant to th b" h
the need of themselves and teh _is ohp and to his successors that for
W. D. Macray (ed.), Charters and Documents illustrating the History <if t a11 age• or aid
. from their citizens
e1 r c uhrch ' they may Ievy a reasonable
,
the Cathedral, City, and Diocese of Salisbury, in the twelfth and thirteenth tallage in our domains. , w enever we or our heirs make a
centuries, Rolls Series, London: Eyre and Spottiswood, 1891, pp. 17 5-8.
We grant, moreover, to the bisho . .
Latin, transl. by GR men_t of the same city, the ma alfe and his h_e1rs that, for the improve-
Henry [Ill], by the grace of God king of England, etc., to his arch- leadmg to it, as they see lt y. rhand_redirect the roads and bridges
' saving t e rights of others
bishops, bishops, ministers, etc., sends greeting: Know that we, out Furthermore, we grant to the bisho . . .
of reverence for God and the Blessed Mary ever Virgin, and for our each year for ever a fair in the said ~ and his he1rs _that they may have
salvation and that of our ancestors and successors, have granted and the eve of the Assumption of the st1ty ~f~ew Saltsbury, lasting from
by the present charter confirm to God and to the church of the blessed morrow of the octave of the sam f◄ esse[ ary : 14 August] until the
Mary - whose translation from our castle of Salisbury to a lower site market there on Tuesday with al~ 1~:St . 2S August:;; and each week a
was ordained by ourselves, and in the foundation of whose church we to such fairs and markets' W I ~ e~tles and free customs belonging
laid the first stone - and to the venerable father Richard, bishop of that of our lands and of othe;s ate a so es_1re and direct that all merchants
place, and to his successors, and to the canons of the same church and the1r
· merchandise
. in the ·sam peace·t
with us 'commg• and staying with
their men, all the liberties and free customs which they had in the time of any intervention by our ba~i~s ~ andh then leaving it, should be free
of our forebears, the kings of England, throughout our kingdom, by and should have free passa e . rot ers, whether on land or water
virtue of charters either of our predecessors or of others of our realm render due customs. g m and out of our lands, provided the;
granted to the said church, bishops and canons, as the charters of our
predecessors and of other donors reasonably bear witness. All
th of. these
. things we grant to the bishop d h" h .
h e c1t1zens, saving the liberties f _an is e1rs, the canons and
In addition, we desire and grant, for ourselves and our heirs, that the and of Ralph, bishop of Chiches~ our c1t~ of London. Given by the
place called N ew Salisbury shall for ever be a free city (libera civitas), 13 January 1228. er, our chancellor, at Westminster,
enclosed by ditches as is noted below; and that the citizens living in
that city shall be quit of toll, pontage,* passage,* pavage,* lastage,•
stallage,* carriage* and all other customs throughout all our land, with
 URBAN GROWTH 67
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
66
new burgages. The rhetoric of such a monastic charter as this presents
14. Royal foundation of a new town the abbot in the creative role of urban promoter. But while the monas-
tic licence was necessary, and the rents were set by the lord at a level
. d s from the mid-1290s. Edward I's known designed to attract settlers, it is implicit that it was the latter who,
This royal wnt probably. ate f t ded to the Scottish border,
. h lannmg O towns ex en . . having taken up leases on the plots, would undertake to build on them.
involvement m t e P [England 14 Here specialists m
the south coast o · '
into Wales an d along nd on the crown for a fresh venture of the
the art are summoned to atte 'fi d d wl1·1ch had perhaps, at the H- :: Sal_ter (ed.), Eyns~am Cartulary, 2 vols, Oxford: Clarendon Pres\
. · h' h is not specl e an
kind, ma location w ic
' . .
'd 'fi d '1th the aid of this comm1ss1on
1901-8, 1, pp. 60-1. Latin, transl. by GR. I
time ofthe meetmg,. yet to be l ent1 e w
. l'mpse of the practical ch al-
.
of Londoners. The document d~1vest: fo1undation of a new town, and To aU those children of holy mother Church to whom the present
fi ld writing shall come, A[dam], by the grace of God Abbot ofEynsham,
lenges and procedures surroun mg e
f b dy of practical experience in the e . and the convent of that place send greeting in the Lord. Know that we,
of the emergence o a o
for the utility and advancement of our house, have, by the advice of our
. Alb Liber Custumarum, et Liber Horn, g friends, let all the lands which belonged to our demesne* outside the
H. T. Riley (ed.), Lzber us, B wn Green Longmans and
S • Lo don· Longman, ro , ' viii* ofEynsham, that is between that vill and the main street towards
vols, Rolls enes, n · _ .. (2) p 535 Latin transl. by the
Roberts, I 859-62, ii ( 1), PP· , 7-8, II ' . . ' the Cassington bridge to the south, and similarly all that land which
editor, revised by GR. belonged to our demesne towards the north (extending for twenty
perches* in length from the same street towards the north), on this
d etc to his faithful and loyal John le condition: that whoever shall hold one acre of those lands shall pay
Edward, b~ the grace of ~oci~ of London, and to the good people
us 4s annually ... and who shall hold three-quarters of an acre, shall
Bretoun,. his. warden ?f t We ?trictl command that you cause to be
of the said city, greeting. Y. t of the most experienced and pay us 3s annually at the same terms; and who shall hold half an acre,
th men of the same c1 y, shall pay us 2s at the same terms. And whoever accepts any portion of
chosen f,our wor y k h w to devise ordain and array a
•
most sufficient, wh o may best now ol '
d of merchants. Let these these lands shall hold it without contradiction for the service named,
h fit of ourse ves an by right of their own inheritance and that of their heirs in perpetuity,
new town, m?st to t e pro Saint Edmunds on the morrow of All Souls
persons be with us at Bury d d repared to go elsewhere upon in ways and paths, entrances and exits within the aforesaid limits of
[2 November] next to come11' re~ ~ atnh np1 Given under our Privy Seal, the lands assigned, freely and quit of all [further] service and exaction
. busmess,
. belonging to ourselves; and they shall remain as free and quit of all
tins where we sha enJom el •. the 24th year of Edward I ,
at Tuggehale, 21 September [apparent y m service to other lords as our demesne in Eynsham. And if the tenants
shall desire to give or to sell their tenement to any secular person, they
1296].
shall do this freely: in such fashion, however, that the seller shall give
us 2d, and the buyer 4d, in recognition of our lordship. But the tenants
, town· Eynsham 1215 shall have free choice as to who should do fealty* [for the land] to both
l5. A monastic new ·
themselves and us. And if anyone shall forfeit that land, or be sued by
. h of E nsham was an extension of a pre- another [over it], then the suit of that tenement shall be held. And if
The small monastic boroug y bb t s The reference in the
d l ent at the a ey ga e · by judgement he is put in mercy [convicted], he shall make good his
existing market ~ve opm tl l'berties of the nearby county town
abbot's charter, printed here, toh 1e I. l 191)1s is of interest, as is the transgression, according to the degree of the crime, by the view of his
ted by royal c arter m , f h equals, such that the fine shall not exceed I 0s. And if one of the bur-
of Oxf,ord (gran ' d 'b th small body of tenants o t e
use of the word 'commune to escn e e gesses ( burgencium) should die having made division of his goods within
this lordship, then that division shall stand. If, however, he should die
. 196,; H. Colvin et
of the Middk Ages, Le1eester, without making a division, his goods shall be divided into three parts:
14 M. Beresford, 1:}ehNK~ '!' :0:1cs 6 vols London, 196:l-82.
al., The History~ t e mg 5
0

' '
one for the child, another for the widow, the third to be divided by the
24·
15 See Introduction, P·
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
URBAN GROWTH 69
68
t and confirm to Wycombe as to why he does not permit them to have their guild mer-
. l f the deceased. W e gran . chant with its appurtenances, as they used to have it in the time of the
nearest relatives tor the sou _o d ll other good customs winch we
[the burgesses] these _lib~r~1es _an o~ the liberties of the burgesse~ of lord King John, when he had that manor in his hand; concerning which
are able to give them m imitationnants in the county of Oxfordslure. the burgesses say that in the time when the lord King John had that
Oxford and of those other free dte t the commune (commune) of manor in his hand, and when the lord the king gave it to the same Alan,
' . f h. we han over o . d .th they had a guild merchant and a liberty which the same Alan has takep
And in witness o t is, . t th'is charter furmshe wi
I id tenemen s ' d away from them, by which they are much injured, for by that guil~
those who shall hold t 1e sa . th year of the Incarnate Wor
the impression of our seal. Done m e merchant they had this liberty, that no merchant within their tow~
1215; witnessed by the chapter. could sell cloths at retail, neither linens nor woollens, unless he were
in the guild nierchant or by licence of the bailiffs of the burgesses who
. h w combe 1228-2 4 were in the guild merchant, and furthermore in the same way could not
H1g
16. Dispute over a
guild merchant at Y
. sell fells* or wood or broom or such merchandise, unless he were in the
guild, or by licence. And the same Alan contravened this liberty and
. concerning control over a deve~opmg
The evidence of legal co~fl1~t f ·t growing importance in the granted to all merchants and others that they might sell cloths at retail
ble indicator o i s . . h' and fells* and such wares as they please, and takes sd toll. And they
town can be a val ua d f bal testimonies m t is case
. The recor o ver . used to give for the farm of the lord the king'~ 6s 8d per annum to have
eyes of contemporaries. . . ·n nee at this period, ofwntten
. h . reasmg s1gm ea ' l ' that liberty; and because he has taken away that liberty from them,
draws attention tot e me . weakness of the townspeop e s
. I conspicuous h' h they are injured and suffer damage to the value of £26 13s4tt: and they
titles to authonty. t was a l . to have had a charter w IC
e forced to c aim . £ bring a charge on this count, and if this does not suffice, they offer to
position that ~h ey wer [Wycombe were already paying 4
had been lost m a fire. The 1:1en ~ f th ir borough in the l 180s, so a prove that they had such seisin by the evidence of witnesses (per vivam
er annum to maintain the liberties~ eThose who in these records, vocem), if that is required, or by the body of a man,"' or by the country/0
P . d edated that time. ' fl d and they offer £JS 6s8dto have an inquisition.
charter of some k m pr . h t* were a narrow group o ea -
invoked their right to a guild mere an men's autonomy recorded in And Alan comes and defends force and tort [ claims right of owner-
to the towns b
ing traders. The c h a11enge l d ho had received Wycombe y a ship: and says that he has taken no liberties from them, but ~ill speak
f m a new or w . · t
the text below ca~e ro . h limited resources and every mcent~ve o the truth. The lord king John gave him that manor ~ ith all its appur-
royal grant- a th~~d son wit The eventual decision of the court m the tenances for his homage and service for ,£20 a year and for the service
exploit the town it he_ coul~- ur of the townspeople, who reta_ined con- ofone knight, so that never afterwards did they have a guild merchant,
122os was, however, m fa~ o k . turn for a substantial annual although they often sued for it and murmured among themselves, so
rol of their borough and its mar et, m re that he often asked of them their warrant, if they had any, and they
t 16
rent payable to Basset o f£30 . . show him none. And the town is amended in that merchants and others
R H Tawney (eds), English Economic can sell their merchandise; and so they ought to have no guild.
A. E. Bland, P. A. Brown andd .. G Bell & Sons, 1914, PP· 123-4.
And the burgesses say that his statement is contrary to right, because
History: Select Docunu~ts, Lon on. .
after his time, when he had that manor, they had that liberty, both
Latin, transl. by the editors.
before his time and after, and they offer as before £ 13 6s 8d to have an
. is before the king's justices, 1224] inquisition. Touching their warrant, they say that they had a charter
r Records of the Cuna _Reg . d to answer the burgesses of
·suck'mgh am • Alan Basset'' was summone
of King Henry, grandfather of the lord the king, and it was deposited

• . if the Borough of High Wycombe from Its Origins lo 18 The right to the independent control of their affairs.
I 6 L. J Ashford, 1 he History o 15-20 19 Trial by battle.
1880, London,1960, PP· 11-13, . f tl1e closest counsellors of King John,
\ d been one o · · b 20 Trial by jury.
1; Alan Basset (<l. 1232) . iad t of part of the manor ofWycom e.
from "hom he ha<l receive a gran
70 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GROWTH
71
in the church of Wycombe, and there in the time of wari1 was burned Butchers of Winchester
in the church, and of the truth of this they submit themselves to a jury. Bachcleryr of Northampton
1nm of Glout-ester l:Cls of Cambridge
Plams ofSal.sbury
And Alan defends that they had no charter of this kind nor any war- 111c bath of Rath Cloister of Lichfield
The man·cl of ~tonchcngc
rant, nor ever had seisin* of that guild in his time, nor can he admit llcrrrng of Yarrnouth Merchants of Lynn
Pla1cc of \Vmdielsea
nor will he admit any inquisition without the lord the king; but indeed Dace of K mgston Merling of Hye
Lo<hc, ofWcybndgc"
it may be true that when they had the manor of the king at farm, then Salmon of Bern ,ck
Hutts of BcdfonJ
Barbels of St h·e.,
they did what they pleased. S1mncl"' of Wycombe The crossing of Chelmsford
Waste!"' ofHungerfonJ 1
Co, crcluef ofShaftesbury Treer'' of Newbury
A day is given to them on the morrow of Martinmas to hear their
judgement. The ferry of Tilbury
Empyrean of Meldon
W1111plc of Lewes
Archers of Wales
Sk:ns o1·shrewsbury
Hobbers of Alton
I
Marble ofCorfe
Po ttery ofHenham-·• Plaster of Nowcr'~
Cattle of Nottingham
Cord of Warnick Linen cloth of Aylesham
17. Towns and their associations in the thirteenth century Cambrick of Bridport
Rymt·N of Worcester "(,ha Ions' of Guildford"
Fur of Chester
The" arren of Walton Shipping ofSouthampton
This source is one of a kind. The text appears to be the idle jotting of Qmlts of Clare
Jousters of Yardley To"n of Bures' ·
a bureaucrat, and does not claim any more serious or definitive status. Tourneyers of Blyth
Mills of Dunwich Tilters of lp.mich
None the less it captures loose impressions current in the later thir- Pnory of Waltham
The harbour of Non\'Ich Hrcad ofSt Alban~
teenth century. Its underlying premise, that towns differed markedly Mead ofH1tchin
Ale of Ely He,-e,..... of Banbury
from one another in character, is as worthy of note as are the particular Cod of Gru11sby
Chase of Englewood Covert ofSherwooJ
features ascribed to individual places. For~-st of Windso·
Saddlery of Ogcrston Horn of Carlisle
l'alfrcy of Ripon
Cheese of Jcn·aulx~• Colt of Hie, aulx
H. Rothwell (ed.), English Hzstorical Documents, iii, l/89--/327 (copy- &un cy • ofFountams
Lodging of Duns tabl~ Soap ofCo,·entry
right O 1975), London: Routledge, 1975, pp. 881-4. French, transl. by Scoffers of Elstow
the editor. Reproduced by permission ofTaylor and Francis Books UK.
Leather nf Hristol
G irls of Hereford
c~: of Dunmow
Cord of Hridport

The Baronage of London R~-gratmg" of York Sanctuary of Canterbury 2i Young men.

Relics of Westminster Prostitutes ofChanng The Pardon ofSt Paul's" 28 L«hes may ha, c Ix-en a k d f
Sauce of Fleet•• Deer of Bury St Edmunds School ofOxford about five miles from the
29 White bread ofth fi fl
fi.:;
fai~ ~t~\fish; a_nd Wcybridgc could be Wcybourn,
o a cney m Norfolk.
Scarlet of Lincoln llauberge" ofStamford Blanket oflllyth e nest our.
Burnet of Be,·erley Russet of Colchester Thie\'CS of Grantham SO Inferior bread.
Murderers of Royston Kni\'es ofTI1axted Slec\'cs'" of Durham SI Bread of coarse hrown flour.
Shears of Huntingdon Needles of Wilton Ha1.0rs of Leicester SI! Meaning uncertain.
SS Nore Down Purbeck
• , a source of gyps1m1 f.
S+ In Essex. · or P1aster of Paris.
21 Presumably a reference to the civil war in the closing months of the reign of 35
See I~ F. Sal7.ll1an Enulish
King John, in I 216. 19!>-<100. • • o Industries ef th, Middle Au~s, 0
o· xford, 19'13, pp.
22 Buying up goods before they come to market, in order to raise the pril·e. S6 Reamers bored holes in metal
2S The Pardon Churchyard at St Paul's church in London, where indulgences s1 Id · · .
entrficat1on uncertain.
were available. 38 A drink.
24 Possibly ironic, referring to the pollution of this ri\·er in London. 39 Now a •
mere 1iamlct, bctwt•en Hunt d d •
25 A cloth, as others in the following entries. -IO Now known after • . • . mg on an Stamford.
26 Maunches: possibly ma11cMs, sleeves or alternatively metal points. 41 R d" Wcnslcy, in the same dale.
ea mg uncertain.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
72
The market of !'ontefract
Beggars of Chichester
l'c\\ tcr., of Exeter Glo\"cs of Ha\'erhill
Hose ol Tick hill
Cake of Stamford
III. ECONOMIC LIFE
Tin 0 fCorn\\al1
Cmglcs " of Doncaster
Villeins ofTainworth" rhc castle of Do\"cr
Hardihood of the Cmque Ports
The manor of W oo<lstock Tiles of Heading
The marsh of Ramsey
Medieval sources inform us, first and foremost, about the concerns o{•
The pride of Peterborough The entrance to Thorney..
Mules (or 1m1!1etJ ofDcngic
Parish of Spalding'·'
those who made them. To discover the things we should most like tdl
There':; plenty of places know, we must read them across the grain. The ordinances of York
But too much to drink from 1so1 [18] give only a partial and oblique account of the trades and
And mudi more to say economy of the city, their primary motivation being to serve the inter-
But ,ny wits are~\\\ ay.•· est of the king. The collaboration ofroyal and civic officers in the compi-
lation of these regulations typifies the political situation of the medieval
English towns, which did not enjoy the autonomy of cities in some
other parts of contemporary Europe. To the monarch, York was a vital
strategic and military base, and the civic issues uppermost in the minds
of his officials concerned the provision of hospitality, food supply, the
decency of the streets and the limitation of distractions for courtiers and
soldiers: hence the curious pairing in the ordinances of pigs and prosti-
tutes. Registers of admissions to the freedom (or citizenship) of a town
can also beguile us, ifwe do not question the motives of their compilers.
The York freemen's register [19] ostensibly gives, year by year, a sta-
tistical account of the presence and relative importance of the diverse
listed crafts of the citizens. The realisation that admission required a
cash payment, however, alerts us to the likelihood that fluctuations in
the total numbers of freemen were influenced by the fiscal policy of the
city government. The case of London, where after 1s 12 new freemen
were compelled to find sponsors among existing London merchants
or practitioners of the trade they wished to set up, underlines the need
to weigh such evidence carefully before drawing clear economic con-
clusions from simple totals of freemen admissions. 1 This said, the York
register does give a valuable impression of the diverse aspects of the
urban economy. As we sharpen our focus to examine the organisation
of industry at the level of individual trades, it is natural that we should
draw upon the regulations compiled for particular crafts [20], [!HJ.
Yet here again, our first question must concern the function of these
~2 Reading uncertain. . .• . of this small town. documents. Their point of origin, and the reason for their preservation
4S An ironic reference to the burgesses
in collections of civic records, was usually the city government, whose
,n Horse-saddlery•
· · lly large parish.
45 An exceptiona
1 C. M. Barron, London in the Later Middle Ag es. Govemmenl and People /200-1500,
4G Thorney Abbey. . d . :1 • I Mes trop iad des g'les [gilles: measures Oxford, 2004, p. 205.
. d' · f- 'Asetz 1ad es" cs .
47 Rothwell s ren iuon o . d·. / M ess en ne put suffire.
of wine]/ Emoud plus a ire ..
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 75

74
~hip [25]. Young women were b~~~~u: the pe_riod was by apprentice-
The usual route into a trade thro
interest lay in the maintenance of good order. Having once established
mdeed women are f◄ound pprent1ces as well as men a11d
that the crafts were responsible for electing their own officers to ensure across the en r ,
the quality of their products and the disciplined behaviour of their ~rban economy, although it is hard to ire spe~trum of the medieval
fellow workers, town councils tended to leave the detail of manufacture m a~y particular area.4 Small numb assess their relative prominence
to its practitioners. For this reason we should be wary of taking craft adnutted to the freedom f d' ers of women are found being
I O 1verse tow · h ·
ordinances as a full description: the picture they give is both simplified ~rger number would gain mediated r· ~s m t e,r own right, while 1
and idealised? Yet these sources contain much of interest, not least in nage to a freeman Many m
·
h
ore, ow
ig ts to trade by virtue of
•
marj
their insistence upon an ordered hierarchy of craft master, journeyman trade: at Norwich this w e_ver, were licensed by the year t
and apprentice: the very repetition of the legislation may suggest to us official system [58] A wasosmo regu~anhsed as to appear to have been an
. . an m1g t well . I
that reality was not always so tidy. And where we can find them, com- us and m his own trade a d d s1mu taneously assist her
hb b · n un ertake anoth h
plementary records can amplify the picture by showing the application rewmg, on her own part h'l h er, sue as weaving or
5 B ' W l e at t e same ( k'
ren. ecause medieval officialdom ime ta mg care of chil-
of craft regulations in practice [22]. d
of hou~ehold, women are severe! preferred to deal wi_th male heads
A long tradition has seen the medieval urban craft worker as an isolated yet their role in the eco y under-represented m the record
figure, and as one who was tightly regulated by what has sometimes nomy was no les · ·fi '
men.,6 London custom wh· h s s1gm cant than that of the
been called the 'structure' of the crafts. Modern economic thought, ' IC appears to ha h d •
o ot er English towns p . d . ve a an influence on that
influenced in this respect both by Adam Smith and by Karl Marx, has f h , erm1tte a smgl
tended to accept that, in order for a breakthrough to entrepreneur- uct a business in her own right as fi e woman or a widow to con-
d
of independence, by contrast f~ a emrm sole [26]: a marked degree
ial industrial production to take place, it was necessary for the 'craft Italy.; Those, both men and ' r exa~ple, with the townswomen of
system' to be dismantled.5 The flaws in this argument include not only
shop of their own necessarily~::et7' w1tout the resources to set up a
the fact Gust noted) that the medieval ·system' was less systematic than
whether on long-term or sh t g t ot er masters for whom to work
it may appear but also that master craftsmen and women, in order to b h d or -term contra t. Th '
manufacture the many complex products which were sold in the urban y t e ay ~egan early, assemblin at desi c s. e '.11.any who worked
hope of findmg an employer 27 ~ W gnated hmn~-places in the
marketplace, necessarily collaborated in multifarious ways which are
not reflected in the records of any individual craft. Even a relatively
simple object such as a painted candlestick was the product of both
their particular domain [2s] 8 r
the marketplace, where stalls ;fh J b ~men were especially visible in
s, h owers and dairy products were
. ut t ey were active also in almost
the wood-turner's and the painter's art. Enterprise on a larger scale
- the construction of a cathedral, for example - entailed multiple and
carefully negotiated collaboration between the masters of many crafts. en nett 'Craft•
i:ro:~
4 P. J. P. Goldberg, Women W k d .
and Yorkshire c./300-/Sdo,
.
~9ifi9e,~ycle ma Medieval Economy: Women ill 'Y'ork
Dale'
B .'J s, g1 s, and women in the MiddlPP.A27-s
·1d • "• esp. .. I·' M . Kowaleski and J." M.
Privately contracted arrangements between masters, whether of the 1988: ~;. ; t.!;8~ennett et al. (eds). Sisters and ,:.ork!;ti:~k rr~;;tAter
1 Marion K.
same or of different crafts, must have been common, even if on occasion 5 Sw .. . e ges, Chicago,
the relationship turned sour [28]. The anxiety expressed in many sets anson,
tiation fhe ·illusion ofeconomtc
of work' . structure'; Rosser' 'Crafits, gu ·1d
I s and the nego-
of craft ordinances, that individual masters were stealing a march on
their peers by extending their workforce, is the clearest evidence that 6 K. Reyerson
Handbook 'Urban econonnes
,I'll? . ' • .m J. Bennett and R M
7C M '!, omen and Gmder ill Meditval Europe O~r. d
Karras (eds), The Oiford
. . Barron and A. Sutton (eds M . • or '201:l, pp. 295-507.
this was in fact the case [24].
1994; M. K. McIntosh, 'The benefi)t,· l'Cddtdeval London Widows /300-1500 Lo d
s an rawback. ffl , n on
2 H. Swanson, 'The illusion of economic structure: craft guilds in late medieval ef
ISOO-J6S0' J
Wealth W,' o~rnal <ifBritish Studies, XLIV, 2005 s o emme sole status in England:
English towns', Past a11d Present, CXXI, !988, pp. 2lr-48; G. Rosser, 'Crafts, guilds, esp. p. 215. ives. Women, Law, and Economy in Laie'tie!)o-f~ Bd.A. Hanawalt, The
and the negotiation of work in the medie\'al town·, Past and Presml, CLI V. l 997, PP· 8RH . eva on 011, Oxford. 2007,

s S-SJ.
A. Smith, The Theory ofMoral Senti~nls [ 17 59], ed. D. D. Raphael and A. L. Mcfie,
Feudalismc E .
· • Hilton 'Women t raders .m medieval England' . h"
Workin W. ssaysm fl!edieval Socia/History, London • m is Class Co1iflict and the Crisisef
New York and Oxford, 1976, pp. !Slr-44; Robert C. Tucker (ed.). The Marx-Engtb g omen mEnglish Society, 1300-16'.J0• Cam,bl~d83,pp. 205-15; M. K.Mclntosh
f1 ge, 2005, pp. 128-52. . •
Reader, 2nd edn, New York, 1978, pp. 182-6, 996-i.
76 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
77
all other sectors, including the luxury trades in which delicate work tities of wood, iron and steel but al .
was called for. When Queen Philippa needed three new counterpanes spinet [85]. The network f• so for gaming tables, lutes and a
as part of the ceremonial for the celebration of the birth of the Black . o corresponden , d
information which underpin d I . ~e an constantly updated
Prince in lSSO, the commission was handled by the queen's tailor, enterprise such as that oft~: ~elt i~ter_nat'.~'~al trade ofa mercantile
William de London, who employed - evidently in London - seventy document in this section wh· h hy am1ly is illustrated by the final
men (earning a high rate of 4 14d a day) and forty-two women (earning . , IC s ows how m h
strategies of markets and . , ere ants adapted their
S¼d a day: less, as usual, than the men, yet still more than the pay of . m~estments to tJ ·h·fi · .
outright warfare of late m d' I ie s I tmg alliances and
an unskilled man) to carry out the embroidery.9 A conspectus of the •k e ieva northern Eu [ J , ,
ns s, and (contrary to what i·s . rope 86 . fhey took
stock-in-trade of two high-end London shopkeepers [29] gives an . sometunes thought t b I .
menta1ity) could not be sa·d 1 t 0 b e cons1.s tentl o e t le business
impression of the diversity and sophistication of the wares on offer in ·
rnerc,al decisions. But the Cel s r .
· I·
Y rationa in their com-
the greater towns, to those who could afford them. The commercial supplied. i, y g ew rich on the urban marke ts they
pre-eminence of the capital, already marked by I SOO and even more
evident by 1500, was apparent in the extraordinary concentration of
goldsmiths' and other luxury shops along Cheapside [8].10 The crafts- 18. York civic ordinances ISO!
men working in the Nottingham alabaster industry found a profitable
outlet through the shops of London [80(b)J;11 and here, strategically Ordinances or by-laws are stat f.
poised between the mercantile class of the city and the courtiers of .
that t h ey were easy to . ements o ideals· we sh Id
imp! . . · ou not assume
Westminster, William Caxton in 1476 set up the first English printing cerns and timing can be em,~nt in practice. Yet their specific con-
press, and his bookshop 'at the sign of the red pale' [81]. 12 For the . revea mg to the histo . Th
ord mances \\ere agreed joint! b I . ri~~- ese particular
many to whom such goods were beyond purchase, there operated an king's council. The crown to~k: t le c_1ty aut_hont1es of York and the
extensive marginal economy of hawkers, who carried their miscella- period, both as a military bas d particular interest in York at this
neous wares on their backs from house to house [82], and 'evening and occasional capital city .; an a,s an administrative headquarters
markets' of dubious reputation [88]. h . r . ence t le focus of th ese '.·egu Iat1ons
.
. osp1ta Jty and the provision offood and dr· on
The infrastructure of external and internal trade which supported m I so J were to a degree ide 1· t· d m~. The ordinances agreed
. I . . a is ic, an some difficult
these old and new industries and this endlessly beguiling urban market m t 1e1r imposition. However th t . Y was encountered
is illuminated by accounts of tolls on goods in transit. The records of o t e pressmg concerns f .' . e ext ,s a valuable t es·(tmony to some
f h .
o c1v1c rulers around JSOO.
Southampton offer a unique perspective on internal traffic, and give
an impression of the scale of transportation inland of imported wine,
dyes and other goods [84]. Loaded on to carts, these rumbled their
rM. Prestwich (ed.) York Civ· O· d·
t"t ' lC r, znances
ns I ute, 1976. Latin, transl. by the editor.
ISOJ
•
y k B
or : orthwick
way to the cloth-making centres of Salisbury and Winchester, and
occasionally continued as far as Coventry. Tax on international trade, 1,:or the remedy and relief of those comin .
meanwhile, gives us records of goods coming into the major ports. city, both on the king's b . d g to York, and staying in the
The range of merchandise entering Hull in the cargo of a single ship the extortions and oppreus_me~~ an on that of others, who complain of
ss10ns imposed b tl ••
from the Baltic in 148S gives a small insight into the material culture to observe the assize• of b d d I y ie c1t1zens, both by failing
of a world in which purchasers were anticipated not only for quan- other victuals and necess·t·re_a an a e, and by the intolerable cost of
1
have been compelled to I· 1es agreed
I .
betw th · ·
een e c1t1zens. The people
9 K. Staniland, Mtdiroal Craftsmen. Embroidtrtrs. London, 1991, pp. 2S, 28. On the feast of [the D elalve_ tie city, leaving their affairs unfinished
IS eco at1on of] St John tl B . .
10 D. Keene, Cluapsidt before tlu Grtat Fir,, London, 198.$. 01, the mayor bailiffs a d . . le apt1st (29 August]
11 N . Ramsay, 'Alabaster', in J. Blair and N . Ramsay (eds\ Englzsh Medieval Jndustnts. ' n c1t1zens were called before the king's
London, l991 , pp. 29--4-0 1-' A Hanh
12 L Hellinga, William Ca.rton and Early Prmtmg m England.. London, 2010.
c· am, -r•
, ut Ctlys and TJuir 1//orld· An • .
tntury, Cambridge, 1985. . English Mtrcha11t Family eft/u Fijlw1th
 ECONOMIC LIFE 79
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
78
It is agreed that hostellers who take in strangers, and those who rent
·1 tl at York and by ordinance of the cou~cil, with the assent out houses, rooms, stalls or other accommodation, shall not take more
counc1 , 1en ' . . d creed and ordained.
of the citizens, the following was e d d. than ½d for stabling a horse for a night. If the guest has no horse, the
. a or and bailiffs ten law-worthy an is- hosteller shall be content with Id a night for his bed and a room, but
Firstly, that to assist them yd ther with four men from each of
this is not to apply to boys and other poor people who cannot pay.
creet citizens should be e~ecte '. tobg~l.ff: ho should be sworn in the
• · th ·ty with their a1 1 s, w · No one shall keep pigs which go in the streets by day or night, nor,
the liberties .m . e c1 . d for this urpose, and assigned to k~ep
presence of JUSt1ces. apf01nt~ • . 1l particulars, so that the assize shall any prostitutes stay in the city. If anyone finds a pig in the streets
and maintain the kmg s assize m a. tP. d in the city both within he may kill it, and may at his choice cut off its trotters, or the bailiff of
I here shall be roam ame ' York may let him have 4d for them, if it happens that a pig escapes from
which is kept e sew . h l e ell one measure of weight, one
and without the liberti:s, w1td oln yon 1 ~·here in the kingdom. They someone's custody. If any prostitute keeps a brothel and resides in the
. d of wme an a e, as e se . h city, she is to be taken and imprisoned for a day and a night. The bailiff
of gram, an one . , ll d faithfully those who go agamst t e
shall prosecute and pumsh v.e an who takes her shall have the roof timbers and the door of the building
assize. in which she lodged [shall make the building uninhabitable and sell the
k f bread and ale, according materials]. Nonetheless he who rents out houses to prostitutes shall
[ There follow regulations for the ma.., mg o Jose the rent of such a house for one term.
to the royal assize for these products... .d
. . llers and sauce makers shall not keep bad or putn
Taverners, wme se ·
wine or vinegar in their houses. h 1l h 19. Admissions to the freedom of York in the fourteenth
i a sheep a calf or a goat, s a ave century
Anyone buying an ox, a cow,:e~eg~rdinanc~s come to his house ~efore
two of those sworn to keep t . for which he bought it, and By a process which still remains obscure, the early method of admitting
he kills it, and he shall swear as to \the prh1cell set a price for the labour a burgess to the community of traders in a town, on the basis of his
.h ·ghbouring butc 1ers s a .
they wit two ne1 l d th t he shall not sell the amma1 ownership of a burgage property, was succeeded in the course of the
involved, which_ shall be enrol e .' so A a butcher convicted of doing thirteenth century by enrolment following an application and, unless
for a h(gher pnce than the~:os:~~:-fir;yoffence, for the second 1ss4d, the applicant was the son of a freeman, payment of a fee. The fiscal
otherwise shall be fined 6s 8 b. re his cal1ing for ever. Butchers aspect of this process makes the records of admissions to the freedom
and for the third 20s. He shallfith:~ ~~~t which has lain, either whole or unreliable guides to the quantities of those actually eligible for the
shall not sell measly meat, ~r re 11 l". than one day unless it has privilege.u Freedom brought the right to trade in the market; but it
. h n their sta ior more '
in pieces, m t e sun o ed No butcher shall buy meat from others also carried the responsibility to hold civic office, which some preferred
been well cleaned and salt . h . r shall they sell meat that to eschew. The option ofliving in one of the city's religious franchises•
who have brought it for sale to t ~ c1~\t:on~icted any measly meat and so evading civic regulation was attractive to many. A list of free-
they have not slaughtered th~se vt~~ t for sale f;r more than a day, men is therefore not equivalent to a register of householders or traders
shall go to the lepers, and fres fo~;:sale ~hall be sold, the money going in a town. With this caveat, however, the York freemen's register may
and meat bought from other~ N twithstanding, the butcher shall be be considered as a uniquely extensive list of this kind, extending from
to the common profit of the city. o
the late thirteenth century to the end of the Middle Ages and beyond.
imprisoned for forty days. a Although the fourteenth-century entries appear not to include admis-
I . h has been on sale for more than
No cook shall buy fresh meat w HC t or fish that is not good, sound sions by patrimony (granted to sons of freemen), they give a valuable
day in summer, nor shall he use 1?1ea . bread is not to be sold for impression of the range and importance of trades practised in the city.
and healthy. Roast chicken or ch1ck~n i:d other food is to be sold at
more than 2d, roast goose for more t an ' 14 R. B. Dobson, 'Admissions to the freedom of the city of York in the later Middle
Ages', Economic History Ueview, 2nd series, XXVI, 197:l, pp. 1-22.
reasonable prices.
80 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND CCONOMIC LIFE
81
Sample years have been taken from the early fourteenth century and Geoffrey, forester ofTorksey
from fifty years later (at which latter period the city council appears William de Wistow, fishmonger
Robert de Askham, fishmonger
to have been increasing the numbers of admissions, at least in part for John de Malton, mason
Alan <le Pickering at the bridge, mercer
financial reasons). Placenames, which here have been given modern John de Barnby, mercer
Thomas de Newcastle, furbisher•
spellings, indicate the geographical origins of the individuals named: Henry de Corbridge, merchant
prior to the late fourteenth century, from which period the tendency Admissions to the freedom in 131 1 12
was towards fixed surnames, a locative byname is a fairly reliable Nicholas de Cologne (Col1t), merchant
indicator of an individual's previous place ofresidence (or that of their Richard de Huntingdon, merchant
William de Taunton, merchant
parents).15 In this case those places were most commonly outside York Henry the lacer
Richard de Burton, merchant
yet within the county of Yorkshire, but in some cases well beyond. William de Foston, cook
Roger the marshal•
William de Ne\\ ton, cook
John de Pontefract, skinner
F. Collins (ed.}, Register efthe Freemen efthe City efYork, 2 vols, Selden Roger de lie, tanner
John de Cologne, merchant
Society, XCVI, Cll, Durham: Andrews & Company, 1897-99, i, pp. Thomas de Bilham, sailor Peter the young of Brandsby
13-14, 54-5. Latin, transl. by GR. Gilbert Kokerell, tailor
John Page de Haxby, leather- worker
Walter de Harlington, mercer
William de Monkton, tailor
Adnussions to the freedom Ill I :I I 0-1 I William le Walc·he, girdler
William Skot, cook
Robert de Sundtrlawyk, tanner Eleanor de A11grom Simon de Chilton, fishertnan
Andre\, de Stoke, rook
Adam de Kmgston, cutler William Arkill, tawyer• John de Catton broth fR Robert de Dunstable, skinner
Robert de Walmgate, tailor Andre\\ de Dom·aster, tawyer ·11· d D • er o alph de Catton Adam, senant of Ralph Wiles
W 1 iam e uffield mercer
Walter de Sutton, leather-worker John de Appleton, smith ' Walter of St Nicholas (York),
Wtlltam de Rigton, lorimcr• Nicholas de Steresby, mason leather-worker
Henry de Brampton, hatter
Thomas de Sutton, belt-maker Alan de Haunsard, taverner William de Thaxte<l, cutler
Michael de Lmcoln, cutler
Richard Kokercll, barber Henry de Burton, tailor William de Malton, cutler
William de Lincoln, cutler
Thomas de Strensall, mason Nicholas Foukes, fisherman John, son ofDoraunt de Moreby
Alan Segodc, tailor
John le Long de Doncaster, mercer• Peter de Wilberfoss, potter• Robert de Catton
Thomas de Hornby, leather-worker
Wilham Brown de Rudston, cook Jordan de Harlethorpe William de lie, tailor Thomas de Copmanthorpe, hosier
Richard le Horner, baker Wilham de Tadcaster, sailor Robert Palmer, butcher
Henry, son of Alan de Copmanthorpe
William de Skelton, fisherman Adam de llkley, merchant Robert le 8atour, butcher
Robert de Stainton, skinner
William de Settrington, 'wayder''" Thomas de Hoton, tanner Richard de Raskelf
Robert de Duffield, butcher Adam de Newton, cooper Admissions in 136 l-61!
Alan de Grafton, salter Richard de Ritkle, tanner Adam de Cawood, currier•
Thomas de Ponttbtlli Roger de Stitenham, tailor Thomas de Scrayingham, glover
Nicholas de Strcnsall, cutler
Peter de Wadworth, saddler Adam de Fimber, potter Thomas le stringer
Laurence Sampson, glover
Henry de Steresby, cook Richard de Warthill, girdler• Adam de Tunstall
William Deynte?., glover
William de Hereford, goldsmith Robert de Bridlington, mason Thomas de Brampton, founderl7
William Lax, mercer
Geoffrey de Ampleforth, ironmonger Thomas Bele de Stillmgton, saddler William Rayner, mercer
Thomas de Driffield, mercer
Nicholas de Carlisle, goldsmith Adam de Beverley, bowyer John de Batley, arrowsmith Robert de Killingwick, de lluoum, mercer
John Hemynge, baker
Adam Fetheler, mercer
Richard de Thornton, bowyer
l5 P. McClure, 'Patterns ofmigration in the late Middle Ages', Economic History Revitw. Robert de Burton, bowyer
l!n<l series, XXXII, 1979, pp. 167-81!. Thomas de Brigg carpenter
16 Possibly ·woader·, a dyer with woad. Ii This seems th l'k I .
e t e y readmg of the word transcribed by the editor as ·rounder'.
 TOWNS IN MEDlEVALENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE SS
82
master, and the employment of contracted assistants. Like all rules,
John de J,~reghthorn, tailor
John Duke, de Beeston, chapman• these draw attention to the reality of their infringement. It is notable,
Robert de Whitwell, tailor
John Taite, tailor in these as in all such ordinances, that most of the technical details of
John de Braithwaite, draper
William de Paris, mariner the craft were omitted from the legislation. How to cut and sew mate-
Thomas Legheles, de ~elyn, mercer
Wilham de Hessle, tailor rial were skills understood within the tailoring community, and passed
Thomas dcl More, bowl-maker
William de Hillum, bowyer down within the workshop without being committed to writing. The
Henry de Plcna, goldsmith
Robert de Middleton, spicer reference to a pageant at Corpus Christi is an allusion to the series'
John de Newton, baker
Wilham de Thornton, weaver of religious plays presented at certain festivals by the various crafts
William Parcour de Helmsley, merchant
Adam Tredemond de Burton Agnes of York (see further [114], [115], [116]). The function of a craft
Ed"ard de Brackenholmc, painter
William de! Castell, mercer organisation such as this one was to regulate the professional practices
Thomas de Killingwick, tanner
Walter de Thirsk, tanner of its respective trade. Members might also combine to form a related
Robert de Chester, tanner
William de Grimston, saucer fraternity or guild, with a religious dedication and a range of social,
Thomas de Whorlton, tanner
John de Killingwick, tanner devotional and charitable purposes. Some such guilds were dominated
Adam de! Hall weaver
William de Brune, tanner by the practitioners of a particular craft, but the majority were diverse
John Gerveux, riveter
Robert Paw, n\'eter in their membership (see further [9SJ, [94], [95], [96], [97]).
Henry de Dyvelyn, mercer
John de Hornby, saddler
\Valtcr de Linton, tanner
Richard Watermon, butcher M. Sellers (ed.), York Memorandum Book, Surtees Society, CXX, CXXV,
William de Catton, wea\'er
William de Ne,,.ton, baker Durham: Andrews & Company, 1912-15, i, pp. 94-100. French, transl.
William de Arkendale, weaver
Adam de Helperby, wea,er by the editor.
John de Newham, leather-worker
William de Harc"ood, weaver
William de Wistow, potter
Robert de Heminbrough, \\alkcr• These are the ordinances made by the assent and advice of the master
Adam de Proshow, tailor
John de Stillington, chapman tailors listed below and of all the craft, in the time of William de Selby,
Michael de Weatherall, butcher
Thomas Jordan, painter mayor, 1386-7 [128 names of masters listed].
William Paynott or Donington, butcher
John le clerk, nailer
John Archer, gla1.ier
Thomas son of John the smith, de Bulmer First it is ordained and established amongst the master tailors of the
Alan de Askham, carpenter
Richard Tredemond de Burton Agnes said city, that each year on the day of St James the Apostle [25 July]
Gilbert de Bamborough, skinncr
Richard de Bengley, leather-worker four good and loyal men of the same art should be elected to search,
John de Skipton, leather-worker
Matthew de Thornton, leather- worker oversee and examine the craft, and to present any faults of its practi-
Robert de Linton, de Wetherby
Thomas de Burton, tanner tioners to the mayor of the said city, and upon his advice and theirs
Robert de Seacroft, lorimcr
William de Hollym, mercer duly to punish such faults according to their severity. And any master
Adam de Beswick, cardmaker•
William de Garsdale, draper failing to come to the election of these officers or to any other assem-
Thomas de Touthorop, pinncr
Adam Scraggy, pinner bly touching the governance of the craft (without reasonable excuse
John de Clifton, joiner
Nicholas de Croxby, barber allowed by the searchers) shall pay 6d or I lb of wax to the four
William de Hrompton, dyer
John de Scarborough. painter searchers.
Peter le gray, water-leader•
Robert de Anelagy (?Anlaby), dyer
The four searchers shall gather annually the contribution from each
master towards the craft's pageant at Corpus Christi, and shall bear all
20, Craft ordinances of the tailors of York IS86-87 the costs and expenses to sustain and maintain the said pageant, ren-
dering account for the same on the third Sunday after Corpus Christi,
, d" s of the y ork tailors can be paralleled in many otherf on pain of 10s, half to [the craft] and half to the council chamber on
fhese or mance • d d ss o Ouse bridge.
urban crafts of the period. They describe the peno an. proc~dent
apprenticeship, the requirements for setting up shop as an mdepe
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
84
21. Ordinances for crafts at Bristol
It is ordered that no master tailor should hire the servant of another
master until he has left on the full completion of his covenanted term Ordinances
with the same master. Nor should any master set up his stall to practise the trades inof urban
full b ·crafts were mad e not wr.th a view
. to describing
the craft before he has paid 6s 8d as is customary. Any breach of this torian who makes ut m ~rter to address particular problems. The his-
rule by a master of the craft shall be punished with a 40d fine on the
first occasion, 6s 8d on the second, and on the third the stall is to be
::~h~yJ~{h'~; e,'.:;lr~u:;:, ~~:,;J:;:';;,~:•;1:~hw:~;~·:;::;~ ::
taken down.
by women, of ra8: ;:ol :~~e:,p:~~~rpetaedd to_ regtulahte the s~pply, often
• • pnor o t e weav - •
l
Those apprentices who have loyally served their masters to the end of The c1v1c
. measures
. for ale-sellers 1·0 (b) and f'or metal-worker
mg process.
· (f)
their agreed terms shall pay no more than 40d when they first set up underIme the importance, 1·0 the c1v1c. . sphere of en · th s m d
was practised in public ('commune') ' ~unng at tra e
their stalls, notwithstanding any other ordinance.
lated: That for th_e b~kers (c) points t~l:~:s;0 'i:h;;:~b~~~!~ :a~ :egu-
That no master tailor shall deliver any garment or cloth to be worked
or sewn by the servant of another master. And that no master tailor and saleswomen m distribution for the victualr e. m:n
imposed in (d) were r b bi . mg trades. The hm1ts
shall keep any cutters or servants in chambers, privily or openly, with- quality and by a desi~e ~o :eJr:~t:;~~:fd~::~!hoas~o:gc~;nb to n~aint_ain
out informing the four searchers, on pain of 40d. And that no master
the scale of their operations to . b . ' yen argmg
tailor should hire any servant, on his first coming to the city, to cut or
sew, for less than a full year, on pain of the same fine, unless by grant
and licence of the same searchers. are evidenced
. I. in
. the effort to r ,
:h:;::~~~
masters. A limit on the size' of agam u~1-ness at the expense of other
(e). H~re the altered circ~mstan::s:~ aep;ars :gain_ in
ac . eatincreased
p e\ent masters from offering penod
That no master tailor shall take an apprentice as his servant for less
financ1a mcent1ves to secure workers.
than seven years, on pain of 6s Bd payable to the searchers and 2 lbs of
wax to the mystery* of tailors; and that no master shall do any cutting
(face nu/ coturer) in the same mystery before his inspection and just ~-~r:;t:~eie~!~~n~h~ Litt~
41-4 (e), 182-4 (f). La~in ~~~;•pp.
Red Book of Bristo~ 2 vols, Bristol:
9 32
(a), so (b), -S_ (c), 38-40 (d),
examination by the said four searchers, on pain of 40d. GR. rencl1, transl. by the editor, revised by
lfany complaint be made concerning any garment, and brought before
the searchers together with the maker, and it can be amended with the
same material, he shall take it back to mend it, provided he can give the (a) Ordinance for the fullers* (mid-fourteenth-centur )
searchers surety for it. Tha~ no _tranter* or huckster* or any other pers~n of the town
If any master tailor detains the salary of his servant beyond the day rece1\:e mfl~d;~~I or woollen thread for sale, purchase or pledge
accorded between them for payment, and will not agree to pay, if the on pam o 1one1tmg what 18 · f.oun d ·m t he1r
• possession And "f ,
such thread be borne b th . t any
servant advise the four searchers, they will have the servant paid on that it be borne on F "dy e downer or by a porteress (porteresse),
· n ay an on no other day.
pain of a fine of 2s payable by the said master.
f. If a~y porteress be found bearing oiled wool or woollen thread
Anyone interfering with the searchers in the performance of their duty or sa e on other days than Friday, or putting it in windows for
shall pay a fine of 40d. sale, that the goods be forfeited. On the third offence the .d
That no servant [journeyman]* of the said craft shall hire another porteress shall forswear her office for ever. ' sa1
servant to work for him in the same craft, so long as he is a servant or
of the degree of a servant, on pain of 40d. (b) N~te con~erning tapsters (mid-fourteenth-centur )
That no stranger or servant of the said craft shall be in any place ~~:~i°~::tt~d _that every br:wer and brewster wh~ has ale to sell
except only in the shop of a master tailor in the city, on pain of 40d. solars cha e1r aeon sale ma public (commune) place, and not in
,' mbers, or other secret places, and that the sign of that
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 87
86

ale be at the door of the house where that ale will be sold all the (e) Ordinance of the cobblers ( I 364)
time that the said ale is on sale.
Tl~ese a~e the ordinance~ made before Robert Cheddre, mayor of
Bristol, Monday next after the Epiphany [ 6 January] 1364 for
(c) Ordinance for the bakers (c. I 340s)
the relief of the estates of the masters of the craft of ;obble;s of
It is ordained by the bakers that no baker henceforth give to any the to"."n of ~ristol, ""'.ho are now v~rtuall~ impoverished by the:;
1
huckster* selling his bread but Id over and above 12d s .and ~o excessive price of their servants of the aforesaid craft who ard
more; and if any one shall give more under any pretence, either_ m loath to apply then:iselves to the craft unless they have too outJ
the price of any goods or in repayment of any 1~oney ?n the receipt rageous and excessive salary, contrary to the statutes of our lord
of the money for the aforesaid bread sold, and is convicted, he shall the king19 and the usages of the said town.
give to the commonalty 40d. Also it is ordained that no baker F_irst, that n~ master of the said craft pay any servant for
shall deliver to any huckster more bread than can be sold for the sewing and yarkmg : preparing, working the leather] shoes, well
day's consumption (pro dieta), and if any on~ shall have taken more and fitly, an~ more than ?d per dozen: that is to say for sewing sd
it shall be at the peril of the buyer. And 1f any baker adultera~e and for yarkmg Sd. And if anyone do so and is convicted he shall
any bread after it has been standing in his window for sale and 1s pay for each occasion, _to the use of the commonalty of Bristol,
convicted, he shall likewise give to the commonalty 40d. 6s 8d, and to ~he con~nbutio~ of_the said craft 40d, without any
pardon._Also for m~kmg a pair of boots entirely sd, that is to say
for cutting Id and for sewing and yarking 2d and no more on pain
(d) Note for the dyers (c.1350s)
of th: same penalty. Also for cutting a dozen pairs of shoes '2d:
Recently grievous losses and damages have happened_ to a number that is to say for the o, erleathers Id and for the soles Id and no
of people of the town of Bristol for t_heir woad* which has been more on the same penalty. Also for lasting [ shaping] the dozen
put in working by certain dyers ro.vmg through the town, w~o shoes Id and no more on the same penalty.
have used this woad in various vats m several places at once, with Also that every master shall keep one servant called a
the result that the dyer cannot give his attention to all at the 'covenant-hire' and no more, on pain of the same penalty, and
same time, and so through want of care the woad has been l~st. he must be one who knows well how to cut and sew and to serve
It is therefore ordained by Richard Lespicer then mayor, with pe~ple of this craft. Hi~ pay will be 18d a week, and each year 8
the assent of all the good people of the same, that no dyer who pairs of shoes. No o_ne 1s to pay more, on the said penalty. Every
has put one vat of woad in working should undertake to put any other servant, that Is to say those who serve at piece work (ceux
other in working within the franchise* of the towns~ long as the qe servent a ta.re), shall take as stated above, and according to their
vat which he has put in working is open or full. And 1f anyone do status in the craft.
so and is convicted, let him pay to the commonalty 6s sdfor each Also that no master may employ any other servant within the
conviction. Also it is ordained that if a dyer of the town under- term agreed ~pon between them, nor another servant taken away
take to work in his own house the woad of another [dyer] after o~ procured from another's service, and if he does so and is con-
it has been assayed, the woad must be forfeited, the dyer bound v1c~e~, l:t him incur the same penalty above and he shall make
to restore to the owner as much as the woad cost, and the money sat1stact10n to the injured party.
be levied from the goods and chattels of the dyer by coercion and And the men of the craft pray that two good men may be
distress of the mayor and his officers. Also that no ?ycr undertake elected every year to survey the defaults of the craft, and be
to put [in working] any woad within the franchise of the town sworn to present loyally the defaults which they find. On which
until it has been assayed by the assayers. the mayor and good men, having regard to the evils which may

19 The statute of wages of 1350, 2S Edward Ill c.b .

18 One penny loaf for enry d01.en taken for resale by the huckster.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 89
88

arise to the said town if suitable remedy be not ordained for them, an~ if he do ~nd thereof be attainted [then he should incur] the
have ratified and confirmed all these ordinances.io pams aforesaid and over that make gree [amends] to him that be
so aggrieved.
(f) Ordinances for the farriers, smiths, cutlers and lockyers (1403-4) _And upon these ordinances and articles the good folk of the
said four crafts pray that four masters now be chosen by the said
These be the ordinances made and enrolled in the guildhall of crafts every year for to survey the defaults of the said crafts and
Bristow by the wise men of the crafts of farriers, smiths, cutle~s sworn before the mayor truly to present to the mayor and t~ his~
and lockyers in the time of John Barstaple, mayor of the said ministers of the said town all the defaults that they may find.
town, in 1405-4.
Jn the first they be assented and accorded that no person of
the four crafts aforesaid should practise or in any manner work 22. Application of the regulations of a merchant guild
in their halls or in their shops or in any other place within the
franchises of Bristow until they be burgesses and sworn to the The practical implementation of craft rules is not often recorded in
su~viving documents. However, the rolls of the merchant guild* of
franchise of the same town.
Also that no smith called [an] arrowsmith of the town of Leicester record the application of regulations instituted for the cloth
Bristow nor any of their servants [bear] not through t~e town trade.
any manner ofironwork to sell in their arms nor upon their heads
in any sacks, privy or open, but that [unle~s] th~y have an open M. Bateson (ed.), Records efthe Borough efLeicester, i, London: C. J. Clay,
place beside the high cross of Bristow or m their house open~y, 1899, pp. 68-9. Latin, transl. by the editor.
and nowhere else, upon pain to pay to the use of the community
of Bristow 20d sterling, and the same to the masters o~ the afore- [Merchant guild roll] On Wednesday before the Conversion ofSt Paul
said 4 crafts in their common box in sustenance of thetr alms and [25 J~nuary], 1254, Roger Aldith, John's son, was charged because
he twice offended against the commune of the guild: that is, in that he
other expenses.
And that all strangers that come to the same town with ~ny ~ade a blanket and it was in the first part of good woof and elsewhere
pennyworths called 'smithware' to sell, that they shall stand m a m ma_n;Y places of bad woof, and again because he caused a poor and bad
place beside the high cross of Bristow openly so that the defaults, vermilion cloth_ to be sewed t~ another good vermilion cloth, at Lynn.
if any be, of the said 'smithware' may be overseen by the masters ~e swore that m future he will not offend against the guild and that
of the said crafts and in no other place nor nowhere else upon if h~ should be convicted again for any infidelity or for any trespass
certain pains by the discretion of the mayor of Bristow and of his against the commune of the guild, he will lose the guild; and he pledged
a ca~k of ale and _before th_at a~other because of the first offence. Roger
ministers.
And also they be assented and accorded that no man of t~e Ald1th was convicted a third time concerning a certain vermilion cloth
aforesaid four crafts [should] occupy [employ] any servant m made against guild rules, that is with the woof in the middle poorer and
the said crafts but he be not [unless] by covenant of a whole year worse than at the ends, together with another vermilion cloth on which
or half a year at the least without reasonable cause, and that upon he had sewed a border contrary to guild rules. He was cut off from the
guild and separated from the community of the guild in 1258-9.
pains aforesaid.
And that no other master of the said crafts [should] occupy
the servant of another within the term betwixt them accorded,
nor [the work] of another servant slokke [entice] or procure, 28, Partnership between two metalworkers 1S80s

The rules drawn up for particular crafts give a false impression of

20 At an uncertain later date, these ordinances for the cobblers were crossed out in the their
· separation
· irom
c: one another. To a greater degree than is made
register.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 91
90

clear by sets of craft ordinances, opportunities were open to craftsmen

and women to join forces, either in order to create complex products
requiring diverse techniques or in order to increase their turnover and
~:~~i;:~2r::£: ~~;r;:;~~:~·: ~:,;"w:;~: ;:,·~~::i:;:::~:::~:
profits.
W. H. Stevenson (ed.), Records of the Borough of Nottingham, S vols,
J. Toulmin Smith and L To 1 · S . h (
English Text Society, origina~ s:;~es
p. 383. English, revised by GR. ' '
;_•t
L;/1•
n on.
~';f'2f
·
_?ilds, Early
rubner, 1870~
London: Quaritch, 1882-85, i, pp. 235-7. Latin, transl. by the editor.

Geoffrey the lorimer* of Lenton brings a case against John the lorimer :eh::~di:::/:~~ :::uar~csu:~ot~ed great cloth-making to be had within
of Nottingham, on a plea of debt, alleging that he owes him lOd for a of the people there dwelling, ;h::~1:\~n:a so_o~cupied by a great part
hammer sold to him in 1380-1; also for a bridle, a pair of stirrups, and shearmen and other labourers or a t" fi , . y spmn_e~s, weavers, dyers,
a hammer, 6d; and for a bridle and stirrups, 4d, after they had agreed now oflate right and ractice has r t cers ap_pertammg to the same, as
with each other to work for their profit (sibi convenerunt invicem ad oper- by masters and make~s of cloth, t~1:ey\~::ijd1.~. that tol these artificers,
andum pro eorum profiguo), whereby Geoffrey should always receive half t t d "d b ' , m no ot 1er way be con
of the gain and John the other half. Despite this, Geoffrey has received en e or pat
silver that h ut in mercery ' victuals or Y ot her means, and not in-
b
nothing of his share. John received 4dfrom John of London for a pair of labou~ers an:sJ;;;;;t to a great hurt on the part of the all the artificers,
stirrups, of which Geoffrey should have had 2d for his share. And John poor commonalty.
received 10d from the wife of Thomas Breton of Annesley, for the bind- It is ordained from hencer,orth, by t h.is present guild that no artifi
ing of a chest, and for the key to the chest; from Matilda Fish lake of labourer, or any other person of the said cit ., . cers,
or agreement b d Y, against his assent, will
Lenton, for binding a chest and its key, four flagons of ale to the value 11
of 4d; from William de Halam, 4d or a hammer for making a bridle; [in kind], bu~ ine;:,;~~desil~:r~:~;~: :a~:~:i:~:;~thing in ~haffer
from Friar John de Coventry, 4d for making a 'clicket-key' (klyketkey); ~~o::~1:dnfnhe or they that presume to do the co~trary, :;~~;e~ease~~:f
from the wife of Robert Saddler of Nottingham, 5d for a lock and key the other ha~;~:u;~• to pay 20s, the one_ half to the bailiff of the city an~
... from Thomas Passenham, 12d for a pair of spurs. But Geoffrey says e commons of the city.
he has received nothing. And that no manner of,·( .
because of this act of c~~.~::~ :e:s~:~or m~1abitant within_the sai~ city,
the said cit · I· d • 'pu out any wool m hurtmg of
24. Relations between masters and servants in the cloth trade
( when] th~,r~r~; pun en~g of the poor commonalty of the same, where
d• . ersons enough and people to do the sam d
at Worcester car ' . or spm, weave or cloth-walk [ do the work of a lk *e], to. l~e,
the said city to ever rnann r [ fJ wa er , wit 11n
Civic legislation often strengthened the hand of employers. On occa- be to men or'women ~wellinge wi;hin~;son_dor _persons foreign, unless it
e sat city or suburbs ofthe same.
sion, however, either a rift amongst employers themselves or the peti-
tion of an organised body of workers could precipitate regulation of
shop-owners and at least partial protection of wage-labourers. At the !i!5. Apprenticeship
end of the fifteenth century the civil government ofWorcester retained
the old name and form of a guild merchant. This extract is taken from Given
th . that young peop1e were commonly apprenticed to a t d .
a lengthy compilation of city customs drawn up by the guild in 1467. e1r early teens the related a . ra e m
Two concerns are at issue. One is the payment of workers in kind, concerned with ~he moral b I gr_eements with masters are naturally
rather than in cash. The other is the masters' employment (by the 'put- responsibility of the latter L-~rnv1oir of \he former and the pastoral
ting out' of raw materials to be worked locally) of unregistered, cheap apprenticeship tend not t~ I te c~a t rehgu ation~ [20] , [21], bonds of
en er mto t e techmcal details of the craft
labour found on or beyond the margins of the city. The text illustrates
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 9S
92

in question, which it was assumed would be learned through _prac~ice ~hall make reasonable amends to his master and mistress accord-
in the workshop. Apprenticeship records are of value to the h1stonan, '.n~ to the decision of trustworthy men chosen by the parties. And
however, for what they can reveal about recrui~ment to ~he labour 1f_1t _should ~appen that the apprentice should quit his service
force and the social organisation of the crafts. fhe four indentures w1thm the said term, then he wills that his master and mistress
reproduced here record apprentices enrolled with. the same ~aster or their agen~ ma~ seek him in whosesoever service he may be
and mistress, to learn and practise the craft of tannmg leather, ~n the found a~d- brmg him back again to his former service withou ~
Somerset town of Bridgwater between 1424 a~d 1~37. The diverse contrad_1ct1on. ~nd the said master and mistress, John Davy andl
lengths of the terms of these particular apprenticeships, and the over- Joan, will practise, teach and instruct the said apprentice Michael t
lap in time between them, reflect the facts that more than one_appren- as best_ they can _in the arts and goods they use, finding him meat
tice could be retained at once (although craft regulations often 1mpo_sed and drmk, clothmg linen and woollen and all other things nec-
a limit on the number as a check on competition) and that apprentices ess~ry for him as is suitable to be found for such an apprentice
occasionally changed master in the course of their training (the con- durmg the said term, paying the said apprentice moreover at the
tract sometimes being sold on to the new master). end of the said term 6s 8d. In witness of which indenture the seals
of both parties are appended.
T. B. Dilks (ed.), Bridgwater Borough Archives 1400-144.5, Somerset:
Somerset Record Society, LVIII, 1945, nos. 61~ (a), 628 (?)'. 655 (c), (b} This indenture made at Bridgwater on Tuesday after the feast
75 (d). Latin, transl. by the editor, checked against the ongmals and of_St Matthew [ 2 + Septemberj 14 26 between John Davy of
6 Bndgwater, tanner, and his wife Joan, on one part, and John
corrected by Andrew Butcher.
Taylour son of Thomas Taylour of Swansea in Wales on the
(a) This indenture made at Bridgwater on Saturday the feast of St other, witnesses that the said John Taylour places hi:nself as
Martin the bishop [I I November] 1424 between John Davy a ~ervant and apprentice to the said John Davy and Joan from
of Bridgwater, tanner, and his wife Joan on the one part, and Michaelmas ne~t unti_l the completion of three years. [ The rest
Michael Laleye, son of John Laleye, of Ireland, on the other part, more or less as m the indenture above.]
witnesses that the said Michael has placed himself as servant and
apprentice to the said John and Joan accordi~g to the use and {c) This indenture made at Bridgwater on the feast of All Saints ( 1
custom of the city of London from the day written above to the November] 14 32 between John Davy, tanner, and Joan his wife
end of ten years to be fully completed. Duri_ng whi_ch term_ the on the one part, and John Benet the younger, son of John Benet,
said apprentice shall serve his master and mistress m all thmgs on the other, witnesses that the said John Benet has placed him-
well and faithfully, shall keep their secrets and counsel, an~ shall self as ~ servant ~nd apprentice to the said John Davy and Joan
gladly do all their honest commands. He shall not absent himself from this day until the completion of seven years. At the end of
from his service by day or night. He shall do them no damage or the term he is ~o r~ceive I Ss 4d, a coverlet, two blankets and a pair
dishonour, nor allow others to do so in so far as he can preve~t of sheets for his stipend. [The rest as above.]
it or forewarn his master and mistress. He shall not waste th~ir
goods, nor ]end them to anyone without _t~eir leave or special (d) This indenture made at Bridgwater on 29 June 1437 between
mandate. And he shall give a good and faithful account _of a!I John Davy, tanner, and Joan his wife, on the one part, and William
goods and chattels of his master and mistress which are m his Baker son of John Baker of Taunton, on the other, witnesses
care to guard, whenever required to do s~. He shall_ not co~tract that the said William Baker has placed himself as a servant and
matrimony with any woman within the said ter~ w1tho_ut l'.cence apprenti_ce to the said John Davy and Joan from this day until the
of his master and mistress. He shall not commit fornication or completion of seven years. At the end of the term he is to receive a
adultery on or off their premises with any domestic ?fthei~s; but bed coverlet, a pair of sheets and a pair of blankets for his stipend.
if he do so and is convicted of it, he shall double his service, or [The rest as above.]
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 95
94

26. Women's rights to conduct a business

of London and London Life in the Xlllth, X/Vth, and XYth Centuries,
London: Longman, Green & Co., 1868, p. 435 (b); W. H. Stevenson
Recorded in the early fifteenth century, this statement of London (ed.), Rec~rds of the Borough of Nottingham, 3 vols, London: Quaritch,
custom originates in the fourteenth century. A marr!ed woman could 1882-85, 1, pp. 271, 277 (c).Latin, transl. by the editors.
practise a craft independently of he~ husband, tradmg as w~at w~s
called a femme sole. A widow who did not remarry could enJoy still (a) [Colch~ste~ 1311] John Kelye was charged that he procure~
greater economic opportunity, since she could be a freewoman of the some stmkmg fish _called ray and sent it for sale to the marke4,
city.~1 These privileges differenti_ated London ~omen from those of He acknowledges 1t and asks for the court's favour, which ii
southern European cities, who enJoyed no such nghts. grante~ and he pays the fine. Adam Body was similarly charged.
Petromlla Potes, Petronilla Dounyng, Sibil Belcher, Sibil her
H. T. Riley (ed.), Liber Albus, Rolls Series, 3 vols: Lon~on; L~~gman, daug~ter'. and Nota Godwyf were charged with obtaining and
Brown, Green, Longmans and Roberts, 1859-62, 1, pp. 204-5; Ill, p. 38. carrymg mto market the same stinking fish. They say that it was
French, transl. by the editor, revised by GR. sweet when they obtained it, but owing to the mass of it, it took
heat and lost its sweetness. They ask for the court's favour and
And when a woman who has a husband follows ~ny craft ~ithin the are fined 15d, that is, 3d each.
said city by herself apart, with which the husband m no way interferes,
an shall be bound as a single woman as to all that concerns (b) [London 1379] Be it remembered that the stations about the
sueh a wo m . . d• · h
her said craft. And if the husband and wife are 1mpleade , m sue high cross of Cheap in London were let by John Phelipot, mayor,
wife shall plead* as a single woman in a court of record, and and John Ussher, chamberlain, on 5 September 1379, to diverse
case, tile • · 1
shall have her law and other advantages by way of plea Just a~ a smg _e persons underwritten, to hold from the feast of St Michael [29
woman. And if she is condemned, she shall be committed t? pnson until September] next, at the will of the city, they paying yearly to the
she have made satisfaction; and neither the husband nor 111s goods shall chamberlain, to the use of the commonalty, J3s 4d each: Joanna
in such case be charged or impeached. Hernest, Cecily Eyr, Johanna Suttone, Johanna Staunford,
Matilda Olyver, Cristina atte Forde, Johanna Coulee, Cristina
Walwayn, Agnes Bromwyche, Johanna Holdernesse, Elena
27. Women as dealers in the marketplace Hempier.

Urban court-rolls are dense with the records of petty o~ence:s ~gainst (c) [Nottingham 1395] The jurors say that all the female poulter-
market laws. These can shed light not only on the trade m quest~on ~ut ers of Nottingham sell garlic, flour, salt, tallow candles, butter,
on the gendered nature of the economy, an~ on m?des of co-ordmatlon cheeses, and suchlike things too dearly against the statute, and
between practitioners. Women were promment m the sale of cheese, that each of them makes candles without putting a wick in them to
herbs, fish and petty goods from urban market-sta~ls. As these records the deception of the people, and is a common forestaller• of such
show, their stock-in-trade could be quite diverse. fhe _do~uments also victu~ls aforesaid coming to be sold in the town of Nottingham,
hint at a significant degree of collaboration and orgamsatlon amongst standing at street openings where such victuals come to be sold.
the women traders. Also they say that Isabel de Belton, Alice Anker, Anne
Hukkester, Maud Okkebrok, Alan Culchi's wife, Katherine, the
I. H. Jeayes (ed.), Court Rolls of the Borough ofC~lchester ISJ0-13'.9' wife of Richard Byrford, mason, Ibot, the wife John Albayne,
3 vols, Colchester, 1921-41, i, p. 29 (a); H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials Margaret Glover, Maud Skynner, Isabel, the wife of John
Hakkenay, Robert Ostiler, and Henry de Hykkeling are common
C Barron 'Introduction: the widow's world in late medieval London', in C. M. forestallers of geese, capons, hens, poultry, doves, and such
21 1994
B~rron and A. F. Sutton (eds), Medieval London Widows, /800--1600, London, •
victuals before the due hour.
pp. xiii-xxxiv, at pp. xxvii-xxviii.
 TOWNS IN Ml-:DIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
96 97

28. Labour for hire dozen of ·cradilbowes' : presumably for infants' cradles] , made
of wool and flax, 18d; S 'cradilbowes' made of wool and flax sd·
A high proportion of work in the medieval town was ~rformed. by one doze~ caps, half of which are red and half green, 2s 8d; 'on~
wage labour. Not all of this was contracted over long pe_riod~; w~rkm_g dozen white caps called 'nightcaps', Qs sd; 2 dozen woollen caps of
people in large numbers hired themselves by the da~. fyp1cal m ;his diverse colours, 16s; 6 caps of black wool, 4s; 5 blue caps and one
respect of all towns and of earlier period_s, the_counc1l (known_ ~s the of russet colour, 2s 6d; 5 children's caps, red and blue, 2s Id; one
guild') of Worcester in 1467 recorded this ordinance for the hmng of d~zen black hures -caps] , +s; one black hure, 4d; two hair camise\
daily labour in the city. [ hght coats of camlet, a soft cloth] , 12d; one red cap, 7d; one'
other cap of russet, 7 d; one hat of russet, 6d; one white hat, sd; 2
J. Toulmin Smith and L. Toulmin Smith (eds), English Gilds, Early papers co~ered with red leather, 12d; 2 other papers, one of them
English Text Society, original series, XL, London: N. Tri.ibner, 1870, covered with black leather, and the other with red, 8d; one purse,
p. 395. English, revised by GR. ca~led 'hamondeys' ['almond-eyes'?: , of sea-green colour, 6d; 4
pairs of spurs, 2s, one double chain of iron, 10~ and one other
Also it is ordained by this present guild, that all manner [of] labourers iron chain, 6d; one wooden gaming-table, with a set of men 6d: 2
that will be hired within the city, that they stand daily at the Grass 'permis' [jewel-cases?], 2s, one cloth painted with the Cru~ifi~d,
Cross on the workdays within the said city, there ready to all perso~s and other figures, 2s 4d; 8 white chains of iron for ferrets, sd; a
such as will hire them to their certain labour, for reasonable sums: m set of beads of black alabaster, 4d; three sets of beads of wood sd:
the summer season at 5 of the bell in the morning, and in winter season two pairs ofpencases, with [ink-]horns, 8 d; one pair of child;en'~
at 6. And that proclamation be made at four places assigned, two times boot~ of white woollen cloth, 2d; one osculatory,• called a 'pax-
a quarter, by the bedeman• of the city. bred, Sd; 2 sets of wooden beads, called 'knottes', 4d; 4 articles
called combs of box-wood, 4d; 2 wooden boxes, sd; 2 wooden
pepper querns [grinders], sd; 2 pounds of linen thread, green
'l9. Contents of shops in London IS78, 1382 and blue, 2s; 2 wooden[-framed] cushions, 2d; 6 purses of red
~eather, 4d; 4 specularia [lenses for reading?] , 2d; 18 horns called
Inventories of commercial premises have not ~urvived in large num- mkhorns, 18d; 2 ~ncases, 6d; one black girdle ::belt: of woollen
bers from the Middle Ages. They cannot easily be used to build a larger thread, 2d; IS quires of paper, 6s 8d; other paper, damaged, 6d;
economic picture or to discern trends. They are principally of value as one hat of russet, 6d; 2 wooden coffers, 8d; 2 gaming-tables with
a snapshot, from a given moment, of "'.hat me~ th~ eye of a customer the men, 16d; one wooden block for shaping caps, 2d; 6 skins
entering a particular shop. The first of these hsts_ 1s the pos_t mortem of parchment, called 'soylepeles·, 6d; one wooden whistle, 2d; 7
inventory of a shopkeeper; the second a tally compiled ~ollo_wmg a ~ur- leaves of paper, Id; and s pieces of whipcord, sd.
glary. One concerns a haberdas_her, the othe~ a g~ld_sm1th. fhe vanety
and sophistication of the stock m both cases 1s stnkmg. (b) Delivery of infangthief,* in the guildhall of London, before John
of Northampton, mayor, and the aldermen and sheriffs, and John
H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials of London and London Life in the Xlllth, Charneye, coroner, on Friday after the Assumption of the Blessed
X!Vth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, PP· Virgin Mary [15 August], 1382.
422-S (a), 470-1 (b).Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR. Walter atte Watre, goldsmith, and Nicholas Somerset of
Norton St Philip in the county of Somerset, were taken at the ~uit
(a) Articles that were in the shop of Thomas Trew, haberdasher• of John Frens~he of ~ndon, goldsmith, with the mainour [stolen
of London, in the parish of St Ewen, in the ward of Faringdon good~] ofv_anous ofh1s possessions: namely 2 silver girdles, with
Within, in the month of July !S78. 2 dozen laces of red leather, red silk braids, value 46s; one silver girdle, with a blue braid, Sos;
value 8d; one gross of tagged laces (points) of red leather, I Sd; one one other small silver girdle, with a green braid, t6s; one chain of
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
98 99

silver gilt, 40s, one other small silver chain, 5s, one girdle o~ red light ~n economic realities is shed by the evidence of litigation. In the
silk with a buckle, and studded with silver gilt, 16s, one silver following cases, brought to a borough court, concerning the manu-
chaiice, with paten, S8s, 2 sets of phials of silver, their necks g!lt, fa~ture and sale of alabaster relief.c;, we learn about the distinct roles
20s, one osculatory• of silver gilt, 20s, 2 mazer• ~ups, b~und w~th of those :"h~ supplied the raw material, the carver and the painter,
silver gilt, sss 4d; 6 silver spoons, 145; 2 gold rmgs, with_ 2 dia- and t~e d1stnbutor of the products. The relative softness of alabaster
monds £15· one gold ring with a balas ruby, 26s Sd; S strmgs of lends 1ts~lf to detailed carving, while its sheen and its rarity gave it, in
pearls,' 70s, ~ gold necklaces, £5; and other goods ~nd silve~ gilt, late ~edieval Europe, a precious quality. Local availability of the ra
J 6s: one silver chalice and paten, S8s, 2 sets of phials* of silver, material led to the development of Nottingham during the later MiddJ
with gilt chattels such as fermails [cl_asps and se~tin~s for jewels] Age~ as a centre for the production of carved alabaster for local and
and silver-gilt rings, broken silver, girdles set with silver, buckles for~1?n sale. Workshops made a variety of products, often displaying
and pendants for girdles, and rosaries of silver and pearls, to the reh?1ous themes an? frequently intended as objects of devotion for
value of £40. Which goods and chattels the same Walter atte parish churches. Of images made for domestic use, that of the head of
Watre and Nicholas Somerset, on Wednesday after the feast of the St John the Baptist on a dish became a 'signature' work of Nottingham
Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the year named, feloni- manufacture.
ously stole by night at the corner of Friday Str~et in Wes~ C~1ea_p,
in the parish of St Matthew in the ward ofFarmgdon W1thm, m W. H. Steven~on (ed.), ~~cords ef the Borough ef Nottingham, s vols,
London, and there criminally broke into John Frensshe's shop. London: Quaritch, 1885, m, pp. 18-21, 28-9, 180-3. Latin, transl. by
And also the same Walter atte Watre and Nicholas Somerset the editor.
were taken at the suit of Thomas Stoke of London, goldsmith,
with the mainour of goods and chattels of him, Thomas Stoke: (a) S 1 October 149 I. Nicholas Hill makes a plea against William
namely with one mazer cup, bound with silver gilt, value 1 Os; ~ne Bott, that he render him his reasonable account of the time when
other small mazer cup, bound with silver gilt, 5s; s buckles with he was receiver of N1cholas's money. Nicholas complains that
s pendants, for silver girdles, 15s, one other buckle and one silver w~e~eas he, on_ 10 July 1491, here at Nottingham, delivered to
girdle, 6s sd; and one knife called a 'cut-t~roat' with the scabbard :V1Iham fifty-eight heads of Saint John the Baptist, part of them
ends of silver, 6s 8d; by them stolen at mght on the Wednesday m tabernacles and in niches, to sell and to render his reasonable
stated, from the shop of John Frensshe, goldsmith, in the place, account to the aforesaid Nicholas of the money received for them;
ward and parish aforesaid. and although the same William has been often asked to render
And the jury declared upon their oath the said Wa~ter atte account, he ~as hitherto delayed to render that account, and still
Watre and Nicholas Somerset to be guilty of these felonies. And delays, to N1cholas's grievous damage to the value of £s 6s sd.
because the said Walter atte Watre and Nicholas Somerset were And William comes, and prays leave to imparl [delay] until
clerks [i.e. could read and so claim benefit of clergy, the right to Wednesday n:xt after the feast of All Hallows [l November]
be tried in a church court], and judgement could not lawfully ne~t to come.. ~he same day and place i!> given to Nicholas. On
be proceeded to without the ordinary [ecclesiastical authority], wh1~h day Wilham comes, and he says that he never was the
they were committed to the prison of Newgate, there to be kept receiver of the moneys of the said Nicholas, nor is he bound to
in safe custody. They had no possessions. render hi~ any account of the same moneys, as he has complained
against l11m. Both appeal to a jury.
H December 149 I. Nicholas Hill complains of William Bott
so. A specialist industry: Nottingham alabaster of a . plea that h~ r~nder him. I od, which he owes and unjustly
detams. The plamt1ff complains that the defendant, on 9 June
While the normative records of craft ordinances [20], [21] tend to 1491,_a~reed that he would pay to the plaintiff IOd for painting
give a static and idealised impression of industrial practice, a different and g1ldmg three alabaster salt-cellars, with two images painted
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE 101
100

and gilded: whereby he has damages ?f '2d. And the defendant introduced the possibility of readily reproduced announcements to
comes in his own person and defends himself. promot~ merchandise. This notice was printed by William Caxton at
Westm'.nster. The Sarum Ordinal (also known as a Pye from its black
(b) 7 January 1495. Robert Tull, husbandman, comp~ains of Nicholas and white appearance, like a magpie's) was a calendar. It is clear from
Hill alabaster-man, in a plea of debt of 12d, which he owes and Cax_ton's publicity for his product that he anticipated lay as well as
unj~stly detains. The plaintiffcomplains of Nicholas, who is in the clerical customers for this useful volume. He used the advertisemeiy
care and charge of the sheriffs, that whereas t~e defe~dant on 6 to demonstrate the typeface used in the book ('after the form of tht.
June 1493 hired the aforesaid plaintiff to carry diverse images and pr~se_nt letter'). He had recently (in 1476) established the first Englis~
heads of St John the Baptist from Nottingham to London for wages pnn_tmg-press at Westminster, where by the time of publishing the
of 3s, he only paid the plaintiff 'ls, and so there remain 12d unpaid Ordma! he was not only renting a house and workshop in the Almonry
and now demanded; and although often requested he has not yet at the sign of the red pale but also leasing a small shop at the other end
paid: whereby he says that he is injured and has damage of4d. of the Abbey, close to the king's court and the houses of parliament. In
the same period Caxton published an edition of Chaucer's Canterbury
(c) 27 May 1530. John Nicholson, stainer [painter], complai~s of Tales ( 1478), a manual for learning French ( 1480) and the romance of
John Cottingham, image-maker, of a plea that he rende~ him a Gocifrey ofBoloyne ( 1481 ).
head of St John the Baptist and half a quarter of gold, pnce 10s,
which he unjustly withholds from him, as he says. The plain- G. D. Painter, William Caxton, Edinburgh: Chatto and Windus, 1976,
tiff complains that whereas he, on Monday after the feast of St pp. 98-9. English and Latin.
Andrew the Apostle [30 November] 1506, here at Nottingham,
delivered to John Cottingham the aforesaid head of St John to If it please any man spiritual or temporal to buy any Pyes of two or
paint before Christmas then next following, and then to rede- three commemorations of Salisbury use emprinted after the form of
liver it to the aforesaid John Nicholson: nevertheless John the present letter which be well and truly correct, let him come to
Cottingham, although often requested, has not y~t don~ so, to Westminster into the Almonry at the Red Pale and he shall have them
the plaintiffs damage of 40d; and therefore he brmgs suit. And good cheap. Please do not remove this handbill (Supplico stet cedula).
John Cottingham comes, and defends himself; and he s~ys t~at ~e
does not withhold the aforesaid head from the aforesaid plamt1ff.
S2. Hawkers of goods at Winchester
Both appeal to a jury.

(d) 28 June 1530. William Walsh of Chellaston complains of John Ordinance~ which _sought to suppress door-to-door salesmen were part
Nicholson, stainer, of a plea of debt of I 8d which he owes to him of a (certainly vam) attempt by magistrates to subject all trade to
and unjustly detains, as he says; that is, for carriage of a cartload common procedures of quality control and taxation. The records of
of alabaster-stone from Chellaston to Nottingham, which money civic legislation are full of attempts to ensure that all economic trans-
he should have paid to him. And John comes, and defend~ himself; actions took place in the public view. Petty door-to-door tradesmen
and he says that he owes him nothing. Both appeal to a Jury. subverted that aspiration.

W. H. B. Bird (ed.), The Black Book qf Winchester, Winchester: Warren

s 1. Advertising a new commodity in London c.1479 and Son, 1925, p. 16. Latin, transl. by the editor.

The advertisement of products for sale in the medieval town was At the borough moot held at Winchester on Monday after the feast of
effected largely through the medium of street cries. But handw_rit~en St Ambrose the Bishop [4 April], that is Hock Monday 1409, in the
and posted bills may also have been employed. The advent of prmtmg
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
102 !OS

presence of John Bailly, mayor, Thomas Sutton and Edmund Danvers, held so late in the night upon Cornhill. Old clothes that have
bailiffs, it was ordered by the mayor and his fellows and the commu- been renewed have been often sold there for new clothes ... and
nity of the city that no traders, known as hawkers, wherever they various things stolen in diverse places are there sold in secret, to
come from, carrying goods on their backs, shall go from door to door tl~e great scandal and damage of the city; and many brawls and
through the city nor into any of the streets of Winchester to proffer disputes ha\'e often broken out there. We therefore command, on
their wares for sale, on payment of a fine of 6s Sd at the first offence, behalf of our lord the king, that no man or \\Oman be so bold as to
and double and three times this rate on subsequent occasions. Instead, carry clothes or any other things to sell on Cornhill after the bel
if they wish to sell, they must stand twice in the week, ?n w_ednesday has rung that hangs upon the Tun [ prison: there, which bell is
and Friday, in the established place, that is, on the east side of the town run~ at sunset, on pain of forfeiture of all clothes and other things
next to the gate of St Thomas by St Swithun's cemetery. earned there for sale after that time.

88. Unofficial markets in London S4. Internal trade: Southampton in the mid-fifteenth century

Occasional regulation~ such as these reveal a glimpse of. what was By contra~t wi_th foreign trade [ 85] , the domestic traffic in goods and
doubtless an extensive unofficial, 'black' economy. The difficulty of rav..materials 1s poorly documented in the medie\al record. Howe\'er,
imposing effecti\·e restrictions on this marginal ec?no~y is evident the records of Southampton give a rare glimpse of the detail of internal
from the terms of the by-laws themselves. To the historian such leg- trade. Goods carried either into or out of the north gate, the Bargate,
islation is also revealing of the official prejudice against unknown and of the town ½ere from 14SO onwards subject to three possible tolls,
unregistered outsiders who ventured to trade in the city. known_as custon_1s, brokage• and pontage.• 11 Vessels coming into the
port \\ 1th goods included local fishing-boats, wine-carrying ships from
H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials of London and London Life zn the Xlllth, Bordeaux and the galleys of Genoa and Venice which, in the former
XIVth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, pp. case, had been coming annually to Southampton since 1277 or before.
SS, SS9. Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR. These laconic entries do not supply the precise motives for the ship-
ments between Southampton and other to\\ ns, but these may partly be
(a) On Thursday before the feast of Pentecost, 1297, it was or~ered, inferred by the historian.
in the presence of Sir John le Bretun, warden of t~e City of
London, and certain of the aldermen, that on account of the fights 0. Coleman (ed.), The Brokage Book ofSouthampton 1443-1444, 2 vols,
and murders arising between persons known and unknown, the Southampton Records Series, IV, VI, Southampton: University of
gathering together of thieves in the market, and of cutpurses and Southampton, I96o-6I, i, pp. 8 111. Latin, transl. by the editor.
other criminals, in a certain market which had been lately held
after dinner in Soper Lane,~~ and which was called 'the new fair'; C H p
that it should be abolished, and not be held any more, on pain of Saturday .:; October :1H-3~~
confiscation of the wares both bought and sold there: the market
From Roger Woldyngc going to Salisbury \I ith 5 barrels of tar
having been established by strangers, foreigners, and beggars, ofJohn Hall
living three or four leagues from London. 5d '.!',d Id

(b) [Order of the mayor, 1369] Many disorders have been c~use_d
in the past by the 'Evynchepynge' [evening market] which 1s 25 The s?un·c is the basis of an online proJcct, 'People, places and rnlllmoclities l 4SO-
l5-1-0 fhc o, erland trade of Southampton\\ 1th southern and midland England from
the ~~thampton br~kage hooks'. \\W\\.O\'erlandtracle.org. See further M . Hicks
22 OffCheapside, by St Mary le Bow church. (ed.,, English biland 1 rade l-l-3(>-/54-0: Southampton and Its Region, Oxford, !.!015.
l04 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
105
C B p Monday 7 October
From John Walton going to Salisbury with 2 butts• of wine of
William Hore 4d 4d Id C B p
From Yngram Hewet entering with lambskms
From John Basset going to Romsey with 8 half-bales of woad• Id
ancl lea\ ing for London with 9 bales of dates of Simon Spenell
of Simon Long ad Id Id per ad Id
mare'16
From William Potter going to Sali~bury "ith 120 heads of garlic
of Richard Bele free 2',d Id
From John Loder lea, ing with 5 horses with alum of ,
John Gryffyn of Ludlow

'
IOd 5d
From Roger Marow going to Salisbury with 5 barrels of tar of From John Mathew going to Salisbury with 5 bales of woad
John Hall sd 2'.d Id ofThomas Cook of London
free 2d Id
From John Cook going to Salisbury \I 1th <iO heads of garlic and From John Waryn going to Salisbury with i bales of woad of
'• hundredweight of fish of Richard Bcle frt'C 2d Id Thomas Cook of London
free Sd Id
From John Charnn going to Salisbury with a barrels of black From Stephen Kyng going to Salisbury with 9 barrels of black
soap" of William Wan\ yke ad 4d Id soap of Thomas Pakker
9d 4d Id
From Henry Chavon going to Salisbury\\ ith I tun of oil of From Walter Cabbyll gomg to Romsey with 2 bales of madder•
Wilham Hore ad of Gregory Dyer
4d '·, d Id
ancl I hundredweight of" ax Id 4d Id From Ric~ard Connor entering with wool and leaving for
From Ralph Stride going to Salisbury with 4 barrels of soap of London with 2 chests of Gregory Cattanei [of Genoa] with
William Warnyke 4d 2d Id diverse things for his household
ml ad Id
From Edward Granncell going to Salisbury \I ith 2 barrels of tar From William Laurence gomg to Co\ entry with 9 bales of woad
and 21 bunches of garlic of John Hall sd 2d Id ofJohn Goold
free ad Id
From John Rownde going to Salisbury with 180 heads of garlic From Ingram T\\ynham entering with wool and leaving for
of Richard Bele free 4d Id Coventry with S bales of madder and J bale of alum and 2 bales
of woad of William Rastell
From Henry Curlynge for I hundrcd\\cight of\\ heat 2d free Bd Id
From Thoma~ Hay"ard for 'I. quarters of malt 1d From Tho~as Hewet entering with lambskins and leavmg for
Co1·entry \11th 6 bales of woad and 2 bales of madder of
From John Harpor for 2 quarters of malt Id William Per'
free ad Id
From Stephen Cook going to Salisbury with 6 bales of woad of From Thomas White gomg to Stoneham ._HantsJ "nh s•.
William Wyther 6d quarters of coal of William Smyth
and t bale of alum• of John Noyle of Taunton free +d Id
Id nil Id
From Robert Hyde for s oxhides 1',d
Sunday 6 October From William Watersale for I oxhide
',d
From Isabel Wexcombe for her stall at the Friars Minor From John Ber' gomg to London with 6 bales of woad and s
for 2 days 2d bales of dates of Simon Spene!!
per ad Id
From William Bochcr for his stall at the Friars Minor
mare
for I day 1d T11tsda_v 8 October
From John Bocher for his stall at the Friars Minor From Thomas Dene going to Winchester with I butt of
for 2 days 2d
Rumney [ \\me: and S barrels of tar of Laurence Trygg
free 11 ,d Id
24 Used in cloth manufacture; generally from Spain. !!5 'By sea,'
106
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
107

C 8 p
C B p
From John Dyper entering with biscuit and leaving for From John Mathew going to Salisbury with 2 barrels of salmon
Winchester with 4 bales of woad of Richard Lucays free and 2 kilderkins• of herrings of Richard Bele free 2 1. d Id
and 4 inferior bales of woad of the bailiff of the soke• free nil Id
From Richard Walton going to Winchester v. ith I butt of wine
From John Pynhorn going to Salisbury \\ ith 2 pipes• of wine of Laurence Trygg
free Id Id
of John Halsted 4d 4d Id
From Walter Cabbyll going to Romsey with 2 barrels of salmon,
From Richard Lang gomg to Alton ~Hantsj with i bales of 2 barrels of herrings, 4 casks of herrings and 2 bushels• of onions
woad and I bale of alum of Robert Dye:- 9d 4d Id of Richard Bele
free Id Id
From Walter Cabbyll going to Romsey \\ith 6 bales of woad From Nicholas Couper leaving with I barrel of herrings and
ofJohn Brond 6d Id Id 2 hundredweight of iron in his own cart sd 1d
From Thomas Leef going to Romsey with I bale of madder and and entering with s quarters of wheat 1 '·• d
S bales of v. oad of John Brond 5d Id Id
From John Style going to Winchester with 2 pipes of wine of
From John Hygon entering \\ith wool and leaving for Co,entry John Wodccok
free nil Id
with 9 bales of woad of Thomas Rastell free 8d Id
From Richard Gorman leaving with 5 horses "ith 5 bales of
From Henry Laurence for 1- quarters of malt :id woad ofJohn Trcver
sd
From Richard Paysegood for 4 quarters of malt 2d I bale of alum on 2 horses of the said John Trcver 4d Sd
From Henry Curlyng for 5 quarters of malt 'l'•d From Stephen Mychell going to Salisbury with I butt of wine
From Wilham Ha" tot for 5 quarters of malt 2½d ofJohn Lydford
4d
Monday 23 December I chest with diverse haberdashery and 17 hats of
Henry van Oye
From Wilham Mafay going to Winchester v. ith I hundred"'eight per 2d Id
of paving tiles for the abbot of Hyde free Id Id mare
From John Pynhorn going to Salisbury with 5 bales of alum from John Palmer going to Salisbury with t butt of inferior
5d 4d Id wine of John Helyer
of William Swayn 2d
and I hundredweight of rosin Id
From William Smyth going to Romsey with 7 bales of woad
Id Id and I package of iron pans
of John Brond ?d
and I chest of haberdashery of William van Gyldre per sd Id
From William Hayward going to Salisbury \\ ith I butt of wine
free 2d Id mare
of Thomas Whyte
From Hugh Hancok entering with 2 quarters of malt Id
From John Matho\\ going to Salisbury with I butt of\\•ine of 50 hake
Thomas Whyte free 2d Id Id
I quarter of salt fish
sd hd
From Jenyn Glover leaving v.ith JOO \\OOlfells• I barrel of onions
2d '·•d
From John Shopper for I hundredweight of canvas S casks of herrings
l ½d
From John Hayward entering with cloth of Gabriel Corbet and 600 coarse herrings 11;,d
Edward Cattanei [of Genoa] Id on 5 of his own horses
and going to Romsey with I¼ hundredweight of almonds of John 2d From William Rabayne going to Salisbury with I tun ofoil
Bole and S barrels of herrings of John Medmor 6d ½d Id of Richard at Well of Glastonbury
16d 4d Id
Friday 14 February [1444] From John Rowde going to Salisbury with 2 pipes of inferior
From John Crokkcr going to Winchester with :l. pipes• of wine wine ofJohn Hclyer
4d 4d Id
frt.'t! ~d td
of John Wodecok
108 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ECONOMIC LIFE
I09
C B p 30
S60 clapholts; 1 shock of wooden
From Ingram Ht wet going to Oxford with I bale of alum barrels of osmunds.• troug1is; 6 barrels of potash*; 5
of Richard Spraget, 5 baskets of raisins, 3 bales of rice, 1 bale £25 6s Bd
of dates, 3 baskets of almonds, and + measures of figs, of
free 8d
Herman Overkampe, Hansard:
Thomas Tanfeylde ld
8 bundles of iron from Butow· 51,, lasts and 15 b di . ffl -
From John Bole entering with wool J f ' un es o ax· 2, bar
and leaving for Oxford with 6 measures of fruit, I bale
r~ so osmunds'. 1~ eighths of eels; 6'2 timbers of redwork; ~i' 1 small
p1e~e of wax we1ghmg 5~ lbs; 14 pieces of hyndorlance,i~ contain in 6
of dates, I bale of rice, and I bale of cotton of William HayII
ells, 14 barrels of tar; S pieces of linen cloth. g
and William Dagvyle free sd Id £62 3s4d
Hans Molner, Hansard:
85. International trade: Hull in the fifteenth century s',2lasts and so bundles of flax; I last of osmunds
£62 Ss4d .
This text is taken from the account of the collectors of customs for Hull
Jost Eller, Hansard:
and nearby ports between 9 April and Michaelmas 148S. About sixty
or seventy ships entered Hull from foreign ports each year during the 1•g lasts of osmunds; 8 nests of counters· 8 t fb
I ' h k . ' nes s o oxes· I dozen
later Middle Ages. The officers' imentories of their cargoes provide ulte~; 2 s Obie s of lutestrings; 3 double counters with 2 shock~ of white
p aymg ta es. · '
an extensive catalogue of the goods and materials which subsequently £52 6sBd
found their way (by internal distribution along lines exemplified in
[ s4:) to local and more distant English urban markets. To give an Peter Eckstede, Hansard:
idea of the scale and range of materials imported, this extract lists the 7 lasts and_ 60 bundles of flax; l ''1l straw of wax containin s ieces of
contents of a single ship. The collectors recorded the values of goods
entering the port but in the source the Hansards, traders from the barrels of tar.
or
wax we1ghmg 1400 lbs; 2 barrels of train-oil:* 6 barrels os!und··· 5
s,
Hanseatic towns of the Baltic coast who took shares of the cargo, paid £11s osod
no dues, thanks to an Anglo-Hanseatic treaty of 1474. Hans Stagnet, Hansard:
3 barrels of osmunds; 2972 bowstaves· 5 lasts and 65 bundl f fl
W.R. Childs (ed.), The Customs Accounts ofHull /453-1490, Yorkshire b I f · ·1 ' es o ax· J
Archaeological Society Record Series, CXLIV, 1984, pp. 192-4. Latin, arre o tram-01 ; 1 straw of wax containing JO pieces of wax wei hi~
1250 lbs; 4 nests of coffers; 8 shocks of trenchers g g
transl. by the editor. £ 140 osod ·

The ship of Andreas Hartwych 26 called the Trinity of Danzig moored Gerard Lesebern, Hansard:
[ at Kingston upon Hull] on 16July [148SJ. 2 Ias~s _and 6~ bundles of flax; 15 barrels of train-oil; I roll of wax
contam1ng 6 pieces of wax weighi 750 lb 1 h .
The same Andreas [ Hartwych], Hansard:* bucksk' ..,is 5 h -k ng s; c est with 7 dickers of
ms, s oc s of trenchers.
2 nests of counters;~1 1 double counter; 10 pairs of playing tables;i8 2 £42 IOsOd
shocks"9 of trenchers;• 1 small counter; 5 pairs of playing tables; 6 bar-
rels of tar; 1 bowstaff; S sack hoops; 6 bunches of wire; SOO wainscots;

26 The master, rather than the o" ner. of the ship. SO Small split timbers for barrel staves or panelling.
2i Counting boards for reckoning accounts. 31
Parcels of s,1uirrel skins.
2 11 Games tables. s2 Flax or linen.
29 A shock was 60 pieces. A trencher is a wooden plate. ss Dicker: ten.
 ECONOMIC LIFE I l I
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
110
Peter Bedeker and Peter Nyggebur, Hansards:
Hans Droye, Hansard:
2 barrels of potash; s lasts and 90 bundles of flax; l barre i°
1 f
:a\h
barrel of pitch; 2 nests of counters; l S shocks of trenchers; 1 c 1es w1
l 1 nest of chests; 2 shocks of trenchers; l chest with 4 bundles of flax;
2 barrels of tar; 6 painted platters; 6 buckets; 1 bowstaff; ¼ barrel
of tar; I chest with 18 bundles of flax; 4 shocks of trenchers; I lb of
s bunches oflinen yarn and 13 bundles of flax. amber beads; s nests of chests; so shocks of trenchers; I small counter;
£29 6s sd 1 barrel of tar; s nests of coffers; 2 clickers of buckskins; 5 shocks of

Tobias Stenvech, Hansard: d trenchers; 1 small counter; 1 chest with 10 bundles of wax; l doze{
s lasts and 90 b undles O f. fl a.-.,
.,. 2 barrels of tar; t barrel of osmun s; 4 troughs; I dozen shoemaker's boards; I chest with 6 bundles of flax; fj
furs ofredwork; t shock of winding.-" ' stone of candlewick; JO boards; 8 pieces of bast;• 20 painted platters; 50
£61 osod bunches of bristles; 1 chest; 1 coffer; S stone of candlewick; 32 pieces of
bast; l chest with 6 shocks of trenchers; 20 pieces of bast; I chest with
Mathew Pepersack, Hansard:
6 bundles of flax; l coffer; 1 lectern; 1 chest with 12 bundles of flax;
2 ½ lasts and 18 bundles of flax; 2 barrels of tar.
20 painted platters; 20 pairs of pepper-grinders; 70 bundles of flax; 2
£17 osod barrels of tar; 1 barrel of pitch; 2 nests of counters; 2 nests of coffers; 7
Paul Auekynck, Hansard: . f barrels of train-oil; t chest with 5 lutes; s pieces of bast.
5 lasts of flax; l barrel ofosmunds; •12 barrel ~ftrain-011; 2 nests ~l c?un-
£Si l0s0d
ters· 2 nests of coffers; t chest with 5 small pieces of wax; 2 sma p~~ces
of ,~ax without a chest weighing 250 lbs; l pair of clavysymballes; 25
shocks of 1u testrin gs. s6. The business of the merchant: William Cely 1487
£48 osod
Andreas Klepper, Hansard: f d To the medieval merchant, accurate information was as valuable a
I½ lasts of flax and candlewick; I barrel of tar; ' fz barrel \ os~un s} resource as the goods in which he traded. In their letters, where these
14 eighths of eels; l chest with 2 nests of coffers; 20 unc es o survive, the historian can observe the eager exchange of news regard-
winding. ing markets, economic competitors, and the larger context ofdiplomacy
£15 os od and war. The foreign agent or factor of a firm was naturally concerned
to present his efforts on behalf of his employers in the best light. The
George Plaman, Hansard: 1 f ft
20 barrels of osrnunds; 1 barrel of tar; 5 barrels and 16 bund es o ax; Cely clan was one of the mercantile dynasties of London which in the
later Middle Ages built up substantial commercial and financial net-
8 nests of counters; 8 nests of coffers.
works in the Low Countries, primarily via the Calais Staple* through
£45 osod which English wool exports were channelled. At the time of this letter,
Michael Wittenbarch, Hansard: I barrel with s however, the instability of Burgundy under the Emperor Maximilian
1 last and so bundles of flax; l ½ barrels of osmunds; was disrupting patterns of trade and financial markets, encouraging
pieces of wax weighing 200 lbs. the Cely family to diversify into importing dyes and other goods to
£17 l0s0d London. The brothers Richard and George were the senior partners at
Herman Overkampe, Hansard: this date; William, who seems not to have been a relation, came to the
1 ~!l lasts and 45 bundles of flax.
firm as an apprentice and took, as was not uncommon in such circum-
£11 ssod stances, the family name.

A. Hanh am (ed.), The Cely Letters 1472-1488, Oxford: Oxford University

Press, 1975, pp. 237-8. English. Reproduced by permission of Oxford
S4 Probably ropes. University Press.
SS A form of harpsichord or spinet.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
112

William Cely at Calais to Richard and George Cely at London, 19

November 1487. IV. SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
Right worshipful sirs and my reverend masters, after all due rec~m-
mendation preceding I lowly recommend myselfunto your mastersh1ps.
Furthermore, please it your masterships to understand that ~ am come
to Calais in safety, thanked be Almighty God, for I was never m so g~eat Urban society in the Middle Ages was in some important ways veri
jeopardy coming out ofFlanders in my life, for men ofwar [ enemy ships] like that of the countryside. Notwithstanding the old fable that 'towriJ
lying by the way waiting for Englishmen; and also. I and my comp~n~ air makes free·, the peasant who escaped dependence upon a rural land-
was arrested [for] two days at Dunkirk, but for Sir James_ Tyrrell s lord and found her or his way to the city was vulnerable to exploition
sake we were let go. And so, sir, the world goes marvellously m Flanders in analogous ways to the villeins and cottagers they had left behind.
·,t ·s open war between Ghent and the king of the Romans, etc. Their employer, normally a workshop-owner, a merchant or an eccle-
now, fior 1 b
Sir, as for making over of your money, sin~e this trouble egan- cou
s, I ld siastical corporation, had similar material interests to the landowning
not make over a penny, saving £18 sterling, whereof I shall send you gentry and aristocracy. This was the less surprising in that, in the
the bill at the next passage. But sir[s], John Delop!s showed me at centuries which followed the first investment in the expanding urban
my departing that I should write unto y~ur mastersh1ps to understand sector by the Anglo-Saxon landed elite, economic ties at this level
whether there shall be any jeopardy to bnng wares out of the east parts between town and country remained strong, and, while landowning
into England now from henceforth, or no~, as he supposes that that ~et of aristocrats and gentry continued to maintain substantial town houses,
the contrary shall be put in suspense for diverse causes; wher~fore, sir, ~e some (if only a minority) of those who made fortunes in the city repaid
advises you to bestow your money in gross waress~ now b~time~ at th.,s the compliment by purchasing landed estates.1 The urban man of busi-
Bergen-op-Zoom market: in such wares as your master~h1ps thmk will ness might see himselfin a different light from the rural aristocrat, and
b best at London whether it be in madder,• wax or fustians, but I trow it is perhaps significant that a wealthy Londoner of the late fourteenth
39
:adder be best. A~d so be that you will, G~me~ de.Soria shall buy it for century chose to have himself depicted on his tomb brass not in the
your masterships and ship it in Spanish ships m his own n~me, for John trappings of a gentleman but as a merchant [87].2 None the less, the
Delopys and he are purposed to buy much madder to send mto Englan~. merchant of the town shared a certain class interest with the country
And if so be that it fall to peace, there will be good done upon. mad?er if landowner.
it be bought betimes, and John Delopys says, if your mastersh1ps w'.ll, he This said, the social experience of the town differed from that of its
will bestow your money as well as his own, and he sa_~s. th~t that IS the rural surroundings by virtue of its concentrated diversity and its flu-
best way to make over your money, for the.ex~hange 1s n~ht nought, idity. Both before and after the plague, urban populations depended, in
etc. No more unto your masterships at this time, but Almighty Jesus order to remain buoyant, upon a constant influx from the countryside
preserve you. Written at Calais the 19th day of November. (not until recent times have improvements in health provision enabled

By your servant,
I R. Fleming, 'Rural elites and urban communities in late Saxon England', Past and
Present, CXLI, 1995, pp. 3-26, S. Reynolds, 'The rulers of London in the twelfth
William Cely century', History, LVII, 1972, pp. S:37- 57; C. M. Barron, 'Centres of conspicuou~
consumption: the aristocratic town house in London 11!00-1500', London Journal
S6 An English ambassador to the emperor. XX, 1995, pp. 1-1 6 ; R. Horrox, 'The urban gentry in the fifteenth century', in J. A.
· · trade between England and the Low F. Thomson (ed.), Towns and Townspeople ill the Fifleenth Century, Gloucester, 1988,
S7 Evidently a reference to restrictions on
Countries. pp. 22-44.
S8 Goods sold by the hundredweight. M. Barron, 'Chivalry. pageantry and merchant culture in medieval London',
I! ~ -
A merchant of Spain and Bruges. John Delopys (de Lope1.) was another. in P. Coss and M. Keen (eds), Heraldry, Pageantry and Social Display ill Medieval
59 England, Woodbridge, 2002, pp. 2 18-41.
40 I.e. of currency.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT 115
114
together with one another (one solution was the creation of 'nations'
some cities to contain what had previously been a relatively high
- of the Welsh, of the Scots and so on - and another, the gathering
level of mortality). Because surnames became fixed only fr~m around
of fellow students in common halls) and with the more permanently
I 350, the study of placenames in personal names, s~ch as Margaret
resident townsmen.
of Devizes', has made it possible to map the magnetic range of early
fourteenth-century towns of diverse sizes: the larger the urban centre, Another element in the urban population prior to the end ofthe thirteenth
the longer the pull. A new small town of the thirteenth _ce~tury s~ch century, the history of which was both tragically unique and yet abso-,
as Stratford-upon-Avon drew most of its settlers fr?m "".1th1~ a ~adms lutely characteristic, were the Jews [ 41] , ::42]. Following the Norman
of sixteen miles, while a quarter of recorded names m Bristol md1cated Conquest, Jewish settlers scattered themselves through sixty English
origins more than sixty miles away.s Our sources, however,_ tend to towns.7 The fiscal interest of the crown led to these being formed into
prioritise those who, having come to town, made ~ood suffic1e~tly to official communities, but these were not ghettos, and Jewish families
acquire property and so to enter the written record: The poor migrant lived in the same streets as Christians. Jn the twelfth century the area of
tended only too often to stay beneat~ the r~d_ar [SS], [S9]. The narra- London known as 'the Jewry' was inhabited also by Christian families.~
tives of poor criminals interviewe_d m Par~s m the late four~eenth cen- The city of Bristol preserves the remains of a Jewish bath used for puri-
tury record both seasonal migration and, m some cases, quite lengthy fication, while the Jewish cemetery in York which was discovered and
personal trajectories.
5 excavated in the 1980s lay on the edge of, and by no means hidden away
from, the town.9 Anti-Jewish feeling in certain quarters was manifest in
Immigrants were attracted to towns not only for c?mmercia~ rea~ons
but in order to acquire practical knowledge, professional quahficat1ons the terrible Christian attack on Jews in York in 1190, and continued to
be fed thereafter by some inflammatory stories and preaching; but the
and - in a few cases - learning in its own right. In 12?0 a num?er ?f
expulsion ofall Jews from England in I 290 was primarily a royal act and
cathedral towns offered schools at the higher level with teac~mg _m
not the inevitable outcome of popular intolerance.LO
diverse fields; but the long thirteenth century sa"". the two u~1vers1ty
centres of Oxford and Cambridge emerge pre-eminent a~d, m c~nse- From well before the Conquest, English towns were home to long-
ttract to themselves a substantial national and mternat1onal term and short-term settlers from all other parts of Christendom; but
que nce, a · f h
population of young men [ 40]. The university was a creation o t _e it is a small index of the increasing reach of the monarchy in the later
medieval town, and the two bodies remained interdepende~t, eve~ ~f Middle Ages that national surveys were undertaken in the fifteenth
the cuckoo seemed at times to crowd the nest, and the clen_cal pn_v1- century of the foreigners (or in contemporary language, 'aliens') living
leges of the students regularly drove the city magistrat~s- to d1stract1on in the cities [ 49: . At this point and thanks to these records, therefore,
[85].(l Although the university towns w~re by ~efin~tion ~omewh~t \\e can appreciate the scale of their presence.11 From the lists compiled
peculiar places, they were at the same time typical m their ex~n-
ence of a fluctuating body of strangers, compelled to find ways to hve 7 A. S_. Ahulafia, Christiar,-./ewish Relations, /000-/300: Jews in the Sa11ia ,ifMedieval
Christendom, Harlow, 2011, pp. 88-108; P. Hyams, 'The Jewish minority in mediae-
val England, 1066-1290', Journal efJewish Studies, 25, 1974, pp. !!70-93.
s P. McClure, 'Patterns of migration in the late_ Middle Ages: the evidence of~nglish 8 J. Hillaby, 'The London Jewry: William I to John', Jew,:,h Historical Studies, XXXl II.
surnames', Economic History lleview, 2nd series, XXXll_, 1979, PP· 167-'.2, _E. ~- 1992-94, pp. 1-44.
·1 · n "!'he first half-century of the borough ofStratford-upon-A\on, rep·
cinarus-W 1 so , d
R. Holt and G. Rosser (eds), The Medieval Town. Lon on, 1990, PP·
4 1:r-,O·
• 9 R. ~- Emmanuel and M. W. Ponsford, 'Jacob's Well, Bristol, Britain's only known
s. Penn, The origins of Bristol migrants in the early four!eenth century: the sur• med1e\'al Jewish ritual bath (:'vf1kveh)', Tra11sactio11s if the Bristol and Gloucestershire
name evidence', Transactions ef the Bristol a11d G_loucestershire Archaeologrcal Socuty, Archaeological Society, CXII, 1994, pp. iS-86; J. Lilley (ed .), The .Jewish Burial Ground
Cl, l985, pp. 123-S0; G. Rosser, Medieval Westminster 1200--154-0, Oxford, 1989, PP· at (~bury'. Y~rk Ardiaeological Trust, 199•~; P. Skinner (ed.), .Jews i11 Medieval
Bntam: H1stoncal, Literary and Archaeological Perspectives, \Voodbridge, !!00.'l, pp.
183-90. 102-S and passim.
4 R. Holt, 'Society and population 600-1500·, in CUHB'. PP·
7 9-IM,
at P· !OS. . ell
10 B. Dobson, The medieval York Jewry reconsidered', in Skinner (ed.), .Jews in
5 B. Gercmek, The Margr'ns ef Society 111 Late Medieval Paris, transl. J. Birr •
Medieval Britain, pp. 145-56.
Cambridge, 198i. . 11 S. Thrupp, ·A survey of the alien population of England in 144(f, Speculum, XXXII,
A. Cobban, The Medieval J<;nglish Universities: _Oxford _and Camlmdge lo r.l~OO.
6 199 l957, pp. 26!!-,.~; Thrupp, 'Aliens in and around London', in A. ~:. Hollaender and
Aldershot, 1988; Cobban, English University Life m the Middle Ages, London, ·
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT 117
116
suppressed, had the potential to find voice in persecution when indus-
for taxation at this period we can also get a sense of the differing status
trial competition or labour shortage applied the spur [56]. Yet some
of the prosperous Baltic or north Italian merchant and of the often ~ar
evidence also exists of intermarriage, of business partnerships and of
more precariously situated Flemish craftsmen an? -women .wh~, while
association in the context of parish or guild. 1·1 Medieval history offers
their command of unfamiliar and respected techniques such as tile- and
no simple ideal to hold up to the challenges of the modern city with its
l s-making earned them a certain economic status, tended to seek
g as k h . t' 1 guag multiple diasporic populations, but it does offer relevant experience. ,
out one another's company, to continue to spea t e1r na 1ve an e
· d' lly to find themselves at risk of attack from resentful More or less sharp distinctions thus ran through urban society, sepJ
and peno 1ca . . , r •12
neighbours who on such occasions chose to 1dent1fy them as a 1en~ . arating Christian and Jew, native and alien, freeman and 'foreigner'
In the 1460s, a trade recession and the unpop~\~r An?l~-Bur_gund1an (a non-citizen), layman and cleric, female and male. Certainly, too,
alliance triggered widespread expression of anti_- Fle~ush f~ehng. Th_e there existed a hierarchy of wealth and poverty, which assessments
fifteenth century shows the potential for the ant1-fore1g~er riots of Evil of belongings for tax purposes reveal with stark clarity [ 48], [ 44].15
May Day in London in 1517. The listing from Lynn m 1440 reveals The list for King's Lynn shows as near neighbours the merchant with
a significant presence of Flemish workers from ~cross the North Sea, goods valued at almost £250 and the huckster of bread whose few
many involved in shoemaking. The 1483 subsidy rolls _for_ London belongings the assessors rated at less than £1. And by definition such
and its suburbs, together with complementary records, md1cate t~e records omit altogether those, unquestionably present in significant
presence of some 2700 alien men and wo~en over t~e age of twelve m number, with nothing. Of all the fault-lines which are evident in our
the metropolis _ in an estimated total city population of around fifty sources, it is not easy to identify a single one which had primacy in
thousand at this period. Their distribution, however, was very uneven, determining social development. It is hard, not only because the lines
being concentrated especially in certain areas, n~tably the suburban of tension were so diverse but because the life-course of an individual
districts of Southwark and Westminster (where ahens n:iay h~ve made might cross - and recross - the boundaries of wealth and status. Most
s much as 10 per cent of the local population). Their social range workshop masters had begun their working lives as servants to others
up a . d'ffi . 1 m t - and not a few, given the hazards of trade, subsequently reverted to
was also significant, and is indicated by their I erent1a assess en
for tax. Non-householders (servants) were required to pay 2s; house- that state. In so far as the wealth and status of a particular elite became
holders 65 sd; masters of brewhouses 20s; and resi~ent merc~ants £2. identified with a town's political regime, as the members of the inner
The overwhelming majority of aliens recorded m ~h~ ~ap1tal were group formed the civic council, those - the great majority of the urban
'Germans', which at the period loosely indicated an on~m m Dutch- ~r population - who were excluded from the franchise and yet compelled
German-speaking territories from Flanders to Pruss1a. Muc~ of ~his to obey the laws and pay the taxes imposed by government had every
human movement will have been temporary or seasonal m1grat1~n. reason to feel the resentment of the exploited. The political control by
Many who came were skilled and brought parti~ular tale_nts. The adJ~- the citizen elite over the disempowered majority may be seen as a con-
cent wards of Langbourn, Limestreet, Cornh1ll and Bishopsgate,_ m flict of classes.16 At least some participants in civic disturbances during
the north-east part of the city, attracted a number of we~lth~ ltaha~ the period did see their interests in these class terms.11 At the same
merchants and workers in a variety of trades. The Byzantine (Greek) time, the dominant groups in the towns were not homogeneous: they
goldwiredrawer was symptomatic of London's lu~ury ma~ket.'' ~o tended to include craftsmen alongside the general traders designated
crudely optimistic picture can be drawn of harmonious coexistence m
the towns of medieval England. Perceived differences, often latent but I+ See Section VII I.
1969 IS For comparison with the e\'idcncc of al"('hal'Ology, see R. Gih.hrist, Medieval Lift:
w. Kellaway (eds), Studies in London History pr~~ted to P. E._ Jones., Londo~ '. Archaeology and the Life Course, Woodbridge, 2012.
pp. 25 J-i2; J. L. Bolton (ed.), The Alien Commun11les of London rn the r ifleenth entury
16 R H. Hilton, "Status and class in the medieval town·, in T. R. Slater and G . Rosser
The Subsidy Rolls of 14-4-0 a11d 1483-4, Stamford, 1998.
(eds). The Church in the Mtdiev~l Toun4 Aldershot, 1998, pp. 9--19; Hilton, English
12 M . Carlin, Medieval Southwark, Lond_on, 1996, PP· 149-67. ' Medi{f)(U and French Towns m Feudal Socuty, Cambridge, 1991!.
1
s J. Harris, ·Two Byzantine craftsmen m fifteenth century London, Journal of 17 See Section VII.
History, XXI, 1995, pp. S87--40S.
118 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
I 19
as 'merchants', and their particular profile changed with time. What
united all townspeople was the common challenge of how, in a con-
S7. A fourteenth-century merchant depicted on his tomb
stantly shifting social environment, one could establish the personal
reputation which was the vital basis of trust, and in turn of all life in ~s m_uch as a painted portrait in later times, an image made for a tomb
the city. Whether relatively rich or poor, every townsman and woman '.n a tourteen:h-century city church was an artificial creation: an ideal-
ised celebration of the deceased For those w,·th tl r
was in need of the trust which depended upon a good reputation. If . • le means to pay 1or
damaged, it had to be defended at all costs [45]. such an e~during representation, this v.as an opportunity to show th
ideals which had guided :he ~ubjec-t in life. Richard Lyons, buried in th4
Late medieval observers often declared that they were looking at sig- church o~ St James Garhckhtthe in London, came from obscure, possi-
nificant social change in the form of inferior artisans and their wives ?IY Flem1s~ and probably _s~cially humble, origins. He began trading
who affected the manners and dress of their betters. Both the reality m London in the I S40s,. nsing later to prominence with a share in a
and the observation are perennial; but the demographic impact of the monopoly of the sweet wme trade. He eventually arrived at civic office
Black Death certainly enabled some craftsmen, benefiting from lower as a~ alderm~n and sh~riff. an_d he held in addition a number of royai
rents and higher wages, to sport clothes and household goods which appointm~nts, concerning which he was com icted of corruption. His
annoyed conservative critics. Chaucer's attitude, as expressed in his un~pulartty probably explains his murder by the rebels in Cheapside
lines on the fictional guildsmen on the road to Canterbury, captures during the Peasants' Revolt on J4 June 1 °g I I!! Stow' d d
something of this hostile satire, yet perhaps reserves judgement [ 46]. " . s recor was ma e
at the e nd of the sixteenth century.
After all, the son of a vintner seeking aristocratic patronage for his
writing may not have set himself wholly against social change. The John Stow, A Survey <if, London, ed. C. L. Kingsford, 2 vols, Oxford:
poet's account in the same work of a rich merchant, however, raises Clarendon Press, 1908, 1, p. 249. English, revised by GR.
sharper moral questions about the damage the love of money can do to
human relationships [47]. In her autobiographical writing, Margery Rich_ard Lions . .. ~ famous merchant of wines ... sometime one of the
Kempe gives an account, inflected by the morality of her devotional sheriff..., beheaded in Cheap by Wat Tiler and otl1 be! · h
. h. . . . . , er re s, m t e year
models, of the insidious attractions of material gain motivated by the JS81, 1s p1ct~re on his gravestone very fair and large, is with his hair
desire to acquire yet more splendid dresses [48]. Although cast in rounded by his ears, and curled a little beard forked a ·
the penitential tone which was expected of a pious woman, Margery's h' d t 1i· t· t· ' , gown girt to
•m own o 1s eet, o branched damask v.rought with the likeness
book, in its explicit reflection on social aspirations in the town, sheds of fl~\\ers, a large _purse on his right side, hanging in a belt from his
light on a prominent contemporary debate. 18 It was only too clear, both left s~oulder, a plain hood about his neck, covering his shoulders and
to those with resources and to those without, that this was a society in hanging back behind him. '
which status was determined, above all other distinctions, by wealth.
The poor London Lickpenny has the last word: 'For want of money I
might not speed' ~50]. SS. Two beggars die in London I 25S
Wh ·
at 1s unusual about the deaths of these obscure paupers is that they
happen to b~ recorded._ Such occurrences must have been extreme!
co:mon. As 1s revealed m (a), the neighbours of the ward were suppose~
to. now and to take resp~nsibility for a beggar in the vicinity. These two
cases were recorded during a periodic inquest by the sheriff of Lo d
II! S. Rees Jones, "'A pelcr of Holy Chcrch": Margery Kempe and the _bishops',!" to whom d. n on,
J . Wogan-Browne (ed.), Medieval ll-'omen. 1'uts a11d Conte.rt.< in [,aft M1d1eval Bntarn, were reporte issues unrei,olved at the local level of the wards.
Turnhout, 2000, pp. 377-91; A. Goodman, Margtry Kempe a11d Iler lrorld, London,
2002; J. Arnold and K. Lewis (eds), A Compa11io11 to the Book ef Margery Ktmpt, 19 R. L Axwortl 'R. I dJ d
Cambridge, 2004. Oxf~rd: 200+. ty, t<. Jar ,yon, ( . I Sill)'. O.1.ford Dirtio11ar:y ef Natio11a/ Biography,
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT l~l
120

M. Weinbaum (ed.), The London Eyre of J 276, Lo_ndon Record Society, 4-0. The life of the student
XII, 1976, pp. 8 (a), 9 (b).Latin, transl. by the editor.
The passage comes from an English thirteenth-century set of model
(a) On the feast day of St Urban [25 May] an unknown beggar letters. It was usual practice in the Middle Ages, when writing a letter,
was found dead, apparently from hunger, in the ward ~f John de to ma~e use of stan_dard forms, which were taught from generic letter
Blakethorn (Aldersgate Ward) outside Aldersgate. Nicholas de collect10n~. Thes: mcl~de~ compilations prepared for students, from,
Herlauwe and Roger de Celario, neighbours, do not corn~ and are one of"".h1ch the following 1s a sample. The expression is consequently\
not suspected ... No one else is suspected. Judgment: misadven- convent10nal, but the detail is true to life.
ture ... Because the mayor and aldermen testify that the beggar
was living among them in the ward, and the men of the ward C. H. Haskins, 'Letters of medieval students', in his Studies in Mediaeval
made no mention of his name at the inquest held before the cham- Culture, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1929, p. 10. Latin, transl. by the
berlain and they do not even yet know what he is called, the ward editor.
is judged at fault.
B. to his _venerable master A., greeting. This is to inform you that I
(b) Robert Bord, a beggar suffering from the falling si~kness, sud- am studying at Oxford with the greatest diligence, but the matter of
denly fell down dead in the ward_ of John Horn (Bridge Ward). money s:ands greatly in the way of my promotion, as it is now two
No one is suspected. Judgment: misadventure. months since I spent the last of what you sent me. The city is expensive
and ~1akes many demands; I have to rent lodgings, buy necessaries, and
provide for many other things which I cannot now specify. Wherefore
89. Child-stealing to aid a beggar 1S7S I respectfull~ beg your paternity that by the promptings of divine pity
you may assist me, so that I may be able to complete what I have well
The poor woman and outsider - Alice de Salesbury ha~ probably co_me begun. For you must know that without Ceres and Bacchus Apollo
to London from Salisbury in Wiltshire - who wa~ driven to stealmg grows cold.
a child in order to elicit charity earned her place m the record as her
crime was referred to the mayor's court.
41. The Jewish communities and the crown
H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials of London and London 1:ife
in the XIIIth,
X!Vth, and XVth Centuries, London, 1868, p. 368. Latm, transl. by the Introduced after the Norman Conquest, the Jewish population in
E_ngland ~as concentrated in the towns until its expulsion from the
editor.
kmgdom in 1290. Of particular utility to the crown as a source of
[21 March !S7S] Alice de Salesbury, a beggar, was condemned to financial l~ans, ~he local Jewish communities were protected by royal
the pillory called the thewe* ordained for women, by award of the decree until their role could be supplied by others, notably the Italian
mayor and aldermen, there to stand for one hour in the day, because merchant-banke~s whose presence in London and certain provincial
on the previous Sunday, she had taken Margaret, dau~hter of John towns became evident from around I SOO. The ambiguities of Christian
Oxwyke, grocer, in the Ropery in London, and had earned he~ away, '.11°narchy are apparent in this royal writ which, because of the fastid-
and stripped her of her clothes, so that sh~ mig~t not be recog~1sed by iousness of the queen mother, removed the Jews from her towns to
others.
her family, and so that she might go be~gmg :with the sam~ Ahce, and
gain might be made thereby. As to which, Alice was convicted before
J.M. Rigg (ed.), Sekel Pleas, Starrs, and Other Records from the Rolls of
the mayor and aldermen.
the E~chequer efthe Jews: A.D. 1220-1284, Selden Society, XV, London:
Quantch, 1902, p. 85. Latin, transl. by the editor.
]22
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

By writ of the lord the king [Edward IJ directed to the justices: Whereas (a) Who was my author? The Jews. How? By tax.
by our letters patent we have granted to our de~rest mother, E~eanor, Who ordered me? The king. Who procured me? The masters.
Queen of England, that no Jew shall dwell or_ stay many towns which she Why? For a broken wooden cross. When? In the feast
holds in dower by assignment of the lord Kmg Henry [III], our ~ather, Of the Lord's Ascension. Where did this happen? Here where I
and of our self, within our realm, so long as the same towns be m her stand.
hand; and for this cause we have provided that the Jews of Marlborough
be transferred to our town of Devizes, the Jews of Gloucester to our (b) In~u_isition made at Oxford before Peter de Leycester and\
town of Bristol, the Jews of Worcester to our town of Hereford, and W11l1am d.e Greynville sheriff of Oxford on Wednesday the
the Jews of Cambridge to our city of Norwich, with their c~ir~graph* morrow of St Peter ad Vincula [2 August] 1290 on the oath of
chests, and with all their goods, and that from now on they hve m these Henry Owayn, Andrew de Pyrie, Robert de Wermenhale, John
towns among the rest of our Jews. Witnes~ myself at Clarendon on Wyth, John de Arderne, Ralph de Stoke, Nicholas de Overtone
16 January 1275. The sheriffs of these counties and the constables are and Thomas de Durham, Christians, and Vives le Chapeleyn,
ordered to cause those Jews to be transferred to the places named. Bonef de Crickelade, Moses de Stanford and Jacob de Wycombe
Jews, sworn to enquire about the houses and rents of the Jews ot·
Oxford, what t~ey are and what they are worth in all outgoings,
42. The Jews of Oxford apart from service to the lords of the fee and apart from the cost
of maintenance of the houses; who, sworn, say on their oath that
The first of these texts records an inscription on a stone cross, erected B~nefey son o~ Lumb~rd of Cricklade the Jew holds a messuage
in 1269 in Oxford, in the square of St John's church near Merton witl~ a sho~ ~dJacent m the parish of St Martin, paying nothing
College. This was one of tw_o cros~es _whicl~ the ~ews of Oxford were for it, and it 1s worth 26s 8d per annum; Flora the widow holds
compelled to pay for, followmg an_ mc1dent m w!11ch an unknown J_ew a messuage in the parish of St Aldate (of the brothers of St
allegedly damaged a crucifix durmg a procession throu_gh the_ c1tt Bartholemew's Hospital outside Oxford) of Thomas de Henxey,
The second, an inquisition into the property held by Je~·s m the _city m and she pays 18d to the brothers and 12d to Thomas, so it is
1290 was one of the concluding acts of the tragic process by which the worth 13s 6d clear per annum; Sarah the widow of Benedict le
Jews.were expelled from England in that year. They had ceased to be E\'eske holds one messuage with four shops in the parish of St
vital to royal finance, and were increasingly a religious embarrassment Aldate of the king and she pays to the crown IOs which are
in the context of ecclesiastical criticism. The list reflects a great reduc- assigned to the converted Jews of London, and so it is worth 43s
tion in the size and importance of the community compared to earli_er 4d clea~ per ~nnum; Samuel de Berchamstede holds a messuage in
generations.20 It gives, however, s~me indication of the s_ubstant1al the parish of St Aldate of the king, paying 4 ¼dlandgable* yearly
extent to which the Jewish commumty had been embedded m Oxford, towards the farm of the town of Oxford, so that it is worth 9s 7¾d
principally in St Aldate's parish immediately to the south ofCarfax, the clear per annum; Pya, the widow of Benedict de Caus holds a mes-
market cross at the centre of the city. suage i~ t~e parish of St Aldate of the king, paying 4 ¼dlandgable
so tha~ 1t 1s worth 9s 7¾d clear per annum; Avegaye, daughter of
H. Anstey (ed.), Munimenta Academica, 2 vols, Rolls Series, London: Benedict de Wynton holds in the parish of St Aldatc two mes-
Longmans, Green, Reader and Dyer, 1868, i, _P· ~7 (a): H. ~- Sa~ter suages of the abbot of Abingdon, paying 12d to the said abbot,
(ed.), Cartulary efthe Hospital efSt. John the Baptist, 11, Oxford H1stori~al so they are worth 25s 8d clear per annum; Benedict de le Corner
Society, LXVIII, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1915, pp. 152-4 (b).Latin, holds a messuage with a cellar in the parish of St Aldate from the
transl. by the editors. heirs of Walter Fateplace, paying them Ss 4d, so it is worth 20s 8d
~!ear per ~nnum; Moses son of Jacob de London holds a messuage
!20 See also C. Roth, The .Jews <ifMedieval Oxford, Oxford Historical Society, new series, ~n _the parish of St Aldate of John le Orfevere, paying him 15d, so
9, 1951, pp. 151-4. it 1s worth 13s 9d clear per annum; the whole community of the
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT 125
124

Jews of Oxford holds a house in the town called their schools, fourth part ofa ship called a cog with its gear £10; 1 ship called
for which they pay John le Orfevere 15d, so they are worth I 8s a hulk £JS 6s Sd; 2 lasts of herrings £6; silver spoons 12s sd; 2
9d clear per annum; Margalicia the widow of Uin~s de Glov_ernia lasts ofless good herrings 52s; dried fish I0s; brass dishes tSs6d-
holds a messuage with a shop of John le Orfevere m the pansh of 104 quarters of wheat £28 !Qs; 24 quarters of barley 66s 8d; 4~
St Aldate, paying him 15d, so it is worth 25s 5d clear per annum. quarters of ma! t; 3 cows 1ss 9d; 6 pigs I os; 2 pigs 6s; 1 horse sos;
I saddle 2s; goods and mercery in the said ships £4S; 2 quarter!:),
of Bay salt 4s 8d; 2 barrels of tar 4s 6d; 1 bag of tallow; 20 board~
48. Moveable goods of inhabitants of King's Lynn c.1285-90 20s; provisions in the larder 1Ss 4d; s barrels and 1 pipe of wine
£8 Ss 4d; s hand-mills 2s 8d; I robe 26s Sd; lead 16s 6d; wooden
The material culture of the medieval urban household is partially dishes 21 s; trivets, fire-dogs, etc. 12s; 8 blankets and J cushion
recorded in inventories. The most common occasion for the prepara- 41s; 15 sheets 12s; 4 table-cloths and 8 towels 18s 2d; 2 woman's
tion of a list of material goods was the death of a person who left no robes 47s; 4 chests I ss;_ 50 lbs of Cwax] candles 5s 2 1!.,d; 1 lamp 2s,
will. Such inventories are not very common at this period, but, where armour I0s; tables, chairs, benches and stools 2s 8%d; half a dozen
they survive, they give a vivid impression of the furni_shings i~ the gloves 4 %d. Total £246 8s l ¼d; 15th £16 8s61,id.
houses of townspeople of diverse social status. For two mventones of
London shops, see [29]. These inventories ofan innkeeper: a merchant (c) Agnes de Swaftham staying in the house of Edmund Taverner
and a retailer ofbread at King's Lynn were made as the basis for a royal I robe Ss; I table-cloth and I towel 12d; I chest 18d; baked bread
tax of a fifteenth of the worth of goods. The barley owned by the inn- and other things pertaining to regraters* 7s. Total 17 s 6d; 15th
keeper's wife will have been used by her for brewing ale. t 4d.

D. M. Owen (ed.), The MakingefKing's Lynn, Records of Economic and

Social History, new series, IX, Oxford: Oxford University Press for the 44. Tax assessment at Shrewsbury 1816
British Academy, 1984, pp. 242 (a), 247-8 (b), (c).Latin, transl. by the
editor. Reproduced by permission of the British Academy. This document, like the extracts in ( 4S], is an assessment for a tax on
good_s. In Shrewsb_u~y as clsewh~re, such appraisals were carried out by
(a) Thomas de Holbeach, taverner appointed fellow c1t1zens and neighbours of those assessed. In this case
the crown ha~ !mp~sed a tax of one-fifteenth of the value of the goods
Coin 70s; silver £to; 17 silver cups £17 I0s 4d; I bowl ofmaple- of eYeryone living in towns. The detail of the record enables the his-
wood 6s 8d; 12 silver spoons I Is 8d; 102 lbs of brass dishes; triv- torian t? gain an impression of the character of the local economy (the
ets, fire-dogs, etc. 4s; 2 carcases and 4 legs of beef in the larder 17s butchering and leather trades are prominent) and of the wide diversity
9d- 5 barrels and 1 pipe of wine £40; 2 table-cloths, 6 towels, and ofmatenal resources and social status amongst the townspeople.
8 ~anvas cloths 4s; 11 blankets I 8s; 12 sheets I0s; 3 feather quilts
10s; a cupboard 13s 4d; an oven etc. 3s; 2 lamps Ss; 1 woman's cap D. Cromarty and R. Cromarty (eds), The Wealth ef Shrewsbury in the
7 s; fire-wood and turves 20s; 4 chests 8s; 1 hand-mill 18d; wooden Early Fourt~enth Century: Su Local Subsidy Rolls J297 to J822, Shropshire
dishes, cutlery, etc. 16s 4d; his wife's goods: 34 quarters of barley Archaeolog1cal and Historical Society, 1993, pp. 118-22. Latin, transl.
s½ marks; 28 quarters of barley £6 6s; he has 110s belonging to by the editors.
the guild ofSt Mary. Total £58 8s5d; 15th 77s 1071-d.
[Illegible; probably Adam le Dier:] woad* 8s; lead vat 5s; vessels and
ho~sehold utensils 2s6d. Sum 15s6d; 15th JsO½d.
(b) Philip de Bek
Money owed to him £6 6s 8d; 1 bowl of maplewood I 5S Sd; I William Whelwruyghte: 1 affer* 7 s 6d; I cart Ss, timber 2s 6d; 1 piglet
silver bowl 52s Sd; 1 ship called a cog with all its gear £40; the [ ...]; household utensils 12d. Sum 15s; 15th 12d.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT 127
H!6

[ ... probably Richard] le Hopere: in goods 15s. Sum 15.s; 15th 12d. Roger le Moock: I horse lSs 4d; I cow 8s; meat Ss sd; brassware ss;
Juliana, widow of William le Potter:* brass/brassware 7s 6d; clay household utensils 2s. Sum S0s; 15th 2s.
moulds 6s6d; malt 8s ... household utensils 16d. Sum sos; 15th 2s. Ralph le Dene: in goods 20s. Sum 20s; I 5th 16d.
[ ... probably John] le Barbur: 1 horse 20.s; malt 1 mark; clothe~ IOs; Nicholas de Grymesby: dried fish and herring 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d.
[. .. ]; brassware 10.s;jewelry [. .. ];firewood sos; household utensils 6s. John de Burleton: 2 affers 20s; 1 cart with harness 6s; meat Bs; 1 heifer
Sum 100s; 15th 6s Bd. 20d; brassware 16s; firewood 6s; household utensils 2s 4d. Sum 60s;,
Hugh, son of Robert le Dunfowe: l horse 20s; 2 cows l Ss 4d; in money 15th 4s.
20s; malt 20.s; [ ... ] 20s; meat 10s Sd; 6 silver spoons 6s Sd; [ ... ] s 4d; Ralph de Cobbeleye: I horse 20s; malt of wheat and oats 24.s; meat JSs
household utensils 16s sd. Sum £7 tos; 15th tos. 4d; firewood tos; clothes 9s; brassware Ss; household utensils Bd. Sum
[ ... probably Andrew] le Barbur: malt sos; [ ... ] 10s; firewood 20s; £4; 15th 5s 4d.
clothes I Os; brassware 6s Bd; household utensils Ss 4d. Sum £4; I 5th William de Wrocwardyn: in merchandise to the value 26s Bd. Sum 26s
Bd; 15th 2 I ~~ d.
5s4d.
[ ... probably Richard] de Hulton, merchant: in merchandise £15; Richard Madyn: in goods 20s; 15 th J6d.
I 5th 20s. Phi_lip Molendarius: I horse 1_os; 6 bushels* wheat 12s; 2 bushels rye s s:
[ ... probably Thomas He]rdmon: in goods 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d. 2 pigs Ss 4d; household utensils 20d. Sum sos; 15th 2s.
Thomas Lawe: tanned hides sos; tanning bark 20s; shoes and Richard de Cantelop: in merchandise and his goods to the value sos.
thigh boots J6s Bd; meat IOs; household utensils Ss 4d. Sum £4; 15th Sum sos; 15th 2s.
5s4d. Henry de Sutton: I horse I os; 6 bushels wheat 12s; 2 bushels rye ss; 2
Ellen, widow of Richard Sullelont: in goods 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d. pigs Ss 4d; household utensils 20s. Sum sos; 15th 2s.
John de Lake, dyer: woad, lead vats and brassware 15s. Sum 15s; 15th Richard de Foryate: in goods 20s. Sum 20s; 15th 16d.
12d. William, son of Richard le Parmenter: in money £10; cloth/ clothes
Richard de Upton, smith: iron, coal/charcoal and household utensils £1o;jewellery £10; household utensils £7 10s. Sum £37 tos; 15th 50s.
45s. Sum 45s; 15th Ss. Roger de Muridon: in goods to the value 40s. Sum 40s; 15th 2s Bd.
Hugh de Wygan, apothecary: I horse 20s; spices, ointments and a brass William le Barbur: in goods to the value 60s. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
mortar 60s. Sum £4; 15th 5s 4d. Henry, son of William Charite: I horse 20s; ox meat 20s; firewood !0s;
Nicholas le Spicer: goods to the value sos. Sum sos; 15th 2s. brassware 6s; household utensils 4s. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
William Godyer: 2 horses 20s; ma! t of wheat and oats 40s; firewood 1Ss Thomas Vaghan: in money £20; cloth/clothes £20; meat toos; jewel-
4d; household utensils 6s Bd. Sum £4; 15th 5s4d. lery £12; firewood 60s; 2 horses £7; brassware 60s; household utensils
William de Sutton: goods to the value 40s. Sum 40s; 15th 2s Bd. Joos. Sum £75 0s 7d; 15th IOOs ½d.
Thomas le Dissher: 1 affer* I0s, dishes, platters, cups and wood 27s6d. ~alph de London: shoes and thighboots 20s; tanning bark 20s; tanned
Sum S7s 6d; 15th 2s 6d. hides 20s; wood and lead vats ISs 4d; tan-liquor 6s sd. Sum £4; 15th
Cecily, widow of Richard de Besford: s affers and I cart with harness 5s4d.
20s; malt of wheat and oats 20s; firewood 6s Bd; clothes J0s; household Richard Beget: I horse 26s Sd; s oxen 48s; 20 pigs 40s; ox and pig meat
utensils ss 4d. Sum 60s; I 5th 4s. 60s; firewood 20s; brassware and household utensils 5s 4d. Sum £ to;
John de Westbury: cloth £4. Sum £4; 15th 5s4d. 15th !Ss 4d.
William de Wilderdehope: ox and pig meat IOOs. Sum 100s; 15th 6s8d. William le Cheser : in goods 15s; 15th 12d.
John Russel: 2 affers 10s; 1 cart with harness 4s; hay and fodder 6 s. Sum Nicholas le Deyer: I horse 20.s; woad S0s, vats 6s; firewood ss; house-
20s; tsth 16d. hold utensils I 2d. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
Richard le Taillor: cloth 20s. Sum 20s; 15th 16d. Thomas Hildebront: 2 oxen 20s; ox and pig meat 22s; clothes 12s;
William de Sutton: in goods to the value 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d. brassware 1Ss4d; firewood I0s; household utensils 2s sd. Sum £ 4; 15th
William Lace: in goods 20s. Sum 20s; 15th 16d. 5s4d.
)28 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
129

Roger Hotales: 1 horse 20s; 6 bushels wheat I 2s; I quarter rye 12s, l 4d; tanning bark 6s 8d; wood and lead vats 1Ss 4d; household utensils
heifer 4s; clothes I 0s; household utensils 2s. Sum 60s, 15th 4s. 6s sd. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
Edith, widow of Alan Atteyate: malt I0s; s pigs 6s; clothes 5s, brass- John le Sadeler: saddles, bridles and stirrups 100s. Sum Ioos; 15th 6s sd.
ware 2s; meat 2s 6d; firewood 2s; household utensils 2s 6d. Sum S0s; Roger Moldesonne, butcher: ox and pig meat 45s. Sum 45s; 15th ss.
15th 2s. Roger Atteyate: wool-fells,• lamb, goat and rabbit skins 45s. Sum 45s;
Robert de Whitemor: tanned hides, vats and tan-liquor 52s. Sum 52s; 15th Ss.
15th Ss 6d. Walter de le Clyve, tanner: tan-liquor, tanning bark, vats and hides in
Richard de Wenlok: in merchandise 25s. Sum 25s, 15th 20d. the tannery £6. Sum £6; 15th 8s.
Thomas Lumbard: 1 horse !Os, cloth I Ss; brassware 6s; firewood 12s; Adam de Stretton, butcher: ox and pig meat £4. Sum £4; 15th 5s 4d.
meat 4s; household utensils 20d. Sum 46s Sd; I 5th Ss t ¾d. Robert de Prees, tanner: tanned hides, tanning bark and vats 100s. Sum
Cecily, widow of Roger le Longe: 2 pigs tss 4d; malt 20s; clothes Bs; IO0s, 15th 6s Sd.
brassware 6s Sd; household utensils 2s. Sum 50s, 15th Ss 4d. William de Wilverstone: shoes and thighboots 16s sd. Sum I6s sd;
Prior of the Hospital of St John, Shrewsbury: S affers 9s; l cart with 15th 1sd.
harness 4s; 4 bushels wheat 8s; 4 bushels rye 6s; hay and fodder Ss. Sum Alan de Worcester: tanned hides, tanning bark, shoes, tan-liquor and
sos; 15th 2s. vats £4. Sum £4; 15th 5s 4d.
Reginald de Calverhale: in goods 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d. William de Hulton, tanner: leather in the tannery, and vats 20s. Sum
Roger Michel: wool-fells,• salted hides, honey and wax £4. Sum £4; 20.s; I 5th I 6d.
15th 5s4d. Thomas Willesone: in goods to the value 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d.
Lucy, widow of William de Nesse: 2 affers I0s; l cart with harness 6s Richard de Wemme: in goods 37s6d. Sum S7s6d; 15th 2s6d.
sd; clothes Bs; household utensils 5s 4d. Sum sos; l 5th 2s. Agnes, widow ofJohn le Blak, butcher: ox and pig meat 40s; household
Alice, widow of Richard le Vileyn: malt tos; 2 pigs 6s Sd; clothes Ss; utensils tos. Sum Sos; 15th ss 4d.
firewood Ss; household utensils 2s 4d. Sum S0s; I 5th 2s. Roger de Wythiford: in merchandise toos. Sum 100s; 15th 6s sd.
Simon Colle: in merchandise 50s. Sum 50s; I 5th Ss 4d. Richard de Shoplatch: shoes, thighboots and tanned hides 22s 6d. Sum
Alice widow of John de Chestre: in goods 60s. Sum 60s, 15th 4s. 22s 6d; 15th I sd.
Edw~rd le Mustarder: iron and steel, tallow, nails and candles of Paris Adam de Routon: in the tannery Stssd. Sum SlsSd; 15th 2s td.
15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d. Alan Dawe: in goods to the value 20s. Sum 20s; 15th 16d.
Hugh Lewe: l horse I os; iron and steel t 6s; tallow 6s; nails Ss 4d; candles Isabel Borrey: cloth!clothes 40s; 2 mazer• cups tos; 2 silver cups JSs
of Paris 2s 7d; household utensils 2s. Sum 40s [39s I tdJ; 15th 2s sd. 4d; 10 spoons I0s; Jewellery !Ss 4d; household utensils 1ss 4d. Sum
Thomas Colle: 1 horse 20s, clothes 20s; meat 20s; jewellery !Ss 4d; 100s; 15th 6s sd.
firewood 7s; brassware 6s Sd; household utensils I Ss. Sum I 0Os; I 5th Adinet Cissor [i.e. tailor]: goods to the value tos. Sum t0s, 15th sd.
6s8d. Henry Crok: saddles and bridles I0s. Sum 10s; 15th sd.
John de Oswaldestre, tanner: tanned hides, tanning bark and vats 20s. Richard Bercar [shepherd] de Edeneston: 8 sheep 8s, skins 7s. Sum
Sum 20s. 15th 16d. Iss; 15th 12d.
Walter Geffrey: in money 100s; I horse 40s; meat sos; jewellery S0s; Edith la White: I cow 6s Bd; 6 pigs 6s; I calf 2s 4d; household utensils
clothes 5Ss 4d; firewood 26s Sd; vessels and household utensils 20s. 20d. Sum 20s [16s SdJ; 15th 16d.
Sum £15; 15th 20s. R~chard Bernard: goods to the value £5. Sum I 00s; 15th 6s sd.
Parnel, widow of William Balle: tanned hides, tanning bark, vats and Nicholas in le Dich: 7s6din goods. Sum 7s6d; 15th 6d.
tan liquor 40s. Sum 40s; 15th 2s 8d. Richard de Haden hale: I 5s in goods. Sum I 5s; I 5th 12d.
Robert de Wych, shoemaker: shoes, tanned hides, tanning bark, vats William le Trumpour: s affers 20s; I cart with harness 9s; t cow and
and tan-liquor 45s. Sum 45s, 15th Ss. calf 6s 8d; 4 bushels wheat 8s; 6 bus rye 9s, firewood 4s; brassware 2s 4d;
Adam Gilemin, shoemaker: tanned hides 20s; shoes and thighboots tSs household utensils 2s. Sum 50s [5ts]; 15th Ss 4d.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT !SI
ISO

Richard le Gaunter: in goods to the value 15s. Sum I 5s; 15th 12d. Walter Piscator [ Fisher]: I affer !Os; dried fish and herring 40s. Sum
John le Tipper: gloves I Is; wool-fells and horse hides 20s; 1½ quarters 50s; I 5•h 40d.
of wheat 24s; 1 quarter rye 12s; malt tss; brassware 6s 8d; firewood 6s Agnes le Roo: in goods J5s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d.
8d; household utensils 6s 8d. Sum JOOs; 15th 6s 8d. Thomas de Ondeslowe: l horse 20s; cloth £4. Sum 1oos; 15th
John le Fissher: in goods 10s. Sum lOs; 15th 8d. . 6s8d.
Matilda, widow of William le Frensche: I affer !Os; malt 1Ss4d; 1 heifer Peter Cox: in goods 20s. Sum 20s; 15th 16d. ,
40d; 1 pan 12d; household utensils 2s4d. Sum sos; 15th 2s. Peter Gerard: cloth 60s; dried fish 40s. Sum I OOs; 15th 6s Sd. ~
Roger le Mareschal: iron, horse shoes and coal/charcoal 15s. Sum 15s; Richard de Coln ham: I horse 20s; 1 cow 6s 8d; meat I Ss 4d; timber 1sJ
4d; household utensils 6s 8d. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
15th 12d.
Roger, son of Roger atte Shupene: I cow 6s 8d; 2 bullocks 6s 8d; lO John Reyner: in merchandise 45s. Sum 45s; 15th ss.
sheep 10s, hay and fodder 6s sd. Sum 30s; 15th 2s. Aline le Cok: in goods to the value 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d.
Alan le Glovere: wool-fells lOs; gloves 6s; malt 8s; firewood JOs; clothes Thomas le Frerecokes: in goods to the value 16s 6d. Sum I 6s 6d; 15th
7 s; meat 6s; brassware 4s; jewellery 8s; household utensils I 5d. Sum 60s !Sd.
Adam le Parminter: furs, wool-fells, fox and hare skins 45s. Sum 45.t,
sd; 15th4sO¼d.
Ralph de Ellesmere: in goods to the value 15s. Sum 15s; 15th 12d. 15th ss.
Roger atte Shupene: 40 sheep 40s; wool-fells JSs 4d; hay and fodder 6s William le Hayward, miller: 2 horses 20s; malt 20s; hay and fodder 10s.
Sum 50s; I 5th Ss 4d.
sd. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
Richard Mile: 4 sheep 4s; 4 pigs Ss; firewood Ss; timber 7 s; household Henry Mether, parmenter:• furs 40s; goat, fox, hare, lamb and rabbit
utensils 6d. Sum 17s 6d; I 5th 14d. skins 40s. Sum £4; 15th 5s 4d.
William le Colier: shoes 9s; tanned hides 7 s, tanning bark and vat 4s. Hugh Andreu: in goods to the value 16s. Sum 16s; 15th 13d.
John Baldewyne: in money £10; clothes £6; 2 horses 40s; jewellery
Sum 20s; 15th 16d.
Adam le Mareschal: iron and coal/charcoal 8s 4d; I cow 6s 8d; I sow 40s; vessels and household utensils 50s. Sum £22 I os; 15th sos.
with piglets 4s 4d; 2 bushels wheat 4s; horse shoes and nails 6s 8d. Sum Alan Clement: in goods 45s. Sum 45s; 15th ss.
Thomas de la Clyve: in merchandise !00s. Sum !O0s; 15th 6s Sd.
sos; 15th 2s.
William le Pety, skinner: goat, hare and fox skins 25s; lamb and rabbit Richard Stury: in money £10; clothes £6; 2 horses 40s; household
utensils 50s. Sum £'22 I os; 15th 30s.
furs 25s. Sum 50s; 15th 40d.
Philip de Benethale: in merchandise 60s. Sum 60s; 15th 4s.
John Bayeson: cloth sos 4d. Sum sos 4d; 15th 2s Q',4d,
William de Mudie : Myddle]: iron, coal/charcoal and horse shoes 10s. 45. The importance of reputation and trust
Sum IOs; 15th 8d.
Henry de Prestecote: malt S2s; firewood 26s; meat 5s; brassware 8s; In the context of the medieval urban economy, reputation was a vital
household utensils 4s. Sum 75s; 15th 5s. material resource. Legal cases such as these reveal the importance
Anota de Kent: in goods to the value JOs. Sum !0s; 15th 8d. ~tta~hed to personal standing in the community, and the perceived loss
John le Wayte, baker: I affer 8s; 6 bushels wheat 12s; household uten- if this. were damaged (b ). The ex tract in (a) exempl ities the strategies
sils 2s 6d. Sum 22s 6d; 15th I sd. som~t1mes used by local traders to marginalise those coming from
Reginald Gravegos: in goods 10s. Sum !Os; 15th 8d. outside the town or to limit their ability to compete in the market. The
trustworthin ss-:- real or apparent - of local knowledge was a potent
Henry de Lidleye: I horse 1Ss4d; malt of wheat and oats 20s; I quarter 7
reso_urce. A_ significant strategy for the creation of a trustworthy rep-
wheat 16s; firewood 20s; meat 6s8d; brassware JSs4d; household uten-
sils 10s sd. Sum JOOs; 15th 6s sd. utation, which could help to secure economic advantage in addition to
Richard de Ellesmere: I affer I0s; iron and steel, knives and daggers, moral status, was to join a fraternity [94], [ 95].
silk and muslin 20s. Sum S0s; 15th 2s.
JSI! TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
ISS

I. H. Jeayes (ed.), Court Rolls of the Borough of Colchester 1310-1379, S Geoffrey Chaucer forged his characters from a commingling of the
vols, Colchester, 1921-41, i, p. 84 (a); J. S. Furnivall (ed.), Town Life in books he had read and the social world he knew. The poet's charac-
the XIV Century as seen in the court rolls of Winchester City, Winchester: terisation of the Canterbury pilgrims is full of sharply observed and
Warren and Son, n.d., pp. 148-9 (b). Latin, transl. by the editors, ironic references to the social mores and pretensions of his day. The
revised by GR. five London tradesmen introduced in these lines are representative of
the 'lesser' crafts of the city, whose commerce and government tendedl
(a) [Colchester 1312] John Proffete was charged by the bailiffs to be dominated by the interests of merchants. Very few artisans wer~
that when a certain stranger came to the Colchester market e, er elected to be aldermen. In the late fourteenth century, however -
and exposed for sale herrings at eight-a-penny, the said John at the time of the composition of the Canterbury Tales - the social and
reproved him, saying that he should have sold them at four-a- political upheavals which followed the arrival of the Black Death saw
penny, thereby disturbing the market, to the great scandal of the the prevailing order challenged by craftsmen who aped the clothes and
town. And that he has been accustomed to do the same thing with manners of their social superiors, and who even, for a short time, forced
various other merchandise coming to the market. John pleads• a widening of the city government to include a broader representation
not guilty and asks for an enquiry, which is made and finds him ofordinary townspeople. The five different craftsmen in the tale derive
guilty, and he is cautioned not to offend in this way again. social confidence from their membership of 'a solemn and a great fra-
ternity': one of the many religious brotherhoods maintained in London
(b) [Winchester 1373] William Inge and Margery, his wife, pre- as in other towns, to which the practitioners of diverse crafts were
sented themselves against William Coterengham on a plea of drawn for a variety of motives, including that of the status afforded to
trespass ... And he makes plaint hereon that on the first Sunday the members of so morally respectable an organisation. The cool tone
in Lent 1373 the said William [Coterengham] came to the house ofChaucer's nicely observed portrait perhaps indicates his deprecation
of William Inge with force and arms, namely, cudgel and knife, of these ambitions.-i1
and there assaulted Margery, his wife, calling her false, untrust-
worthy and unfaithful (falsam, incredulem et inftdelem), whereby Geoffrey Chaucer, General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, II. 36 J-78, in
she has lost credit (pro quod amisit credenciam), and has inflicted F. N. Robinson (ed.), The Works ofGeeffrey Chaucer, 2nd edn, London:
other illegalities on her, finding fault with the red and white Oxford University Press, 19.57, p. 20. English.
herring which are their merchandise, whereby they have lost
repute (per quod deteriorati sunt) and suffer damage to the amount An Haberdasshere and a Carpenter,
A Webbe, a Dyere and a Tapycer, - weaver; tapestry-maker
of one hundred shillings; and on this account they bring suit. And they were clothed alle in o lyveree
And William acknowledged the trespass, on account of which the one costume
Of a solernpne and a greet fraternitee.
sentence of the court is that the said William Inge and Margery, Fu! fresh and ncwe hir geere apiked was; clothes; adorned
his wife, recover the said hundred shillings, and the said William Her knyves were chaped noght with bras mounted
Coterengham is in amercement for trespass, and in default of But al with silver; wroght ful clene and weel
security for the said moneys he must remain in custody until (he Hire girdles and hir pouches everydeel. belts; bags; altogether
Wei semed ech of hem a fair burgeys
pay or produce security).
To sitten in a yel<lehalle on a deys. guildhall; dais
E\'erich, for the wisdom that he kan, knew
Was shaply for to been an alderman suitable
46. Social pretensions of the late fourteenth-century For catel hadde they ynogh and rente, goods; enough
townsman and woman And eek hir wyves wol<le it wel assente; also; agree

The Canterbury Tales do not, of course, provide an objective account 2

1 G. Ross'::~• " ~"he fi\'c guildsm.cn·, in S. Rigby and A. Minnis (eds), Historiam 011
of fourteenth-century social types. But, as an inhabitant of London, Chaucer: l he Gmeral Prologue lo the Canterbury Tales, Oxford, 20 J,;, pp. 2'1-7-6 J.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT IS5
1:14

What! lat us heere a mcsse, and go we dyne.' hear a mass

And elles certeyn were they to blame. ·wyf, quod this man, 'litel kanstow devyne can you
called
It is ful fair to been ycleped 'madame', The curious bisyness that we have. full efcare
services for the dead
And goon to ,·igils al ~et~re, For of us chapmen, also God me save, merchants; as God preserve me
cloak; carried [i.e. the train]
And have a mantel ro1alltche ybore. And by that lord that c\epid is Semt Y,e, called; St Ivel Ivo
Scarsly amonges twelve tweye shul thry, e
Continuelly, lastynge unto oure age
,
two

47. Material values of a fictional merchant c.1890 We may wel make chiere and good visage, put a good.face on i
And dryve forth the world as it may be,
The image of society recorded in the Canterbury T_~les is r~fra~~ed And kepen oure estaat in pryvetee,
through the satire and irony of the poet. Yet the cnucal r:rspectlve Tit we be deed, or elles that we pleye take a holulay
A pilgrimage, or goon out of the weye.
of the literary text itself formed part of contemporary social debate,
And therefore have 1 greet necessitee
· t ona
and t h e I11s · n n•ho
.. reads. with care has much . to learn. from, such Upon this queynte world fa, yse me; elaborate
he artful evocation of the merchant m The Shipman s Tale For ~vermoore ,,e moote stond m drede
a source . T h' • If c d
·11· al view of his class and values w 1c11 1tse 1orme Of hap and fortune in oure chapmanhede.' merchandmng
conveys a er 1c · d h ·
art of the cultural context in which real mercha~ts pore over t e~r
paccounts, worne · d about their gains and , on occasion, neglected
. . their
wives. To the merchant in the tale (who lives at St Dems: winch may 48. Material desire and spiritual values c.1400
indicate that Chaucer's literary source was a French fabliau), the cost
of his abstraction is great. For his wife, desirous of new clothes_ - s~e Margery Kempe (c. l S7S - c.14S9) was born to prosperous parents
too is caught up in the value-system of the marketplace - exploits his in the town of Bishop's Lynn (now part of King's Lynn) in Norfolk,
absence on business to secure money, in return for sexu~l fa,·oui_-s, from where her father was five times mayor. She was illiterate, and her
John - who to complete the circle, raises the words were dictated in the 14S0s, many years after the events they
a 1ecI1erouS monk , Dom ' . • d ·1
cash as a Joan from the poor merchant himself. It is~ s1gmficant_ ~t_a1 describe, to a priest. The time of her life referred to in this passage
that the merchant of the tale is anonymous. Read with due sens~t1v1ty fell in the 1S90s. Thanks both to the in tern al evidence of the text and
to its literary art and its moral perspective, such. a text as _tl~•s can to fragmentary external sources, we know something about Margery
reveal something about the contemporary perception and critique of Kempe, her marriage, her pilgrimage!>, her particular devotion and
late medieval mercantile and urban values. her visionary experience~. There is some evidence that, while not all
responses to her demonstrative religiosity were positive, she acquired
Geoffrey Chaucer, The Shipman's Tale, II. 212-ss, in F. N. R~bins~n a following in her life and after her death. The single extant manu-
(ed.), The Works ojGeoffrey_ Chaucer, 2nd edn, London: Oxford Umvers1ty script copy of the book was made, a decade or so after the lost original,
Press, 1957, p. 158. English. in or near Norwich, possibly in a religious house. That the book was
first made with the help of a cleric should alert the historian: these are
Up to hir houshonde is this wyf ygon, not Margery's unmediated words and thoughts. The stories which
And knokketh at his countour bolde\y. characterise the book, of her humiliation and mockery by others, and
'Quy la? quod he. 'Peter! It am I,'
Quod she; 'what, sire, how \onge wol ye faste? of her public testimony of her spiritual experiences, are suggestive
How longe tyme wol ye rekene and caste of analogies between her life and that of Christ. However, this is not
Yourc sommes, and youre bookes, and youre thyngcs? a text written to claim Margery's status as a saint (nor do we know
The de,•el have part on alle swiche rekenynges! that anybody attributed miracles to her). Although eccentric in certain
fry God; gift
Ye have ynough, pardee, ofGoddes sonde; ways, the life which is indirectly recorded in this book was formed
Com doun to-day, and !at youre bagges stonde. in response to circumstances which we can recognise as common to
Ne be ye nat ashamed that daun John miserable Margery's contemporaries: the material po~sibilities and attractions
Shal fasting al this day alenge goon?
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT IS7
IS6

of life in the city (especially to one born into substantial m_eans); the her but alw~ys desired more and more. And then, out of pure covet-
example of a life lived, by contrast, according to non-materia~ v~lues; ousness and m order to maintain her pride, she began to brew and was
and the vision of human life as a pilgrimage, an arduous, per10d1cally one_ of the greatest b:ewers in the town of N. for three or four years
frustrated, but spiritually rewarded struggle to move from the first to until she lost a lot of money, as she did not have experience of doing
the second ideal. In these contemporary currents of thought Marg_ery this.1 • For, although she had ever such good servants and knowledge
Kempe, notwithstanding social conventions regarding the appropri~te of brewing, things would not go successfully for them. For, when the
behaviour of women, found strength to negotiate the terms on which ale had as fine a head on it as could be seen, suddenly the head would
she lived with her husband, to travel independently and to speak out fall away, and all the ale would be lost one brew after another, so her
~-ith remarkable boldness in the presence of ecclesiastical authority. servants were ashamed and did not wish to stay with her. Then this
creature thought of how God had punished her before, and she could
A. Bale (ed.), The Book of Margery Kempe, Oxford:_ Oxford University not take heed, and now again through the loss of her money; and then
Press, 2015, pp. IS-14. English, revised by the editor. Reproduced by she left off and bre wed no more.
permission of Oxford University Press.

So when this creature had thus through grace come back to her right 49. Foreigners in English towns 1440, 1488
mind she thought she was bound to God and that she wou_ld be His
servant. Nevertheless, she would not put aside either her pride or her Foreigners in late medieval English towns were known as 'aliens'.
pretentious costumes that she had been used to, neither for her hus- ('Foreigns', meanwhile, were inhabitants of or visitors to a town who
band nor on any other person's advice. And yet she knew full well that were not en.rolled i~ the local lists of residents and who consequently
they said a great many insulting things about her, for _she wore ~ol~ !~eked the rights enJoyed by the registered population.) The introduc-
piping on her headdress [a fashionable arrangement using gol~ wire.., tion ?Y
the crown of occasional taxation of aliens generated lists which
and her hoods were <lagged with tippets [slashed to allow a d1~erent surv1:e from a number of towns. The records give some indication {if
coloured material to show through, and with long, narrow strips of only m the name) o~ the place of origin and of the economic activity
material attached]. Her cloaks were also <lagged and ~i~ed with man7 pursued by these migrants. A striking proportion of the substantial
colours between the <lags, so that it would be more strikmg to peoples community of craftsmen of Flemish origin working in the east-coast
eyes and she herself should be more admired. tow~ of Lynn were involved in shoemaking. Their mutual intercon-
nect10ns stand out, as they do also in the lists from London. In the
But when her husband wanted to speak to her about leaving aside her
metropolis there appears a significantly greater diversity of traders of
pride, she answered sharply and shortly, and said that sh~ came from
foreign extraction.
worthy kin - he never seemed a likely man to have married her - for
her father had once been mayor of the town of N. and afterwards he
2 D. M. Owen (ed.), The MakingefKing'sLynn, Oxford: Oxford University
was alderman of the high Guild of the Trinity in N.~ And ~herefore she
P~es~ for the British Academy, 1984, pp. 457-9 (a), reproduced by per-
would uphold the honour of her kin, whatever anybody said.
m1ss1on of the British Academy; J. L. Bolton (ed.), The Alien Communities
She was hugely envious of her neighbours, that they were dressed as ofLondon in the Fifteenth Century, Stamford: Paul Watkins for Richard
stylishly as she. Her every desire was that she should be ho~oured bl, III an? Yorkist History Trust, 1998, pp. 66-70 (b). Latin, transl. by
the people. She would neither learn her lesson from one chastisement the editors.
nor be content (as her husband was) with the goods that God had sent

!!!!'N.' is King's Lynn. The guild of the Trinity was the most prestigious of the town's
24 Brewing "as a common occupation for me<lie\'al women. See J. Bennett Ale &er
guilds.
2:l After the birth of her child, Margery Kempe had suffered for a period from a severe and Brewsters in E11gland: Wo=n's ll'ork in a Chancring World 1300-16~ O~ford'
1999. o· , ,
mental illness.
158 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
IS9

(a) Return of aliens resident in Lynn and its immediate neighbour- Bishop's ~ynn, Henry patten-maker and Matthew patten-maker serv-
hood and liable to pay the aliens' subsidy granted to the crown ants of Richard patten-maker of Bishop's Lynn, G erard G ra bo servant
•
for sea defences in 1440. fW'll'
o I ,am Johnson, John Mathew, servant ofJohn Depyng of,Bisho 's
Lynn, James, servant of Robert Pynder of Bishop's Lynn J h p
Hundred• of Freebridge. Inquest made at Lynn in the county of of William Wad f B' h , L ' o n, servant
. e o is ops ynn, Hugo Man, servant of William
Norfolk on Tuesday after the feast of St Barnabas the Apostle [11 Nayler, Richard Pers, servant of James shoemaker J I .
June], 1440, before Miles Stapleton, sheriff of the same county, in William B bbl . , o rn, servant o(
virtue of the king's commission addressed to the sheriff, by the oath of
. r?~s, c~ er, Deryk Symondesson, servant of Deryk Cla /.
;~ ~1e , Ape m Bishop's Lynn, John, servant of Peter Ducheman ~f
the jurors, who say on their oath that none of the persons listed below is ops Lynn, Paul, servant of John Tay lour in Northend s·
were born in England, but that they are householders within the hun- servant of William Mollesworth of Bishop's Lynn w·11·
dred ofFreebri<lge, that is: fJ h s · • , 1 1am,' servant
imon,
o. o ~ ad11ler m Grassmarket, William, servant of Hugh Tyler of
William Combe souter• of Bishop's Lynn, Peryn Otelemaker of the Bishops Lynn.
same, Deryk Ducheman, tenant of William Waynflete, of the same,
John Boteler of Bishop's Lynn, shipman, Richard Peterson of the same, (b) "Fore·ign-.bo rn res1'dents of London aged over twelve years listed
patten•-maker, John Byrste of the same, turner, Ioceus shoemaker, 1or the ahen subsidy in June 1483
Dutchman, of Bishop's Lynn, John Mundesson of the same, tailor,
Margaret Selander of the same, widow, James Ducheman of the same, Langbourn Ward
souter, Herman Chapman, tenant of John Gebon' in Purfleet Street,
Thomas Bowen of Bishop's Lynn, cordwainer,• William Brouns of the Gaunt Giles \'an German currier•
[Gaunt] 6s8d
same, shoemaker, Deryk Claus of the same, shoemaker, Philip Johnson 1':Jizabeth \ an German wife of Giles ,an Gaunt 2.(
of the same, ferryman, Claus Smyth, tenant of Robert Hamond, chaplain,
Peter Ducheman, tenant of Margaret Frank, Nicholas Tailiour, tenant Caren Dcdcric \an German currtcr
[Caren] 6.r8d
of Richard Cosyn, John Taylour staying at Northend, Nicholas Swete, Elizabeth , an German
"ifc of Dedenc ,·an Caren 2.r
tenant ofJohn Nicollasson, Isabella Duchewoman staying in Hobhorse Yevan Daniel German capper Qs
Lane, John Sadiller, Dutchman, of Bishop's Lynn, Hugo Tyler stay-
ing in Braunche rents, Nicholas Irysshman of Bishop's Lynn, tailor, Frankenbury Henry German book printer" 6s8d
lanyn Tyler staying in Northend, John Wryght of Geywode, Henry [blank] Bernard German book printer 6s8d
Houndesburgh of Ayleswythorp, John Clerk of Great Massingham, Ree Stephen German scn·ant to Henry Frankcnbury l!s
Nowell Adam of Gayton, William Goldsmyth of South Lynn, William Grcx·e Herman German Sef\ant to Henry Frank enbury ~s
Slynglond of the same, John Webster of Terrington Fen End, John Derikson Dederic German servant to Henry Frankcnbury l!s
Bernard of Hardwik. Derykson Adrian German scnant lo Henry Frankenbury 2s
And that none of the persons listed below was born in England, nor are [blank] Peter German goldsmith
they householders within the hundred of Freebridge, that is: 'ls

Richard Slynglond of South Lynn, labourer, John Berebrewer of the [blank] Ambrose Lombard• brok1:r
same, labourer, Joan, servant of Edward Goldyng of South Lynn, Justinian 'lJ
John Lombard broker'"
Margaret, servant of William Sweyn of Dersingham, Robert Hoberd, 'll

servant of John Waryn ofTilney, Thomas, servant of William Walton

of East Walton, John, servant of John Stonham of Tilney, Richard, 25 ldentifi1:d in other r d •
servant of William Kellowe of Bishop's Lynn, Henry Frese, servant of collaborating with ~;::r; v:~t s~::d~r:~:. ~ut ~s a 1~rctant of pri~ted books,
26 Possibl . . . . . ' is prcsuma y t e person hsted next.
William Combe of the same, John Byrte, servant of Thomas Spicer of . y G10\•an111 G1ustm1a111, ofa Genoesc merchant family of this name.
140
TOWNS JN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
Ml

[ blank] Littil John German servant of Pancracius Justynyan"' 'ls Calaman HcMdi<-t Indian ( not gl\'C,nJ"
Pemontes James German servant of Pancracius Justynyan 'ls Calaman Antoma Indian wife of Henedict Calaman
Pemontes Pancracius German servant of Pancracius Justynyan 2s

[ blank] Paul Lombard servant of Pancracius Justynyan 2.f Loy John de German organ maker 6s8J
( blank] Simon Lombard sen·ant of Pancracius Justynyan 'ls Brokenho\\t Peter \ an Cblankj sen ant to John de Loyc
Godfrey German servant of Pancracius Justynyan 'ls
: blank]
Nicholas Lombard servant of Pancracius Justynyan 2s
[ blank]
Gaoloto Mark Lombard servant of Pancracius Justynyan 2s 50. A poor suitor at Westminster and London

Limestreet Ward This poem dates from the early fifteenth century. It describes the
misfortunes of a peasant from Kent who visits the lav.-courts of
Effamato Alexander Greek gold wired rawer 6s8d
Westminster in the vain hope of finding justice in a case, but who
finds himself powerless because of his lack of money. In addition to
Castomala Anthony German servant of Cosine Spinell"" 2s
the courts, the poem eYokes a more inclusive image of the streets of
Benedict German servant of Cosine Spinell 2s
Gamoff Lon~on and its western suburb.''1 The text is a passionate critique of
Bokyn German servant of Cosine Spinell 2s
Stepman the city by a man of the country, of the late medie\·al social hierarchy
Maromarius Batyn German servant of Cosine Spinell ':ls
by a pea~ant, and of a legal system perceived as accessible only to those
,,ith money by a poor suitor.

Cornhill Ward
J. M. Dean (ed.), Medieval English Political Writings, Kalamazoo:
6s8d
Western Michigan University, 1996, pp. 222-5. English.
Milhorn Nicholas German cobbler
Mariana German silkwoman, widow 6sBd In London there I was bent, where; hasteni11g
Jerbray
Margareta German servant of Mariona Jcrbray 2s I saw my-self, where trouthe shulc.l be atcynte; achievrd
Symond
!ls
Fast to Westminstar-ward I went
Trumpet Nichodeus Roman [not given]""
To a man ofla\\, to make my complaint.
[blank] Cornelius German servant ofNichodeus Trumpet 2s
I sayc.l, 'For Marys love, that holy seynt, Mary's
Have pity on the powrc, that '\\ould procede. poor; litigate
Bishopsgate Ward I \\oulc.l gyvc sylvar, hut my purs is faynt.'
German servant of John Ambrose de .wlver; bght
Legge Philip de For lackc of money, I may not spede.
2s
succeed
Nigrono""
servant of John Ambrose de
A~ I thrast thrughe-out the thronge pmhed; crowd
[ blank] Henry German
Amonge them all, my hoe.le was gonn; hood; gone [~tolen]
Nigrono 2s
Netheles r let not longc, did not hesitate
To kyngs henche tyll I come. to King's Bench
Matthew Greek [not given] 2! Before a juge I knelecl anon;
[ blank]
:_blank] Johanna German wife of Matthew the Greek 2S I praycl hym for Gocls sake he would take hedc.
Broun John Scottish sheath maker 6s8d Full rcwfolly to hym I gan make my mone; complai11t
For lacke of money [ may not spede.
Benethe hym sat clerks, a great rowt; company
'i.7 Pancraz10 Giustmiani, a member of the Gcnoese merchant family. Fast they writen by one assent.
28 Cosimo Spinola, a member of another Gcnocse merchant family.
29 Italian trumpeter who played at the coronation of Richard Ill. 3I Perhaps from the Christian conummity in Kcrala in south India.
30 Giovanni di Ambrogio di Negro was another Genose merchant operating in London. 32 For the context sec G. Rosser, ,\.ledieval lf-'eslminsler /1200-15-1(), Oxfonl, W89.
142 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ~OCIAL DEVELOPMENT
l4S

There stode up one, and cryed round about And profery<l me good brede, ale, and wyne.
' Richard, Robert, and one of Kent!' A fayre clothe they began to sprede,
I wist not .,..e[e what he ment Rybbes ofbefo, both fat and fine·
He cried so tl11ke there in dede; quickly But for lacke of money I might ~ot spedc.
There \,ere stronge the\'es shamed and shent, poweiful thieves; ruined?
But they that lacked money mowght not spede. might In to London I gan me hye;
hasten
Of all the lond it bearethe the prise.
Unto the Comon Place I ym,de thoo Common Pleas; we11t then 'Hot pescods!' one gan cry, 1s the bes)
Where sat one "ith a silken houde. 'Strabery rype, and chery in the ryse!'
branch
I dyd hym reverence as me ought to do; One bad me come nere and by some spice;
I told hym my case, as well as I coulde, Pcpar and saffron they gan me bede,
And seyd all my goods, by nowrd and by sowde, north; south CloYe, grayns, and tlowre of rise.
ciffer
.falsehood brand1
I am defraud yd\\ ith great falshed; For lacke of money I might not spede.
He would not geve me a momme of his mouthe. the slightest word
For lake of money, I may not spede. Then mto Chepe I gan me dra\\ne,
Cheapside; went
Where I saw stond moche people.
Then I \\ent me unto the Rollis court efRolls One bad me come nere, and by fine cloth oflawne
Before the clerks of the Chauncerie. Paris thred, coton, and umple. '
lmen
There were many q11i tollis, summons to plaintiffs fine gauze
I seyde there-upon I could no skyle,
knl'W nothing about 1t
But I herd no man speke ofme. I am not wont there-to in <lede.
Before them I knelyd upon my kne, One bad me by an hewre, my hed to hele:
Shewyd them myne e\ idence and they began to reade.
cap; cover
For lake of money I might not spede.
They seyde trewer thmgs might there nevar be,
But for lacke of money I may not spede. Then \\Cnt I forth by London Stone
Thrnghe-out all Canwike street.
Candlewick
In Westminster Hall I found one Drapers to me they called anon;
Went in a lunge go\rne ofray. stnptd doJh ~rete chepe of clothe, they gan me hete; bargains in cloth; qfjer
I crowched, I kneled before them anon; _I ~en corn~ there one, and cried 'Hot shepes fete!' sheep'sfeet
For Marys love, ofhelpe I gan them pray. R1sshes faire and grene', an othar began to grete· rushes; another
As he had be wrothe, he \'oyded away Both_melwell and makarell I gan mete, '
he ciffered me mulvel (cod)
Bakward, his hand he gan me byd. But for lacke of money I myght not spede.
'I wot not what thou menest', gan he say. know not
'Ley downe sylvar, or here thow may not specie.' Then I hied me into Estchepe.
Eastcheap
One cried, 'R1bes ofbefe, and many a pie!'
In all Westminstar Hall I could find nevar a one Pewtar potts they clatteryd on a heape.
That for me would do, thowghe I shuld dye. !her \\as harpe, pipe and sa\Hry.
Without the <lores were Flemings grete \\00 11; in a large number psaltery
Ye by Cokke!' 'Nay by Cokke!' some began to cry;
Upon me fast they gan to cry Sollie sange of Jenken and Julian, to get themseh s mcde.
And sayd, 'Mastar, what will ye copen or by- barter or buy reward
Full fayne I wold had of that mynstralsie,
Fine felt hatts, spectacles for to rede But for lacke of money I cow Id not spede.
Of this gay gere?' - a great cause why
For lack of money I might not spede. Into Cornhill anon I yode
went
Where is moche stolne gere amonge.
stolen goods
Then to Westminster gate I \\ent
nine o'clock
! saw wher henge myne owne hode
hung
When the sonc \\ as at highe prime. fhat I had lost m Westmmstar amonge the throng.
Cokes to me, they toke good entent, Then I beheld it" ith Jokes full longe;
Called me nere, for to dyne, I kenned it as well as I dyd my Crede.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
144

buy
To he myne owne bode ag~yne, me thought it wrong,
But for lackc of money I might not spe<le.
V. URBAN GOVERNMENT
Then came the taverner, and toke me by the sle,ve,
And seyd, 'Ser, a pint ofwyn would yow assay?
it cannot hurt
'Syr·, quod I, 'it may not greve; . , ,
For a peny may do no more then 1t may. Political power in the borough derived its authority from two principa
I dranke a pint, and therefore gan pay; went sources. From above, it depended upon the concession of royal rights,
Sore a-hungred away I yede; for 011ce a11dfor all
For well London Lykke-peny for ones and eye, more or less extensively granted in the form of a charter. Regal powers
For lake of money I may not spede. might be conceded directly or mediated by lords who were themselves
Billingsgate dependent upon the crown. Royal grants were precious, not only for the
Then I hycd me to Byllingesgate, move; hence right to regulate the market and to hold a court of justice but also for
And cried 'Wagge, wagge yow I1ens.I'
the protection of trading members of the urban community when they
I prayed a barge man, for Gods sake,
That they would spare me myn expens. travelled to other towns [ 51]. Monarchs under financial duress were
thee hence the more willing to delegate powers for a financial return; but no civic
He sayde, 'Ryse up. man, and get the hens. ,
Do you think; charity
What wenist thow I will do on the my ahnes-dede. corporation under the aegis of the medieval English monarchy was
for less than twopence
Here skapethe no man, by-ncthc ii. pens!' allowed to forget that it exercised delegated authority on suffrance, and
For Jacke of money I myght not spede. might at any time be compelled to yield it back to the giver. The county
towns, as an elite class of regional centres which was largely defined by
Then I conveyed me into Kent,
For of the law would I medle no more; about I 100, would always be seen from the point of view of royal go\·-
By-caus no man to me would take entent, ernment as means for the exprei.sion and as1>ert1on of central authori-
set myself
I dight me to the plowe, even as I <led before. ty.' Meanwhile, a second and no less significant basis of urban rule lay
Jhesus save London, that in Bethlehem was bore, in customary practices of self-regulation in the neighbourhoods which
his soul's reward
And every trew man oflaw, God graunt hym souls med; made up the tO\\ n. The implementation of civic administration called
And they that he other, God theyr state restore: - 1
For he that lackethe money, with them he shall not spede. for the engagement of the townspeople themselves, and this was typi-
cally realised by means oflocal systems of policing and self-assessment
which in many cac;es, having originated long before, became enshrined
in the structure of civic government. The wards of London are one
case in point, the leets of Norwich another: in both instances the neigh-
bourhood body has the appearance of having predated (and perhaps by
a long period) the more or less systematic organisation of the urban
constitution in the thirteenth century [52] , :ss]. Even after their
incorporation within the civic structure, these elements of street and
neighbourhood culture would continue to have great importance both
for their participants and for the everyday runn ing of the town.
The body which acquired and claimed to exercise administrative
powers in the town might be a collectivity of property-owners like the

I D. Palliser, 'Towns and the c.:ro"n in England: the counties and the c.:ounty towns',
an D Palliser, Towns and L<><al Commu11iti,s i11 Medif'l!al and Early Modern England,
Aldershot, 2006, ~cparatcly paginated.
146 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ~-:NGLAND e RBAN GOVERNMr:NT
147

universitas of townspeople in twelfth-century Oxford; a group of trad- tion from the duty to hold ffi. d
ers such as the 'merchant guild' of Leicester in the thirteenth century; f 1 . . o ce, on groun s both of its expense and
o t 1e t1m~'.t ?etracted from personal business, are symptomatic of the
or, most grandly, a common council with an elected mayor exempli-
re~urrent ifficulty of persuading all in a position to do so to shoulder
fied in fourteenth-century York. The rhetoric of urban government a share of the communal burden [ 55:;."'
emphasised the ideal of unity under the crown: several town councils
claimed that their respective city was 'the king's chamber•.~ None the <?~.ly a~mall minority ~f.the urban population enjoyed the right to hold
less, in whatever terms civic government presented itself as a uni- c1, IC o ce and to part1c1pate in town government. Women wer .
tary authority, power in the borough was always in practice refracted ,rsa!l\excluied. The privileged body comprised a variable prop;r~i:~
through a diversity of jurisdictions by which the hierarchical charac- ~ ma e ~use olders. About a half of this group became freemen in late
ter of urban politics was complicated and at times subverted. In the ourteent -cen~ury York ~ 1~:::; only between a fifth and a third in the
eleventh and twelfth centuries, the sokes of powerful secular lords c~~e of ~xeter. . The adm1ss1on of individuals to the freedom, or full
continued to function as islands of legal privilege within the town. c1t;;cns~1£' was influenced by the fiscal policies of town councils which
Subsequently it was rather the ecclesiastical bodies whose significant ~o ecte ees from those admitted. The pattern in detail therefore varied
territorial presence within the urban fabric endured as an archipelago e_tween towns and over time, making it difficult or impossible to r-
of jurisdictional immunities in the lake of municipal government. To ce1, e general trends. Urban government towards the end of the Mi :le
the constant frustration of mayors and corporations throughout the Ages 't~nded to become mor<: .narrowly concentrated in a few hands.
land, the prosperous artisan or wealthy merchant who chose to inhabit T~e ~" idenc~,_ however, qualifies this generalisation. The under) in
a part of the town owned by a monastic body or cathedral chapter could principle?'. c1t1zenship w.as that full rights to participate in the econ:mi~
enjoy many of the privileges of urban life without undertaking any of opport~mt1es of urban hfe also carried a responsibility to share in its
its public burdens of tax or office.5 In addition the custom of sanctuary, regulation through office-holding and to be I·t b . . .
· · ar s costs y contribution
which allowed the person accused of serious crime to take refuge in any toc1,·1~ t.axes. :he need for both time and money to sustain this role con-
church for forty days prior to handing themselves over to royal justice fined c1t1zensh1p to those owning real estate . th 'fh
. b I. d . . m e town. e assump-
or to abjuring the realm, was in a small number of towns extended to a tionc; e un medieval government we r. fi
fd re ,ar rom any modern principle
permanent protection. In the sanctuary towns, which included Durham o em~cracy. But they were regularly debated, as at Norwich in the
and Westminster, both the wealthy tax evader and the poor criminal early fifteenth century when the bailiff'> and the council of tw t -fi
were challenged by th - h en Y our
found a comfortable haven [54].'1 Lawyers and sheriffs might shake . . e assertion t at their ordinances were invalid
their heads over the fragmentation of authority within the towns; but ~•thout the assent of the wmmonalty' and later at Coventr I h
wea ·e • d h . ' Y \\ 1ere t e
this was a condition which remained broadly unchanged to the end of \ rs proteste at t e fixmg of taxes by the elite r 9t"".7
the medieval period and even well beyond. The issue was a part of the ln re~urn for recognition of its right to rule, the t~wn-council under-
even larger challenge of convincing all townspeople of means to con- took m the first place to guarantee the safety and security of the urban
tribute to the smooth running of the community. Petitions for exemp-
5 1 I. Kcrmode, 'Urban dcdine~ TI ff •I r ffi ·
Ii' 1 R ·. · le ig 11 ,ro111 o ee m late tnedic,·al York' E ·
• IS ory nnro.,,2nd series, XXXV, 198!! - . • . ~11om1r
2 C. Liddy, The rhetoric of the royal chamber in late medieval London, York and c1,·1I government on occasion suc(-e"ded : pp. I •~98, As Kcrmode pornts ou1.
Coventry', Urba11 History, XXIX, 200'2, pp. S2:J-49. . . · · ·' Ill extractmg fines for ex. · •
o ffice-Iio Id mg from townsmen who would never h , . • b . . . . emption 1rom
s E. Miller, 'Mcdie\'al York', in The Victoria County History of 'J'orkshire: Tiu City of public posts; so the fines are not an exact guide lo :"ac .,· ecn m a positron to take up
'fork, London, 196 !, pp. 25-1 lCi, at pp. 38-1-0; IJ. M. l'alliser, 'The birth of York's 6
M . son.
. Ko\\alesk1, l,ora/ Markets and Regional Trade i11 Exeter. C b .d
ci\'ic liberties, r.1200-1354', in S. Rees Jones (ed.), 'rhe Govm,ment ofMedieval York,
1-~~:_r~r{t~~ t
7 S. Reynolds, 'Medieval u b· .. . , ' am n gc, 1995, p. 9(;,
York, 1997, pp. 88-107; G. Rosser, 'Conflkt and political community in the medieval 1 1st0ry ~f political ~bought', Urban
History rearbook, 1982, p;. ~U
town: disputes between clergy and laity in Hereford', in T. R. Slater and G. Rosser England m J A F 'ft . d• ·., · g Y, rban oligarchy" m late medieval
(eds), The Church in the J'vledieva/ Town. Aldershot, !998, pp. '2Q-42. • · • • iomson (e ) 7 owm and Tow11s11 0,nf. 111 · th F;n
G louce.ster, H
1988, pp. fi!.!-S(;- S 'Hi b · , , rt r; " e !,,tenth Century,
4 G. Rosser, 'Sanc tuary and social negotiation in medieval England', in J. Blair and authority 1s00- 15,1-0• CU/lB' · · g Y a n<l E: F.wan, Government, power and
B. Golding (eds), The Cloister and the World: Essays in Medieval History in Honour of LattMediroal Enu/ish,Town•· ,Bppt!.!/9~Skl!.!; Cd. Ih, 1ddy, Tl'or, Politir.r and Finanre in
Barbara HarveJ', Oxford, 1996, pp. 57-79. 2005, pp. !! I S-!,4."' ,. ris o' 'or. an t e Crown 135~/A""
· -.vv,
Woodb ridge,
.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT
148 149

population, and beyond this to promote its economic interests. These imp_ortance to the privilege. Close reading of the terms of such a col-
policies were pursued both through practical measures and ~y mea~s lect1or~ of royal_ly approved customs as this one from Newcastle-upon-
of no less significant symbolic rituals. Town walls, although m practi- Tyne 1s revealing of the conversation, which must have preceded its
cal terms of neither universal nor continuous utility, were erected and compilation, between the burgesses of the town and officers of the king:
maintained in part as a potent image of the protective role of urban ~ach."' as careful to reserve their respective spheres of competence. It
government [56].~ Beside an~ othe: purpose, _the_ city was construc~ed 1s,e\'1dent that town_s~~ople could be organ_ised and politi~ally astut',
as a theatre for the representation of power: a significant urban function e, e~ be_fore the acqu1s1t1on of the formal entitlement to act m this wa\l
in its own right. By staging public executions, civic authorities ~em~n- (which 1s one reason why not all towns bothered to press for a charte~•
strated their collaboration with the officers of the crown and 1mphed ~t all). ~h_e concessions enshrined in the Newcastle customs were typ-
their own command over the lives of the urban population [57]. The ical ?f c1v1c charters of the period. As in other cases, they include two
accounts of the late medieval mayor of Leicester show that officer particularly rema~kable clauses: On~ declared that the villein arriving
working hard on behalf of his constituents, controllin? the mea~ures from the countryside who remamed m the town as a property-owning
for use in the market, pressing forward the construction of a bridge, bur~~ss for_ a !ear and a day would enJoy in perpetuity the rights
liaising with the town's member of parliament, and h_o~ting offi~ers of of ~•t1zensh1p. fhe number of rural tenants able to escape service to
the crown [58]. External relations, both with other c1t1es and ;1th t~e their lords and to accumulate sufficient means to pay for a burgage in
royal court, were a constant diplom_atic c~ncern ~59].' [60~. While town can neve~ have been large. Yet the principle expresses a contem-
an individual town might carry relatively httle weight m national pol- po1:ary perception of the town as a potential agent of social change.
itics, close and strategic communication betwee~ cities mean: that _o~ This perception also underlies the declaration - the second especially
occasion an urban lobby could command sway m the royal couilCII. ~oteworth~ clause here that the rights of a free burgess were inher-
The perceived importance of the king's f~vo~r wa~ demonstrated most itable by his son. For comparison of the customs enshrined in diYerse
dramatically in the staging of royal entries, 111 which the town arrayed urban charters, the work of Mary Bateson remain1, valuable. 1'' The
itself to present a microcosm of the kingdom [61]. unique c~py of t~is text was made apparently under Henry I) to record
customs m the tnne of his grandfather,

51. Customs of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the time ofHenry I D. C. Douglas and G. W. Greenaway (eds), English Historical Documents
104~ 1J89, ~nd edn, London: Eyre Methuen, 1981, pp. 1222- .S; with
The acquisition of a charter was an import~nt mileston~ for a body of S. _Rey~olds, W. de Boer and G. Mac Niocaill (eds), Elenchus Fontium
townsmen. The purpose of the charter bemg to enshrine what were Hzstorzae Urbanae, Leiden: Brill, 1988, pp. 5.S-4. Latin, transl. by Douglas.
perceived as existing rights or good pra~tice~, the document was typ-
ically conservative in content, and the historian should be_ careful not These_ are the l~ws an? customs which the burgesses of Newcastle-
to overestimate its transformative effect. Many small medieval towns u~n- fyne had m the time of Henry, king of England, and which they
found means to organi~e local affairs and to create a sense of collec- still have by right:
11
tive identity without ever enjoying the formal d!gnity of a charter.
However, those who did lobby for a charter of rights attached great i. T~e burgesse~ may distrain* foreigners within their market and
without, and within their houses and without, and within their
,, See Introduction, p. ;?5 borough and without, and they may do this without permission
9 R. Horrox, 'Urban patronage and patrons m the fifteenth ~en turf, in R. A. Griffiths
(ed.), Patronage, tht Crown and the Provinces in Later Med1,val England, Gloucester,
of the reeve, unless t_he courts are being held within the borough,
1981, pp. 145-66. . or unless they are m the field on army service, or are doing
10 E. Hartrich, 'To\\n, cro\\n, and urban system: the position oftO\\llS in the English
castle-guard.
polity, 141!! 71·, Uni\'crstty of Oxford D.Phtl thesis, 2014.
12 M. Bateson, Borough Customs, 2 ,·ols, Selden Society, XVIII, 1904.
11 G. Rosser, Medieval Westmi11sltr /!J00-154-0, Oxford, 1989, pp 226-48.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT
150 151

u. A burgess may not distrain on another burgess without the by his oa_th, except in a charge of treason when the burgess must
permission of the reeve. de~en~ lumself by battle. Nor shall a burgess offer battle against
a v1llem unless he has first quitted his burgage.
iii. lfa burgess shall lend anything in the borough t~ someon~ d~vell-
ing outside, the debtor shall pay back the debt 1f he adnut 1t, or xu1. No merchant except a burgess can buy wool or hides or other
otherwise do right in the court of the borough. merchandise outside the town, nor shall he buy them within thf
town except from burgesses. 1
iv. Pleas which arise in the borough shall there be held and concluded
except those which belong to the king's crown. xiv. If a burgess incur forfeiture he shall give 6 oras• to the reeve.

v. If a burgess shall be sued in respect of any plaint he shall not xv. In the borough there is no merchet* nor heriot• nor bloodwite*
plead* outside the borough except for defect of court; nor need nor stengesdint.•
he answer, except at a stated time and place, unless he has already
made a foolish answer, or unless the case concerns matters xv1. An~ burgess may ~ave his own oven and handmill if he wishes,
pertaining to the crown. savmg always the rights of the king's oven.

vi. If a ship comes to the Tyne and wishes to unload, it shall be xvii. Ifa woma~ incurs a forfeiture concerning bread or ale, none shall
permitted to the burgesses to purchase what they please. concern himself with it except the reeve. If she offend twice she
shall be punished by forfeiture. If she offend thrice justice shall
vii. And if a dispute arises between a burgess and a merchant, it shall take its course.
be settled before the third tide.
xviii. !'lo one except a burgess may buy cloth for dyeing or make or cut
vu1. Whatever merchandise a ship brings by sea must be brought to It.
the land; except salt and herring which must be sold on board ship.
XIX.
A bu~gess can give or ~ell his land as he wishes, and go where
ix. If anyone has held land in burgage for a year an~ a day justly and he w11l, freely and quietly, unless his claim to the land is
without challenge, he need not answer any claimant, unless the challenged.
claimant is outside the kingdom of England, or unless he be a boy
not having the power of pleading.
52. The wardmotes of London
x. If a burgess has a son in his house and at his table, his son shall
have the same liberty as his father. The two ?ozen w~rds of London originated, probably before the
Conquest, in the private sokes of rich residents. In the thirteenth cen-
xi. If a villein ( rusticus) comes to reside in the borough, and shall tury they were still known by the names of their respective aldermen.
remain as a burgess in the borough for a year and a day'. he Th~ records of the medieval wards have not survived, but in 1419 the
shall thereafter always remain there, unless there was a previous city s c?mmon clerk, John Carpenter, transcribed into the Liber Albus
agreement between him and his lord for him to remain there for or ~htte Book the mode of holding a wardmote and its principal
a fixed time. busmess.

xii. If a burgess sues anyone concerning anything, he c~nnot_ force H. T. Ril~y (ed.), ~iber Albus: the White Book of the City of London,
the burgess to trial by battle, but the burgess must defend himself London: Richard Griffin, 1861, pp. 32-5, 287-92; with H. T. Riley (ed.),
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND LIRBAN GOVERNMENT
152 \SS

Liber Albus, Rolls Series, London, 1859, pp. 332-6. Latin, transl. by the the ~lderman to present his part to the mayor, at the next sitting
editor, revised by GR. of his _general _court, so that after it has been seen, and enquiry
made if there 1s _any ma~ter the correction of which pertains to
(a) The wardmote is so called as being a meeting together ?Y sum- the mayor and city, the mdenture may be redelivered to him to
mons of all the inhabitants of a ward, in the presence of1ts head, be acted upon in other respects. '
the alderman, or else his deputy, for the correction of ~aults, the And at the wardmote there ought to be elected, by the alder-"
removal of nuisances and the promotion of the well-bemg of the ~an, th~ reputable men of the ward and the jurors, the scavagerJ
ward ... The aldermen were in the habit also, by virtue of w_ar- '-su~erv1sors of street-cleaning~, ale-canners [ tasters of ale for
rants issued by the mayor, to hold their w~rdmotes ~t least twice, quality control] , bedel, and other officials, who at the mayor's
or more often, in the year, on which occas10ns enquiry used to be general court take the oaths befitting their respective offices.
made as to the condition and tranquillity of the ward, and such The alderma_n also used to be specially certified by the bedel as
faults as were presented were corrected by the alderman, as will to the names of such hostelers, brewers, bakers, cooks, victuallers
be shown below. . and sellers as lived in the ward. Bakers were also to have their
The process of holding a wardmote in London has custom~nly stamps there, the impressions of which were to be entered upon
been as follows. The alderman, after receipt of the warrant, 1s to the alderman's paper ... It was customary also for the alderman
command his bedel* to summon all such men as are househo~d- to seal the measures and weights in their respective wards, and to
ers, as well as all hired servants, in his ward, to appear before ~1m condemn such as were not sealed ...
at a certain day and hour on the morrow of such summons, 1~ a . At such a wardmote also, those persons who are not free of the
certain place within the same ward, for the purpose of holdmg city, and ~ho have not been previously sworn in this way, ought
such a wardmote. These names, after the persons h_ave been dul_y ~o be put m frankpledge, 111 even if they had already been sworn
summoned, the bedel is to have entered in a certam roll, that 1s mto frankpledge in another ward.
those of the freemen of the city who dwell in that ward, and a
separate list of the hired servants and non-freemen. And when (b) It is the first responsibility of the wardmote to keep the peace
at the hour appointed they have duly met together, the alderman ofG~d and Holy Church, an~ the peace of his lordship the king,
having taken his seat with the more opulent me? of th~ :ward, between clerks and laymen, rich and poor, in common.
each in his proper place, the clerk of the alderman is_ to enJ~m the Of strangers. That no person be resident or harboured within
bedel, on the alderman's behalf, to command attention. It 1s then the ward if he be not of good repute and under frankpledge
the clerk's duty to read aloud the warrant and t~en to read ~o t~e charged before the alderman of the ward, even if he has been in
bedel the names that are entered on the roll; while the bedel m his under frankpledge in another ward.
turn proclaims aloud that every person who shall not, there pres- Of the sam~. That no one receive a stranger in his house beyond
ent, answer to his name, and shall make default,_ shall be noted a da1 an~ a night, unless he is willing to be responsible for pre-
down and fined at least 4d. After this, the bedel 1s to present to senting him at his trial, ifit so happen that he offends.
the alderman a panel, arrayed by the constables of the ward, of Of_ prostitutes. That no woman of immoral life (de Joie rye),
those reputable men of the ward by whom inqui~ition sh?uld be prostitute or common scold* (tenseresse), be resident in the ward
made; which array, if the alderman shall dee~ 1t expedient, he but be immediately removed by the alderman and driven out of
shall be at liberty to amend. This done, the Jurors are to h~ve the ward, or else to be brought by the constables and bedel to
read to them all the articles touching the wardmote. After this a the c~u~ter prison [of one of the two London sheriffs], there to
certain day for making their present~ent is given by the alde~- remam m t_he manner provided in the article as to the peace.
man to the jurors. On which day the Jurors are to present_ their Of erectmg furnaces. That no man or woman erect any fur-
verdict on an indenture,• one part ofit to rema!n in possess10n °~ nace or furnaces, or place any hearth beneath where they are or1
the alderman and the other with the ward. It 1s also the duty 0 any reredos [tiled back to a fireplace] where a fire is made for
154 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT
155

preparing bread or ale, or for cooking meat, near to p~rtitions,

Of d!rt. That no-one throw straw, dust, dung, sawdust or other
laths or boards, above or in a solar, or elsewhere, by which a fire
refuse mto the streets or lanes, but cause the same to be taken
could be caused. And if there be any, that the ~cava~ers ca~se
by the rakers or others to the places ordained for such rubbish
them immediately to be removed or destroye~; for domg which under penalty of two shillings payable to the chamber. '
the scavagers shall have 4d for every such nuisance so removed
Of rakers. That they have sufficient rakers for cleansing
or destroyed. . the wards of all kinds of rubbish, and order the constables, with'
Of chimneys. That no chimney be made except of stone, tiles,
the bedel, to help them to collect their salary from the people of the
or plaster, and not of timber, on pain of being pulled do"":n. ward.
Ofrebellious persons. If there be any one whether foreigner or
Of pigs and cows. That no person should rear swine oxen or
denizen, who is not willing to be amenable to the officers of the
cows in their houses, on pain of forfeiture of the anim~ls to the
city, who have the peace of his lordship the king to keep, all per- chamber.
sons belonging to the peace shall be ready _an~ prepa~ed _to come
Of sealed measures. That all who sell by measure within the
in aid of the officers, for arresting and brmgmg to JUSt1ce such
ward, that is to say, by gallon, pottle and quart, quarter, bushel,*
disobedient persons, as the law demands. . half-bushel and peck, show all their measures four times a year
Of scotale.* That no person of the ward make scotale m the
to the alderman ... and they shall there be sealed with the alder-
ward, or in any other place within the franchise* [of London],
man's se~l (if not already sealed with the seal of the city chamber)
under pain of imprisonment. . •• And if any measures be, on assay by the alderman, smaller
Of labourers. That no one hire or pay masons, carpenters,
than they ought to be, they shall be burnt at once in the principal
daubers,• tilers or any other labourers whatsoever, ~therw!se [i.e.
street of the ward, so that they may not serve another time and
more] than according to the assize [by-~aw] on ~his ordamed by
the name of him who ~as used them shall be presented b; the
the common council of the city, under pam ofpaymg to the cham-
bedel to the chamberlam, and the person fined accordingly. And
ber double the amount of the excess. . . if it be found that the bedel has put the mark on a false measure
Of ladders. That all persons who live in large houses within he shall be sentenced to the pillory. '
the ward should have a ladder or two, ready and prepared to help
Of stalls. That no stalls be beyond the house of greater breadth
their neighbours in case of fire. than two feet and a half, and they are to be moveable and flexible
Of barrels filled with water. That all who occupy such houses
at the discretion of the alderman, according to the breadth ofth~
should in summer time, and especially between Pentecost [the streets or lanes.
fiftieth day after Easter] and St Bartholemew [24 August], have
?fpentices. That pentices* be sufficiently high that people may
before their doors a barrel full of water for quenching a fire, if the
easily go and nde beneath them. If there be any lower than they
house does not have a well (fountaigne) of its own. . . . ~u~ht to be, they should be altered within fifteen days after notice
Of carpentry work in houses. That no house w1thm the hb-
1s given by the constables, scavagers, or bedel; or otherwise, these
erties [of London] be covered otherwise than with lead, tile, or
officers are to demolish them, taking for their trouble 4d as above.
stone. If there be any, they should at once be rased by the con~ . Inquisi~ions at ~he wardmotes. You shall present if the peace of
stables and scavagers, they taking for their trouble as was state
his lordsh1_p the kmg has been broken, or any affray made within
earlier. d ·h h th~ ward smce _the last wardmote, and by what person or persons;
Of iron crooks. That the reputable men of the war , wit t e
or 1fany conspiracy (corryne) or assembly against the king's peace
alderman, provide a strong crook of iron with a wooden handle, has been made.
together with two chains and two strong cords; and that the
. IS . Y~u shaO also present if there is any one resident or harboured
bedel have a good horn, and loudly sound mg. w1tl11n the ward who is not a lawful person, or not of good fame,
or not under frankpledge;
JS These items were also intended for fin.~fighting. if there is any huckster• in the ward;
156 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT
157
if there is any leper resident in the ward; 128 7-88
if any bargain of usury has been made within the ward since
the last wardmote; The chief pledges present that H d
if any baker of tourte bread [the coarsest brown bread] bakes
white bread, or the converse;
if anyone is in the habit of wandering in the ward after forbid-
well but nobody knows howy d . et
hold him in suspicion and sa tha::y . e Ca?1pesse is a thief and they
agamst_the peace and dresses
Thomas the leather-dresser j~n . is a ways r_o nng about by night . . .
den hours, and in a manner forbidden by the common council of corn ahead of the market -i~ Jmg ov~r against Trowse bridge, buy
the city; similarly ... Thomas Gerv~ s o;ri er to ra;se the pricej ; and three other
if any officer of the city has made extortion or affray within the blocks for working up old cyl 'tl ~~erer~ and Walter Hee have fullers·•
ward under cover of his office, to the wrong or detriment of any also has a measure not sealed
0 les m a iraudulent
h h
w
manner. alter Hee
person; •rt so t at t ose measures m k
a e one ga11on
if the ale-stake [sign] of any tavern is longer or extends
. . . ie men of Sprowston knowin 1 bu
and sell their sausages and p dd" g Y i . .
measly pigs, and they make
further than is ordained. Norwich market . .. Adam Ca~el
together, and is in the habit of d .
~:fi;
~~et ~or ~uman consumption, in
lks with good and bad mixed

53. Local jurisdiction in Norwich

the fishmonger rode out to Brun~;
1 0
y.};
· ~ John the bleacher _and Ralph
and bought them, so raising th . . . heet a bo_a t laden with oysters
e prrce m t e Norwich market.
The four 'leets' or areas ofjurisdiction into which Norwich was divided 1290-91
for administrative purposes in the thirteenth and fourteenth centu-
ries had significantly older origins, probably antedating the Conquest. The chief pledges present Rich d d S
These principal districts of the city were subdivided so that house- in his work by tannin his h"dar ~ talham because he makes fraud
h
holders reported to the courts by neighbourhood. The system was an Stalsiteletller) and becat~e they' h:s w1t ~I:;~ of ash (and this is called
adaptation of that used in rural manors for the regulation of behaviour in buying hides, and because the v:;rgu'. iurtful to_the lord the king
by groups of householders. Only in the fifteenth century did Norwich's to be pleaded before the bailiff:. Jd rect transgressions which ought
s, ne I Ss 4d. 42 other tanners likewise.
leets, then renamed ·wards', cede place to the developing system of cen-
tral municipal courts. The 'chief pledges' of the leets were responsible 1292- 93
for discovering offences and made their presentments to the four bail-
iffs of the city (in existence from 122S) in the tollhouse (on the site of ~l~e cobblers fined 20s because the hav .
the later guildhall). Prior to the city's charter of incorporation of 1404, b1t1on of the lord king i , ½h b ~ ea guild contrary to the prohi-
the bailiffs represented the king's interest in a town which belonged those who carry on th; busi~::s~;a?'o~t~e of their_apprentices 2s, and
to him. Major crimes were the responsibility not of the leets but of the 10s to the same guild. The saddl fi d er on their own account give
king's sheriff or coroner. But the records of the leet courts give some have a guild hurtful to the king ;~ ~ell I Ss 4d because they similarly
. e u ers 6s 8d for the same.
insights into the everyday life of particular urban neighbourhoods. One
1299-lsoo
of the motifs to emerge from these records is collaboration amongst
townspeople, who are sometimes said to have sought for economic
advantage by forming unlicensed guilds. Fine imposed upon all the chandlers for m k.
themselves that is that n f h a mg an agreement amongst
than anoth~r (8 ch~ndlers ~::~)- t em should sell I lb of candle at less
W. Hudson (ed.), Leet Jurisdiction in the City ofNorwich during the Xl/Ith
and X!Vth Centuries, Selden Society, V, London: Quaritch, 1891, pp. 14
About eight nu·1es
• . d own-n,
· er on the ,~ay toy
5-6, 8, 10, 14, S9, 42-S, 52, 55, 66, 70-l. Latin, transl. by the editor, h
15 A eh f armout .
arter_o_ Henry Ill ( 1~56) had forbidden h .
revised by GR. comprom1smg the authority of the k' ' b .,t.ffie fonna!Ion of craft organisations as
mg s ar r s. ' ·
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT 159
158
result that they developed into havens for substantial resident commu-
1312-13 nities of the disenfranchised. The records concerning the operation of
he daughter of William Gerberge of sanctuary privileges shed light, not only on crime in the city but also
The jurors present Rose, t d sells malt like a fellow-citizen on the duty and agency of urban neighbourhoods in the identification
b e she buys corn an of and response to social offences.
Chedgrave, ecaus fi d 12d Also Margery, sister of the same
and is not of the freedom: ne . ,
Rose, for the same: 12d. H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorlals ef London and London Lift ln the Xlllth\
X!Vth, and XVth Centurles, London, 1868, p. 17 (a); A. F. Leach (ed.),
1374-75 Beverley Town Documents, Selden Society, XIV, London: Longmans,
an apprentice, and is not a Green & Co., 1900, p. 20 (b); J. Raine (ed.), Sanctuarium dunelmense et
·1k an buys ancl sell s an d has
John t h e s1 m . . . enrolled in a tithing, as a member of the sanctuarlum beverlacense, Surtees Society, V, London: Quaritch, 1887,
citizen (non est czvz: is n_ot the wi maker similarly buys and sells, and p. 27 (c).Latin, transl. by the editors, revised by GR.
frankpledge); fined 2s. AhcAe tgh bookbinder similarly, and is not
. 't' en· fined 2s. gnes e d
is ~~t a et iz d, d A d w the lantern-maker similarly; fine 40d. (a) On Thursday the feast of St Dunstan [19 May], 1278, the cham-
12 berlain and sheriffs [of London] were given to understand that
a c1t1zen; fine · n r: h d the same· 6 d. Edmund de Metton,
Richard Clerk, cardmaker, as one • one Henry de Lanfare was lying dead in the house of Sibil le
weaver, the same 18d. Feron ('the ironmonger') in the ward of Cheap, in the parish of
[St Mary] Colechurch . .. having called together the good men
1390-91 of that ward, and of the ward of John de Blakethorn [Aldersgate
ward] and the ward of Henry de Frowyk [Cripplegate ward],
.
A maidservant of Nicholas Fas~o it .
, lf arish clerk of St Stephen, entered
ht and there stole his apples diligent inquisition was made thereon.

and pears and earned them o , an

f
the garden of Wil~iam Ides t;1ced h:~~id' Nicholas received her with
l l Robert the cook
Who say that one Richard de Codesfold having fled to the
k · g she had sto en t 1em ... church of St Mary Staining Lane in London, because of a certain
the apples and pears, now1:,, t ) fall kinds of food, and he sold to robbery being by one William de London, cutler, imputed to him,
is a common re-heater (reca :Jae: dogoose to the peril of his life; fined and the same William pursuing him on his flight thereto; it so
Friar Thomas Walsham a re-coo e . ' happened that on the night following the Day of the Invention of
40d. the Holy Cross [s May], in the present year, there being many
persons watching about the church aforesaid, to take him, in case
he should come out, a certain Henry de Lanfare, ironmonger, one
54. Sanctuary in the borough of the persons on the watch, hearing a noise in the church, and
. h t anctuary to the person fleeing so fearing that the same Richard was about to get out by another
All churche~ ctl1 ~~: !~:
1
c~:~~:~:a~ctuary might rema_in for up to
the law oft \ an . din a church (the local community havmg respon•
part of the church, and so escape through a breach that there
was in a particular glass window, went to examine it. The said
forty days un arm~ h' . ) at the end of which period he was Richard and one Thomas, the then clerk of that church, perceiv-
'b'l't for preventmg is escape, d I d n ing this, Thomas, seizing a lance, without an iron head, struck
s1 I I y . h l or otherwise to be ec are a
obliged to hand himself over to t ~ a~h kin dom under the sheriffs at Henry through the hole in the window, and wounded him
outlaw and abjure the realm, leav~ng e g I . ' l urban phe- between the nose and the eye, penetrating almost to the brain.
. h f turn This was not an exc US!\ e y
orders without ng t o re . f . . authorities the persistence From the effects of this wound he languished until the day of St
b ' th the development o c1v1c . .
nomenon, ut_w1 b of the distinctive complications ofJuns· Dunstan [ 19 May], when he died, at about the third hour. They
of sanctuary nghts ecame one . . ·luding Beverley, Durham and say also, that both Richard and Thomas are guilty of the felony,
diction in the towns. A few centres, me ive sanctuary rights, with the seeing that Richard was consenting to it.
Westminster, boasted much more extens
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT 161
160

And Thomas was taken, and imprisoned in Newgate, and after- had hired at York. Fearing due punishment for these actions, he
wards delivered before Hamon Haweteyn, justiciar of Newgate. craves sanctuary.
Meanwhile Richard still keeps himself within the church. Being
asked if they hold any more persons suspected as to that death,
they say they do not. They have no land~ ~r chattels. And the 55. Exemptions from holding office in York 1476-78
body was viewed, upon which no other mJury ?r wound was ,
found except the wound aforesaid. And the two neighbours near- It was a principle of communal ~overnment in the medieval town tha\
est to the spot where he was wounded, were at~ached;* and t~e those property owners who enJoyed its privileges should share the
two neighbours nearest to the place where he died; and the said burden of its responsibilities. To enforce this principle, however, was
Sibil was attached, in whose house he died. not always easy. Some preferred to pay a fine rather than hold public
office. Some of those recorded as paying such fines may never have
(b) The community of the town of Beverley assembled together in been able_ to take up office: in these instances the process was a merely
the Guildhall on Tuesday 16 March 1429 for a certain letter to fiscal device employed by cash-strapped civic rulers.
the twelve keepers or governors of the town of: Beverley named
below in the name of Sir Henry Broomfleet, knight, and Master L. C. Attreed (ed.), The York House Books 1461-1490, 2 vols, Stroud:
John Ellerker; the contents or purport of which l~tter was this, Alan Sutton fo~ Richard III and Yorkist History Trust, 1991, pp. 61
that for the respect due to their worships and at their request, the (a), 137 (b).Latin, transl. by the editor.
twelve keepers or governors of the town shot'.ld a~mit William
Gelle fisherman, and make him a burgess. This being shown to (a) Meeting of the mayor's council, 21 September 1476. The same
the c~mmunity, they with one consent said that the said William day, presence and place it was agreed by all that William Ward
Gelle is a sanctuary man, and that inasmuch as it was ordered and draper, for considerations reasonable and for £10 paying to th~
decreed before that day that they would make no sanctuary man a c?mmon use of this city ... and also considering the great age and
burgess, therefore he should not be admitted to that freedom, nor sickness of the said William Ward, that he from that time forth
any other sanctuary man for ever. for the said sum of£ 10 be discharged of bearing of any manner
And it was ordered and decreed the same day that no bur- of office within the said city.
gess of the town of Beverley who is a sanct~ary man should
for offence against the common people or against the peace of (b) Meeting of the mayor's council, January 1478. The same day it
the lord king henceforward carry on him a knife. or dagger, was agreed by a whole consent and assent that Brian Conyers
except with blunted points, nor any club or sword m the_ town s~all_ not be called to the office of sheriff within this city of York
of Beverley, on pain of forfeiture of the same to ~he archbishop, w~th~n the s~ac~ of eight years, unless he by the grace of God
and forfeiture of his burgess-ship to the commumty of the town within the said eight years may grO\v in goods and riches to have
of Beverley for ever. the said office, then he to be elected and accepted to the same
office by the discretion of the council.
(c) Thomas Coke of Bridgwater in Somerset came to the cathe-
dral church of Durham on 6 February 1485, and at once sought
immunity - the bells being rung, as was customary - on account 56. Defence of the city: the walls of Hereford
of the fact that he had lately attacked one David, servant to Lord
Audeley, wounding him and cutting off his right hand. Because Internal evidence, including several references to the bailiff John
of this, Thomas, greatly fearful both of that powerful lord and of Gaunter, dates this version of the customs of Hereford to the third
the friends of the said David, fled away on the horse of Master quarter of the fourteenth century. After this period, the chief officer of
John Drew, his master - or rather, a horse which Master Drew the town acquired the title of mayor. Several of the provisions relate to
162 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND L' HBAN GOVERNMENT
163

Hereford's situation on the internally troubled border with Wales. By mon~rch, such as the violent usurper Henry Bolingbroke un fh'
the mid-fourteenth century, however, sieges had ceased to be a normal public support. , sure o 1s
concern; the passage below has its origins in less peaceful times. A
recurrent motif in urban legislation are the status and obligations of J. <?· Nichols (ed.), Chronicle of the Grey Friars ef London, Camden
those living in houses belonging to one or another 'liberty' - in the case Society, Lill, 1852, pp. 9-11. English, revised by GR.
of Hereford, many occupied the 'bishop's fee' - and thereby claimed to ,
be free of any obligation to the civic authority. There was a perceived The first yea~ of [ Henry [V's] reign was beheaded at Cirencestet
injustice in those who enjoyed the benefits of the town while finding the earl o_f Salisbury and the earl of Kent, and at Oxford Sir Thomas
excuses to avoid the common burdens of its maintenance and defence. Blount, Sir Benet Ely [? recte Sely] knights TI W
The authors of the civic customs were, meanwhile, insouciant about the w· II ' • iomas ynter [recte
mt:rce or Wintershal!J esquire, and Sir John Holland, earl of
further injustice of the exclusion from the city's protection in time of
~nu:~~~:~nB ~:s behead~d at Pleshy in Essex, and their heads set
war of poor cottagers living in the surrounding countryside. . n g~, and Sir Bernard Brocas knight was beheaded at
London m Cheapside, and Sir Thomas Shelley knight Maudlyn d
Hereford Public Library, Hill MSS, vol. iv (sixteenth-century copy ofa Feryby clerks, were hanged at Tyburn. ' e an
fourteenth-century original). Latin, transl. by GR.
5th year [ of Henry rv, 1403-4]. This year the bishop of York Scro
and Mowbray, the earl marshal [were] beheaded And th ' f phe,
When the town is besieged by the king's enemies, or if the city walls k· · h b · ree men o t e
are in great need of repair or rebuilding, then the bailiff; in the king's i~g s c am ~r hanged, and the prior ofLaunde, Sir Robert Clarendon
krnght,_and eight friars minor [Franciscans] were hanged at Tyb
name and for the safety of the city, uses all means to compel the men
And this year was the battle of Shrewsbury in the which ul r~.
of the city and suburb to assist: the stronger and healthier, to watch Henry Pere d Th ' was s am
by night, and all others to be made to contribute from their goods and y an omas Percy taken, and two days kept, and after
was hanged and beheaded and his head with one quarter of H
chattels, without respect to anyone's liberty or to ecclesiastical posses- Percy set on London Bridge And w·11·
1 iam SereI I enry
t 1at was chief
sions within the city ... And he should receive [for safety within the • • • ••
yeoman with Kmg Richard was drawn and hanged and behea.ded at
walls] those citizens living outside the gates - except the cottagers Tyburn, and the quarters salted.
[cottars] - to come with their goods and chattels to stay for the time
within the city, and should allocate to them empty houses for their St~ y;ar FofHenry rv, 1406-7]. This year the earl of Northumberland
temporary residence. a~ t ie o~d. Bardolf was beheaded in the north, and the earl's head
with one of his quarters ... were set on London Bridge.

57. The town as a political stage: public executions c.14-00

58. Expenses of the mayor of Leicester
This chronicle was written by a member of the Franciscan house
at London during the reign of Henry VIII. Although the notices of Urba~ acco~nts roll together petty expenses with the funding of b
stant1al pro•ects All c b 1· su -
events before his own time are laconic, they reveal the interests of the f . .· ~ · ~n e revea mg of the concerns and strate ries
townsman no less than the friar. The annals reflect the mendicants' ;r Cl\ IC officers. Alon~s1de the practical undertakings of mayoral gov-
keen awareness of, and occasional direct involvement in, secular public nmen_t, also i~otable m these accounts are a variety of hos italit gand
affairs. 11; The public execution of declared traitors and the exposure of ?1fts e,,1dently intended to cultivate good relations \\ith th:crowy d
its agents. n an
their remains to public view was a regular utility of urban space to the

16 See in general J. Rohrkasten, The Mendicant Houses of Medieval London, 1221-1539, ~- Bateson (ed.), Records ef the Borough ef Leicester ii London· C J
Munster, 2004. ay, 1901, pp. 7-8. Latin, transl. by the editor. • ' . . .
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT 165
164

(a) Account of John Alsy, mayor, I S27-8. Expen~es. He accounts _for Richard Willoughby, in wine, !Od. Given to Henry of Winchester
the expenses of the king's marshal and of h1s servants (staying for having his aid in speaking good to the lord earl and to his son
four days in December: bread, wine, beer, large meat bought, for diverse causes 6s Bd and a pair of gauntlets for 2d ... In 9 lb of
roast meat bought) ... hay for ten horses for four days a_nd three mix:d metal bought for [making] a standard gallon ts6d, and in
nights ss ... total £2 4s 10%d. He accounts for £6 paid to t~e makmg the same 9d. In beer given for making the same 2d ... To
marshal for the fine of the whole town ... He accounts for a gift J~hn of Knighton coming to parliament and bearing his writ fr,r
sent to the king and queen at that time in bread 11 s 8d and in a his expenses arising from the community, a pair of hose ...
tun of wine £4 1ss 4d. In two carcases of beef S2s. In five pigs'
carcases 18s 4d. In porterage of this gift to the castle 1od ... In a
gift sent to the taxers of the twentieth [a royal tax granted for 59. The city of Coventry cultivates royal patronage 1451
the war against the Scots], viz. to Sir Hugh of P~estwold, one of
them (bread and wine), to Roger of Belgr_ave his fellow _(bread The public encounter between sovereign and city, such as is described
and wine), to Sir Robert de Malmesthorp, Sir Walter of Friskney, in this record, was choreographed in advance and carefully staged, to
justices of the lord king assigned after Hockday [after East_er] secure and e~hance the dignity of each. The historian must imagine
(bread and wine). To Sir Roger of Gildesborough at that t1_me the conver~at1on and negotiation between the mayor's and the king's
(bread and wine). In a present sent to Sir ~obert ~urdet coming officers which preceded and prepared the events recorded in the text
through the lord (earl of Leicester) to enquire of misdeeds done to (see [61]). 17
the servants of the lady Queen [Isabella] and Le Mortimer [the
earl of LeicesterJ (bread and wine) ... M. D. Harris (ed.), The Coventry Leet Book: or Mayor's Register, 4 vols,
Three cartloads of stone from Swannington bought for the London: Oxford University Press, 1907-13, pp. 263-4. English, revised
north bridge 1s 6d. For carriage of the same with three hired by GR.
carts ss sd. In two cartloads of limestone bought for the same
2s 4d. In a cart hired for two days for carrying hard stone and Receiving the king
sand to the same 2s. In the wages of two masons hired for one
week for the same Ss 4d. In the wages of a groom hired to serve ~emorandum that the 21st day of September, the year of our sover-
them during that time 9d. In the wages of a paver [working] on eign lor~ afore rehearsed [1451], the king our sovereign lord came
the bridge sd. In the wages of a woman helping them to collect fr?m Leicester towa~ds Coventry, the mayor being then, that is to say,
stones out of the water and this for one day 1d. Total I Ss 6d. Richard Boys and his worthy brethren arrayed in scarlet and all the
commonalty clad in green gowns and red hoods in Hazelwood beyond
(b) Account of John le Marewe, mayor: 1332-S._ Expenses._.. For the the broad oak on horseback attended the coming of our sovereign lord.
expenses of the king's marshal commg to Leicester at Michaelmas And as soon as they had sight of our sovereign lord's presence, the
and staying for three days £1 10s ... In a pre~ent sent to t_he earl ma~or and h~s peers alighted on foot, and meekly thrice kneeling on
at Lady Day [2 February] in bread 15s and m a tun of wme £4 the~r knees ~1d unto our sovereign lord their due obeisance, the mayor
!SS 4d ... saymg to l11m these words: 'Most highest and gracious king, you are
A piece of iron bought for making the seal for sealing measures welcome to your true liege men with all our hearts.' At which the
s ½d, and in making the same sd. In the repair ofa chest for ke~p- mayor'. by advice of counsel, had no mace in his hand, but his sergeant
ing and placing the muniments and charters of the community, attending upon the mayor, the words afore rehearsed said, put the
and in nails and boards bought for the same Is. In the expenses
of the mayor, John Alsy and other honest men of the co~mu-
17 ~ fur~her C. Kipling, Enu r the King. Theatre, Liturgy, and Ritual in the Medieval
Civic 1 riumph, Oxford, 1998; H. Carrel, The rituals of town-crown relations in
nity, treating and discussing the business of the community ~t post~Black Death England', in F. Andrews (ed.), Ritual and Space in t/u Middle Ages,
the tavern after the departure of the justices that is to say of Str Domngton, 2011, pp. 148-64
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND URBAN GOVERNMENT 167
166

mace in the mayor's hand, and the mayor kissing the mace offered it ... And the same seek allowance in their account for various payments
to the king. The king, tarrying and hearkenin_g to_ the mayor's speech made by _them_ on the orders of the mayor this year ... paid for four gal-
in favourable wise, said these words: 'Well said, Sir Mayor, take your lons ofwme given to Robert Constable, knight, John Barneby, Nicholas
horse.' The mayor then rode forth afore the king'. bearing_ hi~ mace in Portyngton 18 and others on the mayor's orders 2s 8d ... And for two
his hand, with the knight constable next afore with tl_1e kings _swor~, pikes, two tenches and other fish given to the king's commissioner in
the bailiffs of this city riding afore the mayor with their maces m their the port of the aforesaid town to have his favour in the payment of £4p
hands making way and room for the king's coming. And so ~hey rode gr~nted t~ t~1e burgesses ofth~ aforesaid t?wn by the king 10s 6d. An~
afore the king till the king came to the outer gate of the pnory. 7"he paid to Wilham Mabson for his expenses m going to London with thl
king then forthwith sent for the mayo~ an~ hi~ br~thren by a !might king's letters patent for the said forty pounds 20s. And paid to Richard
to come to his presence, and to speak with him m his chamber, and_ the Doughty for his expenses in going to London to labour to have allow-
mayor and his peers according to the kin~·s co~mand_ment came mto ance of the s~id £40 in the account of the said customer in the king's
his chamber and thrice there kneeling did their obeisance. Thomas exchequer this year 40s. And paid for three pikes, two tenches and
Lytelton, then recorder, said unto ~he king su~h word_s as was to his other fish given to the earl of Northumberland and his wife the coun-
thinking most pleasant, our sovereign lord saymg_ agam th~se words: tess wl'.en they dined in the town, on the orders of the mayor 24s 7 d.
'Sirs, I thank you of your good rule and demesne [1.e. lordship or gov- And paid for one gallon of sweet wine given to the said countess 12d.
ernment], and in special for your good rule the last year past, for the And paid for one hogshead of wine given to the said countess on the
best ruled people then within my realm. And also I thank ~ou for the orde~s of the may~r 26s 8d. And paid for two and a half dozen gallons of
present that you now gave to us.' The which was a t~n of wme and 20 ale given to the said countess on the orders of the mayor 5s. And paid to
great fat oxen. The king then moreover gave them m com~1andment John Berker, servant of the said countess, as a reward when he brought
to govern well his city and to see his peace be we~l kept, as 1t has been two bucks sent to the burgesses of the aforesaid town by the said coun-
afore-time, saying then to them he would be their good lord. And so te~s, on the orders of the mayor 1Ss4d. And paid for the expenses of the
the mayor and his peers departed. said mayor and the other burgesses present when the said bucks were
eaten at the last collection of taxes 7 s. And paid for a tun of wine given
to the chancellor of England, the archbishop of York, on the orders
60. Diplomatic relations: Hull 1464-65 of the mayor £6. And paid for the carriage of the said tun of wine to
C_awode on the orders of the mayor 2s 6d. And paid for a tun of wine
Presents from the mayor of Hull found their way to a significant l_ist given to the duke of Suffolk, the duchess his wife and the duchess his
of royal officials and peers of the realm, whose sup??rt for the city m?ther, on the orders of the mayor £6. And paid for the carriage of the
was clearly perceived to be vital. Some of these gifts were dou~t- said cask to the place of the said duke on the orders of the mayor 12d.
less intended to oil the wheels in particular current controversies; Total: £20 16s Id.
others which recur in the chamberlains' accounts on an annual basis,
demo~strate the conviction that it was always worthwhile to cultivate
amicable relations with the royal family and with the clerical and lay 61. Preparations for a royal visit to York 1488
nobility.
In _the second of these documents, the secretary of King Richard III
R. Horrox (ed.), Selected Rentals and Accounts ef Medieval Hull, 1293- writes to ur~e the r~lers of Yo~k. to provide a splendid and flatteri ng
1528, Yorkshire Archaeological Society Record Series, CXLI, I 983, PP· show for an 1mpendmg royal v1s1t. Such a hastily written letter - an
96-7. Latin, transl. by the editor.
18 These were all powerful men 1n the region. Sir Hobert Constable \\as a <:onstablc of
Extract from the account roll of the chamberlains of Kingston upon F,lamborough;_ John Rarnby was asso<'iatcd with the constables of Burton Constable;
Nicholas Portmgton was the son of a judge.
Hull, Michaelmas 1464- Michaelmas 1465.
168
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

urgent word of advice from the royal sec~eta? to the governors_ of

York - is an unusual survival, preserved m this case because copied
into the civic records. The first record reveals that the mayoral council
I URBAN GOVERNMENT

puni~hment of offenders [~gainst] his laws. The cause I write to you

169

now 1~ for so much as I verily know the king's mind and entire affection
that h1~ grace bea~s towards 1ou and your worshipful city, for manifold
already planned just such a 'sight to be made_at the ~ing's _coming'. A Y?ur kind a~d loving deservings to his grace shown heretofore, which
number of priests are identified as advisers for the mvent10n of pag- his grace w1~l never forget, ~nd intends therefore so to do unto you
eants, or staged spectacles, to greet the monarch. that all the kmgs that ever reigned upon you did never so much, doub,t
n?t ~ereof, nor make no manner [of] petition of desire of anything b!
L. C. Attreed (ed.), The York House Books 1461-1490, 2 vols, Stroud: his h1ghne~s to you to be granted, but this I advise you, as honourably
Alan Sutton for Richard 111 and Yorkist History Trust, 1991, pp. 288 as Y?ur ~1sdoms can imagine, to receive him and the queen at their
commg, dispo~e you to do as well pageants with such good speeches as
(a), 7 IS (b).
can goodly, this short warning considered, be devised, and under such
(a) Meeting of the mayoral council 4 August 1483. At the which form as Master Lancas_ter of the king's council, this [letter's] bringer,
day it was agreed that my lord the mayor and all my masters shall somewhat advert1~e you of~y.mind in that behalf, as in hanging
his brethren the aldermen in scarlet and all my masters of the the streets through which the kmg s grace shall come with cloths of
twenty-four and the chamberlains and _all those that have bee_n Arras, tapestry-work and other, for there come many southern lords
chamberlains and also all those that will have bought out their an~ men of worship with them, which will mark greatly your receiving
charges of all offices in this city, shall i~ red gowns on h~rseback thetr_ graces. Me needeth not to advise you, for I doubt not ye have
meet our most dread liege lord the kmg at Brekles Mills, and provided therefore better than I can advise you, how be it on my faith
over this that the bridgemasters and all others that have been I show you thus of good heart, and for the singular zeal and love that
bridgemasters and all other honest men of the city shall be in red, I bear to you and your city, afore all •others, ye shall well know that I
upon the pain of 20s to be forfeit and paid to the_ commonalty of ~hall not forbear calling on his grace for your weals nor unremember
this city by every man doing the contrary ... (their se~van:s shall 1t, as Master Lan~aster shall show you, which in part heard the king's
be in blue) and that all other persons of every occupation 1~ blue, grace ~peak herein, to whom touching the premises it may like you
violet and musterdevil [yellow] shall on foot meet our said sov- [to] give credence. Scribbled in haste the 23rd day of August [ 148SJ
ereign lord at St James's church. _ . at Nottingham with the hand of your servant and hearty lover, John
Memorandum to send for Sir Henry Hudson [priest], Richard Kendale, secretary.
Burgess, parish clerk of St Crux church, Richard_Standish, parish
clerk of Christ's church, William Hewet, parish clerk of All
Hallows' church, William Gylmyn, parish clerk of All Hallows'
Belfry, and George Lovell, esquire, of St Mary's Abbey, to ~av.e
their advice for a sight [spectacle] to be made at the kmgs
coming at Micklegate Bar, Ouse Bridge and Stonegate.

(b) To my good masters the mayor, recorder, aldermen and sheriffs

of the city of York:

Right worshipful sirs, I recom~end me _u~to you as heartily as_ I c~n,

and thanked be Jesus the kings grace 1s m good health, and m l~ke
wise the queen's grace, and in all their progress have been ~orsh1r
fully received with pageants and other etc., and his lords andJu~ges in
every place sitting, determining the complaints of poor folks with due
 THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY or LIFE 171

equipment or an antisocially sited privy arose early in the history of

the medieval towns, and such parochial issues gave rise to some of the
first discussions concerning the identity and purpose of the city as a
VI. THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF public body. In the process of negotiating the boundaries of domes-
LIFE tic and communal space, urban governments contributed to evolving
ideas, on the one hand, of personal identity and, on the other, of civi{
. industrial sounds and at the same time a perva- duty and decorum [67]. The street was contested territory [71]1
L1fe at close q~arters,
sive flavour of the farmyar c
town. Communal spaces, toge 1er .
d h
:tc terised the streets of the medieval
with a larger idea of the public
··d of private sokes
'"72], [78], [74], although by the end of the period a number of towns
had recently sought and obtained parliamentary permission to impose
upon individual residents to pay for the paving of the principal thor-
be won from the persistent res1 ue .
realm, ha~ to_ h' . d t nded to remain at constant nsk of oughfares, if not yet (or for centuries to come) the side-streets [78].
and ecdes_1as_t1ca~:;an;rs:~:i ::d :xclusive use. Large-scale planning The provision of a town cross, often connected to provision for market
reappropnatton p d d almost impossible by the congeries of stalls, was another public work with both practical and symbolic pur-
of the townsc~pelwas_ rel1nts eNreone the less the records sampled in this p0se:• These and the efforts to provide uncontaminated water (many
1oca_I and part1cu ar ng I
· '
rtiall successful attempts of urban co_unc1 s
·1 would continue throughout and for long after this period to depend
section demonstrate t ,e pa ~ of good practice for upon street water-vendors [69: ) were significant contributions by
and officials to establish and to implement norms . 1 ·ive sense of town councils to the enhancement of the quality of life.
. . J and in the process to foster a more me us .
bu1ldmg [62 • . . . f, bl" . ·es for common interests m food The regulation of food supply, which was an equally pressing concern
collective respondsibhila1tl~h o;:ctfo~\:a~u;lity oflife in the town. of the magistrates, led them to attend to the fields and pastures of the
supply, water an e , .
. .d the range of urban and environmental immediate hinterland. The town herd of cattle emblemised this fun-
·
I t 1s 1 u·11 minatmg to cons1 er . k damental and enduring bond between the city and the country [75].
f,
. rulers were w1"Jl'ng
h" h city 1 and even anxious to ta e
matters or w IC . f nal urban planning on a relatively The more or less uncontrolled population of animals and fowl kept by
"bTty An instance o commu . private citizens for butchering and for their eggs expressed the same
responsi i I . . h it of Bristol's extension of its harbour, for evident
grand s~ale is t e c_ ythe 1240S [68].1 Major civic works largely com- tie, and generated another occasion for the council to legislate in the
econom1c reaso~s, i; which ~ere ostensibly provided for security but intere~ts of communal safety [72]. Fuel, too, was a limited and pre-
prised walls an ga es d f, h f the time rather served to define cious resource, the supply of which from the surrounding woods and
which, in many cases an or mu~ od here~t and controlled.2 The hedgerows called for municipal scrutiny :76J.
. f the town as contame , co .
an image o vas also conditioned by eccles1as- The smallest dwellings of medieval townspeople had no fireplaces and
l d texture of the townscape , . . . h
:~:a; :t~ilding, to which in various ways the secular community mig t little opportunity for cooking or heating beyond small stoves:s Many
will have had recourse to the ovens of bakers, or else to the suppliers
contn"bute.s . the of ready-cooked food [~]. [ 50].6 The homes of more prospering
Be ond singular and very expensive projects, town. counc'.~s fro~e u-
artisans and merchants could be relatively comfortable, offering the
thi~teenth or fourteenth centuries arc f~undj o:/:ie1;::::::~~ puflic advantages not only of warm fires and draught-excluding windows
Jar basis, legislating for the communal s~pp y[ J [70] [71] [7S].
• d r, r the clearance of rubbish 68 , • ' .
fountains an o . lb . h leaking gutter, noisy industria1 + See in general G. T. Salusbury-Jones, Simi Lift i11 Mediroal England, 2nd ~-dn,
Complaints about the neig 1 our wit a
Oxford, 1948; T . Scrase, 'Crosses, conduits and other street furniture in the south
west of England', in M . Boone and P. Stabel (eds), Shapi11g Urban ldmtity i,r LatP
. . . s ·e M. D. Lobel and E. M. Carus-Wilson. Meditval Europe, Lcu\'en-Apel<loorn, 11000, pp. 201-19.
I On the topography of the mcd1e, al por~ . c . T .. London I 9i 5. 5 See Introduction, p. 2S.
'Bristol", in M. D. Lobel (ed.), Atlas of Htstoric owns, II, •
6 M. Carlin, 'Fast food and urban li\'ing standards in medie,·al England', in M. Carlin
•l SeeIntroduction. p. 25. and J. Rosenthal (eds), Food and Eati11g i11 Meditval Europe, London. 1998, pp. i!7-52.
s See further Section IX.
172 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE
l7S
(which by the fifteenth century might even be glaz_ed) but a_lso of
H. T. Riley (ed.), Liber Albus, London: Longmans Brown Green
degrees of segregation of activities and personal privacy dented to Longmans and R0 b t 185 ' ' '
humbler classes [64], [65].7 . er s, 9 , pp. 321-9. Latin, transl. by th d·t
revised by GR. e e 1 or,
The question of the quality oflife in this context calls for careful assess-
ment. It is evident that some townspeople lived not only prosperously J. If anyone ~ ishes to build in stone, and his neighbour on account
but well. At the same time, contemporaries were aware that money was of poverty is unable, or is unwilling, then the latter must give tl)e
not everything, and the view is recorded that even the rich could suffer o~her three feet of his own land, on which he can make a wall h
in human and spiritual ways for their enslavement to material gain [ 47]. his own cost, S feet thick and 16 feet high. He who gives the l;n!
Individual cases of personal business success and social advancement sl_ia_ll have one_ clear half of the wall, and may place his timber
can be identified at all times across the period. It is harder to be cer- oo,~ts] upon It for building. And they shall make a gutter to
tain whether the conditions oflife for the generality of the late medieval :e_ce1ve and carry off the water falling from their houses at their
urban population were improving or otherwise. When the owners of Jomt expense.
urban estates thought it worthwhile to build new rows of shops, it is
evident that commerce, at least, was perceived to be flourishing [66]. On ii. \oncer~ing pri\'ies in the houses of citizens, it is ordained that
the other hand, we are invited to consider the claims made by a number it the pit_ made in such a chamber be lined with stone, the mouth
ofurban governments in the mid-fifteenth century that the loss of popu- of t~e pit ~hall b_e 21,;, feet distant from the neighbour's land.
lation was causing an uncontrollable decline both in the economic power B1'.t ,f not hned \Hth stone, it should be S'2 feet distant fi· I
and in the civic spirit ofthe towns [77]. The larger question ofthe quality ne1ghbours . · lan d . tom t 1e
oflife needs to be considered in the light of a wide range ofsources, and in
view not merely of material criteria but of the opportunities for personal iii. If any person has windows looking onto his neighbour's land
fulfilment open to townspeople of diverse social class and status.8 although he may have been for long in possession of the view an<l
e\:en though his predecessors may have been in possession of the
\,_md~ws, nevertheless his neighbour may lawfully obscure tl
62. Building regulations in twelfth-century London 'icw t_rom sucl~ \\ indows by building opposite them or by placin1e
anything on his own land as may seem to him most expedienf
These ordinances, the first of their kind to be recorded, were included unl~ss the ~ers~n w~10 h~s such windows can show any writin~
in an 'assize of buildings' issued in 1189 by the mayor of London, Henry by re~son of which his neighbour may not obstruct the view fron
fitz-Ailwin. The reference to a major fire in the city during the reign the wmdows. 1
of Stephen is an indication that the vulnerability of wooden buildings
and the need to build in stone had been debated in earlier periods, iv. In ancient times the greater part of the city was built of wood
and indeed such fires must have generated collective discussion of the and ~h~ houses were covered with straw, stubble, and the like'.
common interest long before the twelfth century. The implementation Hence it happened that when a single house had caught fire the
of some of these and related ordinances in the city is recorded from greater_part ~f the city was destroyed by the conflagrati~n -
1300 in the 'assize• of nuisance' [67]. something which occurred in the first year of the reign of Kin
~tephen [ 1_ I S5- S62 when, by reason of a fire that broke out a~
H. T. Riley (ed.), Liber Albus: The White Book of the City of London, ondon Bridge, the church of St Paul was burned from where
London: Richard Griffin, 1861, pp. 278-85; with, for the Latin text, t~e blaze extended, destroying houses and building:, as far as the
c urch of St C_leme_n_t Danes. After this many of the citizens, to
7 A. Quiney, Town Houses <if Medieval B,-itain, New Haven and London, 200S,
the be~t of their _ability to avoid such a peril, built stone houses
J. Schofield, M~dieval London Houses. New Haven and London, 1994.
on ~heir foundations, roofed with thick tiles and thus protected
8 See also Sections Vlll and IX.
against the fury of the flames. It has consequently often happened
 TOWNS JN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QU ALl'ry OF LIFE
174 175

that, when a fire has broken out in the city, and has destroyed middle of the marsh, and at the outer part of the marsh towards
many buildings, upon reaching such houses it has been unable to the A_von, ~O feet wide. On the land thus measured the commune
do further damage, and has there been extinguished. In this way, of Bristol 1s to h~ve in perpetuity free access for its ships, as in
by such a house as this the houses of the neighbours have been t~1e past; meanwhile the ~ommun~ is to preserve the monastery's
saved from being burned. r~ghts over the land, and 1s to maintain the watercourse ifit dete-
riorates. The remainder of the marsh of St Augustine towar<\s
the Frome and towards the marsh of the town of Bristol on t~
6S. Harbour works at Bristol 1240 east and south side_s of t~e said ditch, is to belong in perpe,tuity tt
the commune and 1ts_he1r'i, for :hem to make a ditch (trencheam),
The expansion of the harbour was a major c!vic project f~r. the mayor a _ga_te or whatever smts them without any impediment or contra-
and commonalty of Bristol. Such an enterprise was a poht1cal no less d1ct1on. For this co~cession and for their good faith, the mayor
than an engineering challenge. The two d~cumen~s r~pro~uced here and commune of Bristol gave to the said abbot and convent £6
illustrate the division oflordship and franchises which mev1tably com- 1Ss4d.
plicated grand designs for urban development. By (a) the mayor and
council of Bristol obtained permission to build on land of the powerful (b) Henry, by th~ gr_ace of God king of England ... greetings to his
abbey of St Augustine. The royal letter in (b) shows how t~e mayor men of Redchffe m the suburb of Bristol.
obtained the king's intervention to require suppor~ for the ~rOJeCt fr~m Whereas our burgesses of Bristol, for the common utility of
the inhabitants of the suburban district of Redchffe. Outside the city tl~e wh~le town and suburb of Bristol (pro commzmi utilztate tocius
and therefore independent of its legal control, Redcliffe would continue vzlle Brzstollie similiter et suburbia), have begun to dig a ditch in the
during the Middle Ages to offer an attractive immunity to the ":ealthy mars(1 of St Augustine, in order that ships coming to our port
shipowners, merchants, and others who liv~d there: The splendid local of Bristol ~ay more freely, and without impediment, enter and
parish church of St Mary Redcliffe remams testimony to both the depa~t, which trench they cannot complete at their own charge,
wealth and the local pride of the area. we direct you that, since the improvement of the port will be of
gr~at benefit no: only to the citizens but to yourselves, who also
D. Walker (ed.), The Cartulary ef St Augustine's Abbey, Bristol, Bristol enJoy the san~e. hberti~s as are held by our burgesses in that town
and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, X, 1998, no. 588 (a); N. D. a~d are part1c1pants m scot and lot [i.e. are assessed for tax]
Harding (ed.), Bristol Charters 1155-1373, 1, Brist~I: Bristol Records with them, and the successful completion of this ditch could be
Society, 1930, pp. 18 19 (b).Latin, transl. by the editors. of ~reat_ utility and profit (multum possit utilzs etfructuosa) in so far
as it affects you along with our burgesses in the liberties of the
(a) ~24 March 12 1-0 .] This is the agreement made between William county,_you are_ to lend effective strength to their enterprise, lest
;f Breadstone, abbot and the convent of St Augustine in Bristol the proJect, which we r~gard as our own, should be delayed for
and Richard Aillard, mayor with the whole community of Bristol. lack of your help. At Wmdsor, 2 7 April I!.140.
That is, that the said abbot and com ent grant, for themsel\'es
and their successor:, in perpetuity, to the mayor and commu-
nity of Bristol and their heirs all of that lan_d in the mars_h of St 64. A skinner commissions a new town house 1 sos
Augustine's, Bristol, which lies outside the ditch surrounding the
canons' arable land and extends eastwards as far as the edge of His_ profits from the trade in furs enabled this skinner to pay for an
the harbour on the Frome ( usque ad margmem portus Frome), "hich ~ntirely new house on the edge of the site ofhis 'old chamber'. Favoured
ditch runs from the canons' grange to the Avon, saving to the h~ we~lthy ~ow~smen, the type adapted the features of the typical hall
abbot and convent the land next to the ditch which the commune use inhabited m rural contexts by the country gentry. The hall two
has begun to dig, measuring 142 feet wide, 92 feet wide in the storeys 1i·1gh , was open to the roof From one end of the hall, a 'door
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE 177
176

opened on to a cross-passage containi~g a pa~try, on ~he other side of s~rvive_. they_~an be used to reconstruct (if only in part), like a four-
which was a ground-floor chamber with a chimney. 1 he passage also dm:iens1onal Jtgsaw puzzle, the evolving pattern of development of
gave access to a stair which led up to a bedroom, known as a solar, a city street. Two sites in Cambridge are described in the following
situated over the ground-floor chamber. The carpenter, in return for a late fourteenth-century grants. Although differing from one another
Jump sum paid by the skinner in the form of skins, und:rtook to over- in detail, both exemplify some common features of medieval urban
see the entire work, from the procurement of the materials to the com- build!ng. The premium on space at the street frontage, for its coT9-
pletion of the locks. The evidence is a contract recorded in the ~ourt of mercrnl value, led to a pattern in which properties tended to be narro\v
the mayor of London. This would give the patron reco~rse ~gam~t the on the street and to run back for a relatively long distance. Each Jf
carpenter in the event that the work was not done to his sat1sfact1on. these cases exemplifies a house with a hall (of two storeys, open to the
roof) set back from the street behind a solar (usually a bedroom) raised
L. F. Salzman, Building in England down to 1540, Oxford: Clarendon above cellar~ or shops. In the case of(a) a row of three tiny shops has
Press, 1952, pp. 417-18. Latin, transl. by GR. encroached m~o the street in front of the solar block. In (b) there are
three booths directly ~mderneath the solar itself, two with doors open-
Simon de Canterbury, carpenter, came before the mayor and alder- mg outwards to receive customers approaching through the church-
men on Saturday after the feast of St Martin [11 November] 1308, yard. In (b) the nuns grant the tenants a building lease on condition
and agreed to make at his own proper charge~, down to the locks, for that the latter have built an additional house on the site. A great deal
William de Hanigtone, skinner, by the following Easter, a hall and a of urban property was leased, as in these cases, from communities of
room with a chimney, and a larder [for the storage of food] between monk~ or ~uns. Monastic landlords varied, amongst themselves and
the hall and the room; and one solar [upstairs bedroom] over the over time, m the degree to which they engaged actively in the develop-
room and larder; also an oriel [space, here probably lit by a window] ment ofreal estate (see also [ 66]).
at the end of the hall beyond the high table; and outside ~he hall ~ne
step [flight of stairs] from the ground to tl~e hall door with an oriel; Jesus College, Cambridge, MS. Gray 141 (a); MS. Gray Q50a-b (b).
and two spaces in the cellar, divided cross-wise, beneath the hall; and a Latin, transl. by GR.
room for a privy, with two pipes leading to the pri~y; and a _stable, 12
feet wide stretching between the hall and the old kitchen, with a solar {a) This indenture* witnesses that Margaret, prioress of the nun-
above th; stable, and a loft above the solar; and at one end of this solar nery of St Radegund in Cambridge, grants to John Berlee of
there is to be a kitchen with a chimney; and there is to be an oriel [here Cambridge, carter, a tenement in the parish of St Andrew outside
meaning a porch or passage], 8 feet wide, between the said hall and the Barnwell Gate, between a tenement of Corpus Christi College on
old chamber. one side and a tenement formerly ofJohn de Toft and a tenement
o~Robert de Parys on the other, abutting at one end on the king's
William de Hanigtone acknowledged that he was bound to _pay to
highway and at the other on the king's ditch and on Pouches
Simon for the work the sum of £9 5s 4d, 50 eastern marten-skms, fur
Croft of the prior and canons of the chapel of St Edmund of
for a woman's hood to the value of 5s, and fur for a robe for Simon.
Canterbury ... for forty years, paying I 8s per annum to the said
priore1>s and her successors. [The property comprises] a hall
with a solar in front of the tenement, and two cellars and a doo;
65. Houses and shops in Cambridge
benea~h the solar, ~mder a roof. The hall is Q 1 feet long and 18
feet wide; the solar ts 20 14 feet long and 14 feet wide. And there is
Property deeds, of which examples are given here, are _among the
a chamber at the west end of the hall beneath another roof, which
commonest form of surviving urban records from the Middle Ages.
chamber is 33 feet long and 20 feet wide. And there are three
Individual examples can be informative regarding the scale and func-
chambers Joined in front of the said tenement, solar and cellars,
tion of houses and shops. Where substantial concentrations of deeds
under a separate roof. There is also a dovecote. John agrees to
178 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND Q UALITY OF LIFE
179

repair these as necessary at his own expense. Witnessed b~ John almoner's_ supplie~s includ~d other officers of the same monastery. The
Morice, mayor of Cambridge, and others. Dated on Christmas construction entailed making the wooden frames, which were laid out
Day, 1369. ~at on the g~ound ~rior to being hauled upright and locked into posi-
uon. Stone foundations are not mentioned. Once completed, the new
(b) This indenture witnesses that Margery Clanvile, prioress of St shops were let for about 9s each per annum. The considerable invest-
Radegund's nunnery, has granted to Richard Milde, chaplain, ment ~as evid_ently made in an expectation of a continuing econoll)ic
John de Kelesseye, cooper, and Avisia his wife, a tenement in ~xpansron, which demographic decline and consequently falling rerlts
St Clement's parish, Cambridge, between the tenement of John m the early fifteenth century would disappoint. ·y
Dunton and that belonging to the chantry of St Mary in St
Clement's church, abutting on the churchyard of the same church Westminster Abbey Muniments I 8989. Latin, transl. by GR.
at one end, for 7 s per annum payable to the nunnery while Richard
Milde lives, and after his death, !0s per annum. Witnessed by Expenses on new buildings
William Horwode, mayor of Cambridge, and others. Dated on
Tuesday after the Beheading of John the Baptist (so August) Carpentry work for seven shops newly built £6. The cost of lifting
1373. the same shops Ss 10d. Wood bought from the warden of St Mary's
This indenture witnesses that Margery Clanvile, prioress of St chapel _sos. Four carts hired to bring the wood from Claygate to
Radegund's nunnery in Cambridge, leases to John de Kelleseye Westmins ter 6s. The expense of the almoner's cart with two men
and Avisia, his wife, a tenement in St Clement's parish between a and three horses fetching wood there on four occasions 4s. 7000 laths
tenement of John Dunton and another belonging to the chantry bought at. Kingston 35s. For their carriage Ss 6d. Laths bought at
of St Mary in St Clement's church, abutting at one end on the Rosamund s [ a nearby manor of the abbo(? 5s. Elm boards 12 s. 100
churchyard, for their lifetimes and five years thereafter, paying Eastlan~ boards [ imported from the Baltic::; 2Ss 4d. 62 Eastland boards
to the nunnery 4s per annum. [The property comprises] a good bo~ght !rom Brother John Mordan I0s4d. 21,000 roofnails '28s. 2s,ooo
hall on the north side of the tenement, with a solar joined above spngna1ls 26s 10d [ ... and other nails]. 350 sacks of powdered lime
11
the same hall, of the same width as the whole tenement, towards 56s 5 2d. 2 casks for [ holding~ laths Ss 4d. 225 roof:.tiles 20s sd. 51 ooo
the churchyard. Under the solar are three cellars, one of which tile-pins 9s6¾d ._.. 10 locks and keys bought for the doors of the sl;ops
has a door opening into the hall and two have doors opening and other d?ors m_ the Almonry Ss 4d. 7 hinges bought for the doors
into the churchyard. There is also a kitchen joined over the solar 4s I d. 16 pairs of lunges 6s Bd. 8 door-handles for the doors with their
on the south side of the tenement, and two cellars beneath the attachments_ '2s 6d. The cos_t ofroofing in total £6 ss 4d. For putting in
same roof as the hall on the north side of the tenement. Within the gr~unds1lls [w~oden foun?ations] of the houses 4s 2d. The wage
one year, John will build a new house of oak beams, 30 feet ofa pamter for lath mg, plastering and painting the said houses in total
long by 12 feet wide, at the end of the same tenement on the 75s6d. Total £ss ss lO ~+d.
south side, towards the east. Witnessed by John Cotton, mayor
of Cambridge, and others. Dated on Sunday after the feast day of
St Barnabas ( 14 June), 1377. 67. Ideas of public nuisance and private space in London

The ~ndon as_size* of nuisance addressed issues of personal and public

66. Building shops at Westminster 1862-65 safety m the city, as had been provided in regulations of the twelfth
century [62]. Its records survive from the very beginning of the four-
The almoner, a monk and one of the officers of Westminster Abbey, teenth century. It allowed Londoners to express, and perhaps encour-
here develops a commercial street within the monastic_ preci~ct. The aged.t~em t~ develop, a sense of propriety suitable to the dense living
source is an extract from the annual account roll of this official. The conditions of the town.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE 181
180

H. M. Chew and W. Kellaway (eds), London Assize ef Nuisance 1301- their servants, day and night, and spoil the wine and ale in their
1431, London Record Society, X, 1973, pp. 79, 160-1. Latin, transl. by cellar, and the stench of the smoke from the sea-coal* used in the
the editors. forge penetrates their hall and chambers, so that whereas for-
merly they could let the premises for £6 13s 4d a year, they are
(a) 25 June 1333. Andrew de Aubrey and Joan his wife complain now_ worth only 40s. Andrew Pykeman and Nicholas Twyford,
that whereas they possess an easement in the use of a cess-pit sheriffs, have testifie~ elsew~ere that the defendants have bee;,
common to their tenement and those of Thomas Heyron and summoned by John Little, tailor, and Andrew Cornewaille. Tht\)'
Joan relict of John de Armenters, and the same was enclosed by come in person but Stephen Fryth says that he has no interest iti
a party-wall and roofed with joists and boards, so that the seats the tenement in dispute. Geoffrey, Walter and William answer as
of the privies of the plaintiffs and the others could not be seen, tenants. :hey deny the plaintiffs' contention that chimneys ought
Joan de Armenters and William de Thorneye have removed the to _be built of stone and plaster, and high enough to cause no
party-wall and roof so that the ~xtr~mities _of those sitting upon nuisance to the neighbouring tenements, and declare that good
the seats can be seen, a thing which 1s abominable and altogether and honest men of any craft, viz. goldsmiths, smiths, pewterers,
intolerable. Judgement, after the site has been viewed, that the goldbeaters, grocers, skinners, marshals• and armourers are at
defendants must roof and enclose the cess-pit as it was before, lib~rty to ~arry on their trade anywhere in the city, adapting
under the penalty described by the law and custom of the city in their premises as is most convenient for their work, and that
such cases. according to ancient custom any feoffor• may give, bequeath or
As regards the aperture which the same Andrew and Joan his lease his property as well to craftsmen using great hammers as to
wife made in their room over the cellar ofJohn de Armenters, now others. They add that they have let the premises against which
held by William de Thorneye, through which his private busin_ess the nuisance is alleged to Stephen Fryth for a term ofyears which
(secreta) can be seen by those in the rooms above, and concernmg has not yet expired, and that he has set up his anvil in what was
which Joan de Armenters and the above-named William have formerly the kitchen at a sufficient distance from the plaintiffs'
made complaint, it is adjudged by the mayor and aldermen that messu~ge, ~nd st~engthened the chimney with mortar and clay
it be blocked up. a_nd raised 1~ by six feet or more. They maintain that the plain-
tiffs cannot m any case complain of the chimney or of the noise
(b) 19 March 1378. Thomas Yonge and Alice his wife complain of the hammers or the smoke, because their messuage was built
by Richard Forster, their attorney, that Geoffrey Chadensfeld as recently as 1349-50, and is much higher than the house it
[rector of St Margaret Friday Street], Walter [Sel~ham, chap- replaced, and has windows facing the forge, which its predecessor
lain] and William [Whetele, citizen and tawyer], with Stephen had not.
atte Fryth, armourer, on Monday 5 October 1377 b~ilt a forge
(fabricam) of earth and timber, 40 feet from the road,_ m the cl~se
of their tenement adjoining the plaintiffs' messuag:• m the par_1sh 68. Clean water at Winchester
of St Augustine by Paul's Gate, on the south side of_Wathng
Street, of which the chimney is lower by 12 feet than 1t sho~ld Streams ran down the middle of most of the streets of Winchester
be, and not built of plaster and stone as the custom of the city providing water for various uses. Subordinate water-channels led fro~
requires; and the blows of the sledge-hammers whe_n the great ~hese in~o individual houses. Arguments concerning the communal
pieces of iron called 'Osmund'* are being wr~ught 1_nto breast~ mte~est m these ~treams evidently gave rise to an appeal through the
plates, guysers [cuisses, worn to protect the thighs], Jambers [for sheriff for royal Judgement, recorded in this writ transcribed in the
the lower legs] and other pieces of armour, shake the stone a~d court roll of the city for 1299. Such a case reveals the tensions which
earthen party-walls of the plaintiffs' house so that t~e~ are m often arose in relation to communal resources in the city, and also the
danger of collapsing, and disturb the rest of the plamt1ffs and legal and diplomatic methods used in the attempt to resolve them.
182 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE
18S

J. S. Furley (ed.), Town Life in the XIV Century, As Seen in the Court Rolls 69. Water sold in the street
efWinchester City, Winchester: Warren and Son, 1947, pp. I S+-5. Latin,
transl. by the editor, revised by GR. Access _to a ready 1iupply ofrunning water was often limited, and towns-
people m such cases were dependent on street vendors. Such suppliers
[1299] Juliana atte Floude brought a writ of the king addressed to
we:e naturally poor, and lacking in the means to defend their interests
the mayor and bailiff.<; of Winchester in these words: Edward, by the
befo~e the law. From this record, it appears that the water-sellers of
grace of God king of England, lord of Ireland and duke of Aquitaine, Nottmgham had responded to the non-payment of one of their numb '
to his mayor and bailiffs of the city of Winchester, greeting: Juliana
atte Floude has represented to us that whereas a certain watercourse
by boycot~in_g the customer concerned. This burgess, however,
able and wtllmg to sue. The decision of the jury is not known.
wl
in the street called Shulworth Street is and ought to be common to
herself and to each and every individual in the same city in such a way W. H. Steven~on (ed.), Records of the Borough ef Nottingham, s vols,
that she and all others of the town ought to have their convenience and Lo~don: Quantch, 1882-85, i, pp. 115- 17. Latin, transl. by the editor,
easement in it when they wish, certain men of the city hinder the said rev11ied by GR.
Juliana from having her convenience and easement in the said water as
she ought to have, and has been accustomed to have in times past, to On 2 4 October 1SSO, Robe~t de More"'.ode brings a case against Henry
her manifest loss; and therefore we bid you that, if this be so, you cause ~e Waterleader on a plea of transgression: he complains that as Henry
the said Juliana to have this convenience and easement in the water as 1s a common servant (commums servzens) to carry water by bushels• to
she should and as she and her predecessors have had in the past, and sell to all men of Nottingham wishing to have water by purchase, and
that you in no way fail in this. Witness myself at Sheen 5 August 1299. on ~onday be~re Mich~elma_s : 29 September2 last, in Nottingham,
And thereupon the said Juliana makes plaint that certain men of the he [1.e. Robert_ sent Ahce, his servant, and very many times other
same city have hindered her from having her convenience and ease- servants of his, to Henry to request that he carry to Robert's house
ment in the said water as she ought to have, and used to have in times four horse-loads of water, and offered him a penny, according to his
past, for washing and cleaning her fine and coarse yarn, to her no small usual rate. But Henry would not carry any water to Robert, but alto-
loss. And inquest was taken on this by the oath of John Botman [ and gether refused, ~nd called Robert false and unfaithful, and alleged that
twenty-three others], who say on their oath that John de Titinger he_perforated his bushel and all the bushels of Nottingham with his
and Henry de Colemere have hindered the same Juliana from washing knife, and further persuaded all his companions of the same calling that
and cleaning her cloths and having other conveniences to which she is they should not carry water to Robert because Robert would not pay
entitled, to her damage of half a mark. And they say that the said water them their wage. So Robert had no water for five weeks, either from
is common and ought, and in all times past has been accustomed, to Henry or from any of his companions, by which he lost the meal of
be common to Juliana herself and to all and singular of the said city, two quarters of malt [grinding malt into 'meal' was evidently Robert
except that they shall not put in the water the refuse of woad, called de Morewode's tra~e], of the value of 10s, to Robert's damage of 40s.
·wodger', nor hides from tanning nor the dung of men or animals ~or Henry says that he 1s not guilty in any respect. Both appeal to a jury.
the guts of animals, nor shall they wash there children's clothes with
their filth, nor have lavatories or drains over the said water. And the
said John and Henry are forbidden to hinder Juliana or others from 70. Water supply at King's Lynn 1378
having any of their conveniences in the said water, save such as are
above mentioned, in such a way that no further complaint about it shall As this reco~d makes exp_licit, to endow the construction of a public
reach our lord the king. :ater fount~m was perceived as an act of Christian piety. A 'pious·
_u~gess havmg provided the means to a convent of friars the secular
CIVIc_authorities collaborated with the monks to realise the ~roject. The
public provision of clean water was thus, for all parties - the mayor
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE 185
184

and town council, the Austin friars and the pious burgess - at once a town were seen to be compromised by the selfish behaviour of individ-
ual townspeople.
practical and a religious duty.

D. M. Owen (ed.), The Making of King's Lynn, Records.of S?cial and W. H. Steven~on (ed.), Records of the Borough ef Nottingham, 3 vols,
Economic History, new series, IX, Oxford: Oxford University Press London: Quar1tch, 1882- 85, i, pp. 3 l 7- 23. Latin, transl. by the editor
for the British Academy, 1984, pp. 117-19. Latin, transl. by the editor. revised by GR. '
~

Reproduced by permission of the British Academy.

[ Borough court roll, April 1396] Presentments of the jurors, wh~
This is the agreement made between the mayor and community of say that a common lane is blocked up in Little Marsh, between the
the town of Lynn, on the one part, and the pr\or and c?nvent of ~he tenement of (bot Barry and that of Richard Chilwell, and now it does
Augustinian friars of Lynn, on the other, that 1s, that smce the pnor not exis~. M!cliael Brabayn and Henry Soothill have blocked up the
and convent have received £40 from one John Glower, formerly a end ofL1mermg Lane with ordure, to the great detriment of the water
burgess of Lynn, on condition that they should comp~ete an_ aq~e~uct, o~ Lene and the loss of the town. Magota Ball blocks up Organ Lane
not denying to any of the community the water fl?w1~g da1l~ m 1t ... with the weeds from her gardens. Margaret Salmon, Nicholas Alastre,
the mayor and community, considering both the pious mtent1on of the and others'. block u~ the common cave'° of the town (obturant antrum
said John and the benevolence and the great diligence of the said prior commune villae praedzctae) on the northern side with ordure, weeds and
and convent to complete the same aqueduct, grant for themselves and cinders. All who live in the street leading from John Whaplington to
their successors that the religious may freely bring the said aqueduct th_e chapel bar on :ither side of the street block up the common way
beneath the wall and the ground of the town as far as their buildings with ordure and cmders, to the serious damage of all people passing
without impediment from the mayor and community ... and ~h~t they there; they are pardoned because they are poor.
may inspect, repair or renew the aqueduct without contrad1ct1on ...
unless by chance the town should be in danger on account of war
... And the said prior and convent will and concede for th~mselves 72, Animals in the town
and their successors that the said aqueduct shall flow continuously
throughout the year for the free use of the commu~ity, from a cistern Animals kept for a variety of practical purposes were a constant and at
to be properly constructed in the street called L1stersgate, ~hrough times intrusive presence in the medieval town. Domestic pets are not
three pipes commonly called 'keys' (claves), the water t.o b~ ava1la~le to well documented, although we know from literary and testamentary
anyone of the community from the sixth hour after tmdmght until the records that cats, dogs and birds were kept - and even, in some social
seventh hour after noon, between Easter and Michaelmas, unless any circles, ~onkeys. 11 The licence granted exceptionally to unleashed dogs
reasonable interruption of the flow should occur because of repairs or of the aristocracy, who may have had such hounds running beside their
horses or carriages, was a mark of class distinction.
other impediment.
H. T. Riley (ed.), Liber Albus, London: Richard Griffin, 1861, pp. 388- 9
(a); W. H. Stevenson (ed.), Records ofthe Borough ef Nottingham, s vols,
71. Public hygiene in Nottingham
London: Quaritch, 1882-85, i, pp. 356-9 (b); M. D. Harris (ed.), The
The disposal of rubbish was both a practical problem and a catalyst of Co~e11try_ Leet Book, 4 vols, Early English Text Society, London: Oxford
discussion concerning the values and amenities of commum~y ~
· 1· the University Press, 1907-13, p. 27 (c); M. Bateson (ed.), Records of the
8
town.9 The local court record reveals the twelve jurors rev1ewmg
series of instances in which the collective interest and identity of the JO The soft sandstone on which Notting ham stands has been excavated with caves
smce early times.
11 See Introduction, p. 2.
9 See Introduction, p. 24.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE 187
186

Borough cifLeicester, ii, London: C. J. Clay, 1901,_ p. 292 ~d).Latin, transl. Also that no ducks be let abroad in any street within the four
by the editors, revised by GR (a), (b), (d); Enghsh, revised by GR (c). gates of the town, on pain of forfeiture of ½dfor every duck, that
to be levied by the chamberlains to the use of the town.
(a) [London by-law, fourteenth century] To ~v~id the_noise, damage
and strife that this has caused in the past, 1t 1s forbidden that any
person shall keep a dog accustomed t~ go at_la~ge and unlea_she~ 73. Street-cleaning at Salisbury ,
out of its own enclosure, by day or night, w1thm the franchises
of the city, with the exception of the dogs of the nobility (chiens Butchering was a recognised challenge to health in all towns, and at
gentilx), on pain of a fine of 40d to the work of the chamber. borough courts attempted to regulate it. The pressure of traffic on
And an equal fine for anyone making a plea on behalf of such an city streets was also general, but the civic officers of Salisbury faced
offender. particular difficulties. The streets of Salisbury had been laid out in the
thirte~nth century [ lS] in such a way that a wide stream ran along
(b) [Nottingham borough court roll, 1398-99] John Blank makes the middle of each (possibly in deliberate emulation of Winchester, see
plaint of Robert Hayward on a plea of trespass, that w~ereas ~he [68]), creating problems for large loads.
usage and custom of Nottingham is that every t~an havmg swme
here in Nottingham should, by the proclamation_ of t~e r:iay~r D.R. Carr (ed.), The First Gerieral Entry Book of the City of Salisbu,y
of the liberty of the town of Nottingha'"?, k~ep h1_s swine m his JS87-1452, Wiltshire Record Society, LIV, 2001, pp. 117, 242-3.
houses, or should have the aforesaid swme m a pig-sty, so that Latin, transl. by the editor.
he should not cause damage to others through lack of proper
custody, Robert's pigs, at the feast of the Nativity of_St John the [c.1450] That city butchers should not slaughter their animals in
Baptist [24 June], worried and devoured a cock-chi~ken of the front of Butcher Row in the common street, but behind Butcher Row,
aforesaid John, worth 12d, and a mayse1~ of red hernngs, worth because of the foulness of the rotting remains; that they should not
6s sd. And this was Robert's fault, because the pigs were not render fat by day but in the night, and that they should not remove the
guarded, so John is injured and has receive~ da':1age to the sum of filth or intestines of their animals by day but in the night.
10s for which he enters suit. Robert comes m his own person, and
def~nds the force and injury, and says that he is guilty of nothing [May 1452] Agreed: to elect certain persons both from the Twenty-
that has been presented against him, and as to this he _rlaces him• Four and from other commoners to supervise the paving of the streets
self upon the country [ appeals to the judgement of a Jury]. and the common privies, ditches, sewers, and gutters emitting their
filth into the common ditches of the city, so that by their supervision
(c) [ Proclamation of the mayor of Coventry, 142 ~-] T~at ~o man the sewers and gutters may be stopped up or by the supervision and
[ may] have ducks going in the street, upon pam of forfeiture of orders of the persons to be elected they may be cleansed and repaired,
the same ducks. ~long_with their banks, and so cleansed and repaired they may be kept
m their state of well-being to the adornment of the city.
(d) [ Leicester borough ordinances, October 1467.J That every
horse neat - cowl or any other beast ofunfranchised persons that [May 1452] Also agreed and ordered: no carters or drivers of carts into
is fou~d in the c;whay [a field on the edge of the town] shall pay the_ c!ty to attach trailers to their carts or wagons, which so attached
for each foot 1d, and that shall the chamberlains levy to the pr?fit or Joined are commonly called drays, [or] to drive them within 'Jez
of the commons. And that no man have more than two neat gomg b~rr?' or en~losures (cepta) of the city. Nor is anyone in future to bring
in the Cowhay, on pain oflosing I 2d for each beast. w1thm the said bars or enclosures of the city on the saddles or the backs
of horses or pack-animals the long wooden packs which are commonly
11! Uncertain quantity called trusses or draughts, on pain of forfeiting the drays, trusses or
188 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE 189

draughts, so that the pavements of the city's streets a_re not broken up 75, Town cattle
as previously by drays, trusses or draughts of the kmd, the banks of
the common trenches are not destroyed, and the watercourses are not An unpaid debt provides a glimpse of the town's dependence on its
altered or blocked by the dragging of mud, as has happened. Advance rural resources. The woman's role appears in the legal record under
notice of this matter is to be given by public proclamation. the shadow of her husband. We may infer a significant social dis-
crepancy between the man, Jonn Broxtowe, who held the civic office
with responsibility for the town cattle, and the woman, Isabel Barrett
74. Street furniture hired to drive the animals out to pasture each day from Easter t3
Midsummer.
The London mayoral ordinance in (a) shows civic authority regulating
the competitive advertisements of taverns in the form of inn-signs W. H. Steven~on (ed.), Records of the Borough of Nottingham, 3 vols,
which, in the attempt to attract custom, grew ever more elaborate, London: Quantch, 1882-85, ii, p. !SS. Latin, transl. by the editor,
substantial, and dangerous to passers-by. The directive of the mayur of revised by GR.
Coventry in (b), on the other hand, shows the city government taking
advantage of innkeepers' desire to publicise themselves by regularising [No~tingham borough court roll, SO October 1432] John Barrett of
their lamps as public street-lighting. Nottmgham makes a personal complaint of John Broxtowe in a plea of
debt of2 Id. And he says that whereas the said John Broxtowe engaged
H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials ofLondon and London Life in the XIIlth, X/Vth, the said John's wife, Isabella, from the feast of Easter 1432 until the
and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, pp. 386-7 feast of the Nativity of St John the Baptist [24 June] then next follow-
(a); M. D. Harris (ed.), The Coventry Leet Book, 4 vols, Early English Te_xt i~g, to driv~ the cattle of the town of Nottingham to pasture for the
Society, London: Oxford University Press, 1907-13, p. 234 (b). Latm, time aforesaid for the aforesaid 21 d, to be there paid to the said John
transl. by the editor, revised by GR (a); English, revised by GR (b). Barret_t at the _feast of the Apostles Peter and Paul [29 June] then next
following; which money the aforesaid John Broxtowe, although he has
(a) 21 September 1375. At the prayer of the common~lty _[of~he city been often requested, has not yet paid to the aforesaid John Barrett
of London], making plaint that the ale-stakes proJectmg m front ~u_t ~efused, and still does refuse to pay him: whereby he says that h~
of the taverns in Cheap, and elsewhere in the city, extended too 1s mJured to the value of 21 d; and therefore he brings suit. And John
far over the king's highway, so as to impede those riding there, Brox_towe says that he owes him nothing. Wherefore an inquest is
and other persons, and, by reason of their excessive weight, did appomted, and John Broxtowe is in mercy for licence [to agree].
tend to the great deterioration of the houses in which they were
placed - it was ordained and granted by the mayor and alder-
men, as a befitting remedy for the same, and all the taverners of 76. Fuel
the city being summoned, orders were given to them, on pain ?f
paying 40d to the chamber of the guildhall every time the said Every town's reliance upon its hinterland for the basic requirement of
ordinance should be contravened, that in future no one should fuel was a perennial source of concern. In later medieval London the
have an ale-stake bearing his sign or leaves [a bush] projecti~g w~ and char~oal supplied (as is described in this record) from neigh-
or extending over the king's highway more than seven feet in boun~g counties was supplemented by coal, brought from Newcastle
length at the utmost. by ship _and co~seque~tly known as 'sea-coal'.* This record, a may-
oral ordmance issued m response to a public complaint, gives a hint
(b) Ordinance of the mayor of Coventry 1448. All innkeepers a~e to of the citizens' prejudice against the peasants who brought charcoal
have a lamp hanging before their doors until 9 o'clock at mght, for sale from the woods of Kent and other counties adjacent to the
on pain of a fine of 6s 8d. metropolis.
 TOWNS JN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE 191
190

H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials of London and London Life in the Xlllth, l February 1452. To the king our sovereign lord. Beseech full humbly
X!Yth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, pp. your humble true liege men, the mayor, bailiffs and commonalty of
SSS-6. Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR. your poor city of Winchester, that whereas they have been charged to
bear the fee farm of your said city, which amounts yearly to the sum of
The common people of the city of London have suffe~ed great loss for £7~, and _bear also to the master of the hospital of the Mary Magdalen
a long time past, because foreigners, of dive~se coun:1es,. have bro~ght beside _'Vmches~er £s; also w~en the 15th penny or tax is granted t?
charcoal in carts and upon horses for sale m the said city, and given your lughness, 1t amounts to the sum of £51 I0s 4d within the sai~
the common people to understand that every sack contained fully one city, the which when it is to be levied, some one man in the said city i~
quarter of charcoal. Therefore on IS January 1368, !ames Andreu, assessed at £2 ISs 4d, and some at £s 6s 8d, because your said city is
mayor of the said city, caused diverse sacks, brought either by cart or desolate of~eople; also the expense of burgesses of the said city coming
by horse, containing charcoal for sale, to be assayed by the standard of to your parliaments amounts to 4s a day. For the which said fee farm so
the city. Of which sacks, one was found to be two bus~els short, and to be paid, your bailiffs have little or nought of certainty to raise it but
another sack was deficient by one bushel and a half; and m all the other only of casualties [occasional levies], and yearly lose in payment of the
sacks fully one bushel was wanting. And for avoidi~g.such ~amages said fee farm £40 or more. For which causes abovesaid, and also for the
and falsities, committed against the common people, 1t 1s ordamed, by great charges and daily costs the which your said poor city bears about
assent of the mayor, aldermen and good people of the commonalty, the enclosing and murage of your said city, it is become right desolate,
summoned to the guildhall on that date, that all those wh.o shall be in so much as many notable persons be withdrawn out of the said city
convicted of such deceit and falsity shall be put upon the pillory, and for the causes abovesaid, and 997 houses which were wont to be occu-
pied w_ith people stand now void, and because of these withdrawing,
the sacks burnt beneath them.
17 parish churches stand unused at this day, the which parishes and
houses be more plainly expressed in a schedule hereto annexed. And
77. The perception of decline: Winchester in the mid-fifteenth where it pleased your highness in relieving of your said poor city, 24
May 14~1, t~ gra~t unto your mayor and commonalty of the said city
century
then bemg, m rehef of all the charges above-said £26 ISs 4d, to be
The pleas of towns for remission of royal taxation are, for obvious re~- taken yearly to them and to their successors unto the end of ... winters
sons, suspect evidence for urban decline in the fifteenth cen~ury. This then_ next f_ollo~ing of the feasts of Easter and Michaelmas by even
example, however, shows how circumstantial such declarat1o~s coul~ portions, of the issues and profits coming of the ulnage• and subsidy of
be; and at least some of its claims are borne out by archaeological evi- woollen cloths within the said city and suburbs and soke* of the same
dence (some fifteen ofWinchester·s churches are, in fact, known to have and in all other places within your shire of Southampton by the hand~
become disused in the later Middle Ages: a figure close to that of seven- of the collectors, farmers, receivers and other occupiers of the same,
teen lost churches claimed in the petition).' 3 The despairing final phrase for the time bein_g, as in your letter s patent thereof to them made may
declares that, if Winchester cannot be helped by the king's remission of appear more plamly: Which annuity is now void to them, and wholly
its tax burden, the mayor and other officers will be compelled to stand returne~ to you, bec~use of an act, made in your parliament, begun at
down and return the city into the direct control of the crown. Westmmster and fimshed at Leicester. 1· 1 And so now your said suppli-
ants sta~d all utterly destitute of all manner of relief of their charges
'A petition of the city of Winchester to King Henry VI', Archaeolo~a, abovesa1d, to the uttercst undoing of your said city for ever, without
I, London: Society of Antiquaries of London, I 770, pp. 91-5. English, your high and noble grace be showed to them in this behalf. That it
please your said highness graciously to consider the charges abovesaid,
revised by GR.

JS See Introduction, pp. 17- 18; Keene, Winchester, i, pp. 86-105; Calendar of Patent Ro/ls, Ii Henry VI, desperately_shor~ of funds, had secured an Act of Resumption in 1450
\\hereby he took back mto his hands various rights and lands previously granted.
1486-41, pp. 400,507.
192 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND THE ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE
19S

and, of your most abundant grace, to grant unto the mayor, bailiffs and Cirenceste~•- and Winch_ester, togethf:!r with Canterbury, whose suc-
commonalty of your said city £26 1Ss 4d, to be had and taken yearly cessful pet1t1on of 1477 1s reproduced here.'~ The case exempl'fi th
to them, and to their successors, from the feast of Michaelmas [29 f !" I es e
us_e o . par 1ament by town councils to secure exceptional rights of tax-
September] 1452, for evermore, of the ulnage and subsidy of woollen ation m order to fund substantial civic project.,;.
cloths to be sold within your said city, suburbs and soke of the same,
and in other places within your shire of Southampton, by the hands of Rotuliparliamentontm, 6 vols, London, 1767-77, vi, pp. 177-9. EnglisJ1
the collectors, farmers, receivers and occupiers of the said ulnage and revised by GR. '
subsidy for the time being, at the feasts of Easter and Michaelmas by
even portions after the tenor and effect of another schedule to this bill To the right wise and discreet commons in this present parliament
annexed. asse~1bled, shown unto your wisdoms, the mayor and commonalty of
These be the streets that be fallen down in the city of Winchester t?~ city of~anterbury. For as much as the same city is one of the oldest
within 80 years last past: c1t1es of_ this realm, and therein is the principal see of the spiritual
estate of the same realm, and which city also is most in sight of all
Jury Street, wherein were 80 householders, and now but 2. strang~rs of the parts beyond the sea resorting into this realm and
Fleshmonger Street, wherein were 140 householders, and now but 2. ~epartm~ out o~ the same, and because of the glorious saints that there
Fishmonger Street, wherein were 60 householders, and now but 4. he enshrined, 1s greatly renowned throughout Christendom
h. h . I . , un t o
Coalbrook Street, wherein were 160 householders, and now be but w 1c city a so ts great repair [the flocking of multitudes] of much
16. of_the peopl~ ~f this r~alm'. both of estates and others, by way of pil-
Calpe Street, wherein were JOO householders, and now be but 6. ~rimage to v1s1t tl_1e said saints. And it is so, that the same city is often
Gold Street, wherein were 140 householders, and now be but 8. times full foul, noisome and unhealthy, both to all the inhabitants and
Burden Street, wherein were 60 householders, and now is never one. ~o all other persons resorting there, on account of which often times
Shulworth Street, wherein were 70 households, and now be but 4. 1s spo_ke~ much disworship in diverse places, both beyond the sea and
Buck Street, wherein were 40 households, and now be but 2. on th1~ s1?e of the sea, which cannot be remedied in any way, unless
Minster Street, wherein were 90 households, and now be but 4. the said city 1~1ay be ~aved. To this the greater part of the inhabitants
Gar Street, wherein were JOO households, and now is never one. ofth~ same city: havmg burgages,• houses or tenements in the same,
are right well willed a~d agreeable, provided that there be authority to
The number of households that be fal lcn 997, and apart from these be compel others to contribute to the same.
fallen within the same city, since the last parliament, 81 households. PI~ase it_therefore your wisdoms ... to enact that all and every persons,
The desolation of the said poor city is so great, and yearly falling, for ~'"~ se1sed• _o~ possessed of any burgages, properties or tenements
there is such decay and unwin* that, without gracious comfort of the within or adJommg to the principal street of the said city, which begins
king our sovereign lord, the mayor and the bailiffs must of necessity at t_he gate called the Westgate ... and extends eastward to Newingate,
cease and deliver up the city and the keys into the king's hands. or in another street which begins at Burgate and extends westwards
to a place called the Bullstake and to the gate of the Black Friars, or
in another street, from the Bullstake southward to the church of St
78. Paving the city streets Andrew and southward from there to the iron cros~ in the parish of
St Margaret, into which streets and places, commonly is more resort
During the 1470s and 1480s a series of town councils petitioned the ofbo~h strangers and others, than to any other street or place within
crown in parliament for permission to impose upon property owners th
e city, after reasonable warning by the civic officers, as often as
the responsibility to make and repair the paving of the street in ~ront
of their houses. The cities concerned included Gloucester, Bnstol 15
For the others sec llotuliparliamentonim, vi, pp. +9, 180, s~.:,. S90-I.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
194

necessary, shall repair the pavement be~ore each of the said burgages,
properties and tenements ... up to the middle of the street before them.
VII. TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE
Which petition being heard in the parliament, the response was: Let it
be done as is requested.

As the medieval town was defined by the diversity of its componen

elements, so it was condemned to the strains of tension and to peri-
odic violence. Economic growth raised the stakes, leading to further
differentiation of wealth and status and encouraging increased compe-
tition for control of taxation and access to markets. During the long
thirteenth century, as the medieval European economy expanded to
its limits, a series of clashes over municipal jurisdiction sprang from a
clear economic motivation. A significant element in these conflicts was
often resentment of the legal immunities enjoyed by the Church. At the
beginning of that period, the leading cloth-workers and merchants of
such a borough as Bury St Edmunds, which had grown up as a small
market to service the monastic community, were already beginning to
show signs of restlessness under the patriarchal aegis of the abbot, who
reprimanded their disobedience as though they were unruly children
[79]. At its end, the townsmen had organised themselves into a guild
through which to orchestrate their commercial interests and political
identity [ 82].1 Monastic town!> in general faced similar and usually
immoveable ecclesiastical authority: only the royal act of Dissolution
in the l 5S0s would remove the clerical yoke. But others in addition
to Bury used a social and religious fraternity as a means to focus
and express the concerns of the secular population : s1]. Assaults
by townsmen upon monastic communities, as occurred in Bury and
Abingdon in IS27, seem in general to have been orchestrated through
the formation of guilds which, if they did not at the time achieve the
autonomy that was sought, none the less continued to function as sur-
rogate communes for the articulation of collective identities and the
undertaking of public works.'1 Such alternative vehicles of communal
expression may go some way to explain the fact that such conflicts only
rarely flared into open violence.'

1M. D Lobel, The Borough ef Bury St Edmu11d's. A ~tudJ m the Government and
Development efa Mo11asltr Town. Oxford, 19.'35.
2 G. Rosser, The Art ef Solidarity in the Middle Ages. Gutlds i11 Engla11d JZ5r>-t650,
Oxford, 2015, esp. eh. 6 .
~ N. M. Trenholme, The E11glish Monastic Boroughs, Columbia, Ml, 1927, is a useful
account wluch, however, tends in general to exaggerate the violence of the conflicts.
196 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE 197

The issue of ecclesiastical rights and franchises* could be no less The secular population was itself, of course, divided by wealth, status
potent a catalyst of political tension in other places, and especially in and influence. Class also can be seen as a contributor to social conflict
the cathedral towns, which on occasion witnessed dramatic scenes of in the town. The large proportion of urban workers who did not own
a bishop blockaded within his palace (at Hereford in 1262) or a cathe- the premises or, probably, the tools of their trade but who worked
dral close in flames (at Norwich in 1272) [5]. Rifts at the level of the for wages created tensions between shop-owners and this dependent
clerical and secular elites could open up debate to a larger political labour force [28]. At times those tensions were manifest in an expli1oit
community, giving an effective voice to the unenfranchised, as rival challenge addressed to the masters by the journeymen of a craft, havi~ir
authorities bid for popular support.+ The legal immunity enjoyed by been nurtured once again in the meetings of an unofficial fraternify
the clerical population of any town, in so far as it was subject to the [90]. However, in the course of a professional career, a working man
ecclesiastical and not to the secular courts, created a particular atmos- or woman typically moved to and fro across this economic divide, com-
phere of intermittent tension in the university towns. In all towns, the plicating the image of a clear class distinction.8 The group of towns-
clerical population represented a not insignificant 2 or 3 per cent of the men in Oxford who in the middle of the thirteenth century identified
total. 5 But in the cases of Oxford and Cambridge, that proportion was themselves as 'the lesser burgesses· and who claimed to speak for the
far higher because all students entered minor clerical orders (even ifa 'lower commune' of the city, catalogued a series of grievances which
decreasing number in the later Middle Ages eventually proceeded to focused on the perceived corruption and manipulation of office on the
become priests), and civic officers found themselves at times provoked part ofa narrow group [80]. These were serious issues, but not in this
beyond endurance by the snub to their dignity and authority. Even case rooted in differences of class.
the deadly consequences of the St Scholastica's Day riot in Oxford in Xenophobia was the ostensible force behind a number of violent inci-
1355 did not bring about a resolution of this jurisdictional conflict, dents, although, considering that these never amounted to a sustained
which certainly went well beyond the apparently trivial incident in persecution of foreigners, a more realistic interpretation of these
a tavern which set light to the city. The value of the students to the attacks would seek the underlying cause elsewhere, and in particular in
Crown as prospective bureaucrats and administrators was such that, perceived economic threats. Intermittent assaults on Italian merchants
to the mayor's exasperation, the king invariably upheld their academic in fourteenth-century London [86] need to be seen in this light, as
privileges [85].1; The university environment generated in peculiarly does the attack on Flemings during the disturbances in London in June
concentrated form a more widely encountered tendency of young men 9
IS81. The true causes of conflict are not always easy to determine. The
in towns to congregate socially, to drink, and on occasion to prove particular role of urban populations in the Peasants' Revolt of 1S8 I
their developing masculinity in acts of collective violence.' continues to invite further analysis. While some studies have pointed
to the class interests of dependent urban workers, others have noted
4 G. Rosser. 'Conflict and political community in the medieval town: <l~sputes bet1_<·ren the opportunism and lack of eYident ideological motivation on the part
clergy and laity in Hereford', in T. R. Slater and G. Rosser (eds). 7 he C?urch 1~ I~
Medieval Town, Al<lershot, 1998, pp. 2()--42; P. Maddern. 'Order and disorder, m of some of the townspeople subsequently charged with involvement
C. Rawclilfe and R. Wilson (e<ls), Medieval Norwich, London, 2004, pp. 189-211!. in the uprising.io At Beverley, a dramatic overturning of the regime
5 R. N. Swanson, Church and Society i11 Later Medieval England, Oxford, 1989, PP· S~;
N. Tanner, The Church in l,at, Medieval Norwich I 370-1582, Toronto, I984, pp. I8-21.
8 See Section IV.
6 For modern accounts of the disturbance of IS55, drawing on additional sourres,
sec H. Rashdall, The Universities ef Europe in the Middk Ages, ed. F. M. P_o~icke and 9 H. Bradley, The Italian community in London, c. I350-1450', Ph.D. thesis, University
A. B. Emden, s ,·ols, Oxford, 1936, iii. pp. 96-102; W. Pantin, Oxford Life ~n Oxford of London, 1991!; M Bratchcl, 'Regulation and group--<'onsciousness in the later his-
Archives, Oxford, 1972, pp. 99-104; J. Catto (ed.), The History ef the Vn1vm1ty rf tory of London's Italian merchant colonies·, .Journal efEuropMn Economic History, IX,
Oxford, i, The Early O.rfard Schools, Oxford, 1984, pp. 146- 7. 1980, pp. 585-610, M. Carlin, Medieval Southwark, London, 1996, pp. 157-f;I!.
7 R. M. Karras, 'Sharing wine, women, and song: masculine identity formatio~ in the IO R._ H. Hilton, Bond Mm Made Free: Medieval Peasant Movements and the English
medieval European univcrsititcs·, in J. J . Cohen and B. Wheeler (eds), &commg Malt ~1s111gef 1381, l!nd_edn, with mtroduction by C. Dyer, London, l!OOS; A. F. Butcher,
in the Middle Ages, New York, 1997, pp. 187--'..!02; P. J.P. Gold~erg, 't-:faste~s and Engl~sh urba~ society and the Re~·olt of 1381 ', in R.H. Hilton and T. H. Aston (e<ls),
men in late medieval England', in D. M. Hadley (ed.), Mascul1111ty m Medieval Eurr,Jlt, The English llwngef1381, Cambridge, 1984, pp. 8+--111; A. Prescott, 'London in the
London, 1999,pp.56-iO,esp.pp.64-8. Peasants' Revolt; a portrait gallery. Lo11donJour11a~ VII, 1981, pp. 125-43.
-
198 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AM) VIOLENCE

coincided with the Revolt, with which some connection appears to be ~r _emoti?nal :ontr?ls on aggressive behaviour [SS], [89].w E\'ery
indicated, but the sources are enigmatic [88]. The most common cat- mc1den~ ~s a tmy wmd~w o_n to. a larger world of social relationships
alyst of political awareness and _activ_ism a_mo~g sh~pkeeJ>:~S, artisans and political debate. Crime 1s of course a function of law, no less than
and merchants alike was a perceived mequ1ty m the 11npos1t10n of local i~ is. fostere~ by economic hardship and social exclusion. Like pros-
taxes. Typical was the introduction in the late fifte_enth ce~t~ry by t~e t1tut10~, which although condemned by canon law was additionally
city elders of Coventry of a new toll on cloth, which prec1p1tated _dis- prosci:1bed by the secular courts of the towns, occasional robbery was
turbances by workers who drew on folk legend and used the_ media of mos~ .frequently the recour~e of those ~riven to desperate measures b
rhyme and billboard publicity to maximise the impact of the1r p~otest pove1 ty. Many would find 1t hard, havmg reached this level, to escape 1
[91].11 At the end of our period widespread protest was occasioned altogether from a world of crime in which some became hardened
concerning access to common pastures outside the towns. Civic officers professionals [ 8 I], :s4y• Most recorded incidents, however had
who attempted to offset financial losses by leasing town fields to grazi- their origins in domestic arguments, generational conflicts, ten,sions
ers provoked townspeople to appeal against this infringement of what in the w?rkplace or, on~e again, the perceived corruption ofjustices or
were claimed (on little or no legal basis) to be their traditional 'libertie~• tax officials, each of which was fostered by the multiple inequalities of
and 'rights'. The significant outcome of such disputes was a heightened urban society.
sense, amongst protesters, of their collective political identity.1~
Official accounts and clerical histories which record such incidents
tend to characterise their participants as irrational and chaotic.15 The 79. Monastery and town: Bury St Edmunds 1197
evidence, however, suggests that, on the relatively rare occasions when
they revolted, townspeople tended to act witl~ a dcli~erate pur~ose. A seemingly superficial incident in the ecclesiastical sanctuary proves
The very emotionalism of their rhetoric and actions, which older h1~to- to be the catalyst of a significant stand-off between an abbot and the
rians overlooked or dismissed as insignificant, needs to be recognised b~rgesses oftl~e surroun~ing town. The event is revealing ofan under-
as part of a conscious strategy.H Our sources often give n~ more than lymg a~d persistent ambivalence concerning the relationship between
tantalising glimpses of the motives of those who caused dtstur~ances, monastic and urban communities. The monastic chronicler naturally
with the result that we risk underestimating the extent of rationally tells the story from the perspective and in the sententious tone of the
formulated protest. 15 monks.
We should take care, therefore, in our interpretation of evidence of
interpersonal violence in the medieval town: it is t~o eas! t? s~ip_ into D. Greenway and J. Sayers (ed.), .Jocelin ef Brakelond, Chronicle ef the
lazy generalisation about the supposed absence of either Jurisd1ct1onal Abbey ef Bu1y St Edmunds, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989,
pp. 8~-s, reproduced by permission of Oxford University Press; with
H. E. Butler (ed.), The Chronicle ef Joceli11 ef Brakelond, London: T.
Nelson, 1949, p. 92. Transl. by the editors, revised by GR.
11 On such political use of popular culture see G. Rosser, 'Myth, image and social pro-
cess in the English medieval town', Urban History, XXIII, W96, pp. 5-25.
12 C. D. Liddy, 'Urban enclosure riots: risings of the ,·ommons in English towns. On the day afi::r Christmas Day [1197], there were gatherings in
1+so--152s·, Past & Present, CCXXVI, 201.5, pp. 41-77. t~e cemetery, wtth contests and competitions (colluctationes et co11certa-
J:I See the monastic chroniclers on the Peasants' Re\'oh, excerpted in 8. Dobson edJ tzones) between the abbot's servants and the townspeople, but matters
if
The Peasants' Revolt I 88 I. l!nd edn, London. 1983.
14 J Haemers 'A moody community? Emotion and ritual in late medieval urban 16
. • l<.'cur,pn.•-De~ar?in ancl A.-L. V~n Bru.aene (ccl) · · m · theHarl See the balanced discussion by H. Sko<la, Medieval l'iolnice: Ph)'stcal Brutalrty in
remits·, in E. s • Emollons t Nor/Mm Frana, t:J7<>-ISS0, Oxford, !!OIS. .
ifthe City (H'h-16'' Centuries), furnhout, 200<>, pp. 63-81. 17
C. Han1111cr, 'Patterns ofhonticide in a mcclle\'al uni\'ersity town: fourteenth-century
15 S. K. Cohn, Popular Protest i11 [.,ate Medieval English Towns. Cambridge. 2015, c~t•- Oxford. Past_and Present. LXXVIII, 1978, pp. 2-23: F . Rexroth, Dn.•,ana and Powtr
logues many incidents, some, although not all, of which bear the mark of planning 1
; Late Me11eval London, transl. P. Selwyn, Cambridge, 2007; B Gercmek, Tiu
and co-ordination. , largms efSocte~y 111 Lale Medieval Pan'.<, transl. J. Birrell, Cambridge, 1987.
 TOWNS !N MEDIEVAL ENGLAND n : NSIONS AND VIOU: NCE
200

escalated from words to blows, and then from punches to wounds and 80. Complaint of the lesser burgesses of Oxford 1255
bloodshed. When the abbot heard about it, he asked some of those
who had gone to the show, but had stood on the sidelines,. to come Thi~ petition to the king was apparently supported by a group of
and see him privately, and he commanded the names of the nuscrea~ts Oxford burg~sses, _although it bears the seal only of one of these,
to be written down. He had all these summoned to appear before him Walter de Milton. fhe group he claimed to represent, and \\ hich he
in St Dcnis's chapel on the day after St Thomas [Becket]'s day [so cal!ed the 'lesser co~1mune', \\ as evidently not made up of the humbl@r
December]. In the interim he did not invite any of the townspeople ~rt1sans, but c~1~pnsed freemen who we:e not eligible to hold offic\;
to his table as in previous years he had normally done ~n the first five m the town, 01, m other words, the less important householders ano
days of Christmas. On the appointed day, after the _ev1~ence on. oath burg:sses, wh~m he distinguished from the 'magnate burgesses of the
of sixteen sworn men had been heard, the abbot said, fhese wicked town . Accordmg to the complaint (paragraph xxvii), many of this
men obviously fall within the canon sentenciae latae, but because they group had been deterred from putting their seals to the document by
are laymen from here and roundabout, and do not ~ppreciate how_out- the threats of the 'greater burgesses'. The outcome of the petition is
rageous it is to commit such sacrilege, I shall publicly excomm~mc~te not known.
them by name, 18 so that others may be more fear~ul. _I s~all beg1~ with
my own household and servants to ensure that JUSt1ce 1s done impar- H. E. Salter{ed.), Sn~ppe'~ Formulary, Oxford Historical Society, LXXX,
tially.' This was carried out as soon as we had put on stoles and candles Oxford: Oxford ~mvers1ty Press, !924, pp. ~ 72- 80, drawing also on
were lit. Then they all left the church, and after some discussion they Calendar of_ Inqutsttwns Miscellaneous, 1219-1807, London: HMSO, pp.
undressed and, naked except for their underpants, prostrated them- 79--83. Latm, transl. by the editor, revised by GR.
selves in front of the church door. When the abbot's assistants, monks
and clerks came and told him tearfully that over a hundred naked men The burgesses of the lesser commune of Oxford petition God and their
were ]yin~ there, the abbot also wep~- ~ut i~ ~is words and ~n his face lord the king of England against the magnate burgesses of the town:
he displayed the severity of the law, h1dmg his mner co1:1pass1on, fo~ he
wished to be urged by his advisers to absolve the pemtents, k~owmg i. When:ver the lord king demands a tallage* from the town
that mercy is exalted above judgement, and that the church receives all of Oxford, by determination of the said magnates, the lc~scr
those who repent. Therefore, when they had all been severely beate~ burgesses are ~lways assessed at a rate nearly double or more;
and absolved, they took an oath that they would accept the chur~h s because of wluch the latter are destroyed and, unless the king
judgement regarding the sacrilege the_y had committed. The following shortly make a great and stern enquiry, to establish the truth
day they were given penances acco~dmg to canon law, an~ the abbot and enfo_rce amendment by the council of the kingdom, they
took them all back into complete umty. But he uttered terrible threats shall be forced by necessity and penury to leave their lands and
against anyone who, by word or deed, should create discord, and he houses. They will shortly be carrying the burdens of the entire
publicly prohibited assemblies and sho~s in _the ce1:1etery. ~o, when town in tallages, gifts and all other misfortunes. And although
everyone had been restored to the blessmg of peace, 1t was w1~h gre~t the magnate_bur~esses ?eclare themselves to be taxed, they
rejoicing that on the following days the townspeople feasted with the1r always remam quit and mdemnified, apart from three men, so
lord the abbot. that in four parishes there are not ten men left to bear tallage,
they are so destroyed. And that this is true will appear clearly
from the following articles.

ii. [n the mayoralty of Geoffrey de Stokewell [1237--40] , £40

\\:ere collected from the lesser commune by common counsel of
1s F or an anat hema to ha\ e effoct at this period, it needed to he addressed to named
him and the fifteen JUrats :_jurors] of Oxford in order to obtain
individuals.
from the papal court, it is said, the privilege that no layman
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE 20S
202

should be forced to go to law either by a clerk or a layman out- Ri~~ard in Oxford, upon which the earl directed the mayor and
side the town of Oxford. This privilege has never been estab- ba1hffs to make recompense; but because the criminals were of
lished, nor yet benefited any man; and this is clear,_ because the th_e magnates, the mayor and bailiff.'> would not compel them,
said Geoffrey is now bringing a case again~t ce~t~m laymen of with the result that the earl distrained and arrested the mer-
Oxford at Hertford, which is against the said pnv1lege. chants and their goods at fairs and markets all around Oxford.
Then the mayor and bailiffs with the fifteen jurats collected
iii. In the mayoralty of Nicholas de Stokewell [1247-49], a n:ian ~~lank] and more from the poor to satisfy the lord earl for the
of the household of Earl Richard [ of Cornwall, brother of Kmg mJury done to his man.
Henry III] was crossing the Hi_gh Str_eet in winter and a man
came up carrying a snowball, with which he str~ck ~he man so n It also happened that a knight named Anketin Malure came on
as to put out his eye. The lord earl, hearing ~f t~1s, directed the the king's or~ers to Oxford, ~nd laid on the burgesses a tallage
mayor and bailiffs of Oxford to arrest the cnmmal and com~l of £200 of silver. Half of tl11s was at once gathered from the
him to make amends; and because they would not arrest hm1, lesser commune; but when the king demanded the remainder,
the earl caused the merchants of Oxford to be distrained, and £40 and more were again gathered from the lesser commune.
their goods to be attached at fairs and markets ~~ eve~y side
of Oxford; on account of which the mayor and ba1hffs with the vii. In the ma~oralty of Nicholas de Stokewell, the mayor and jurats
fifteen ju rats gathered £40 and more from the lesser commune were forbidden by the grace of the king to enter the houses
to satisfy the earl for the wrong done to his man. of widows to levy taxes on them; but they devised amongst
themselves a certain tax on alewives who were the wives of
iv. About the same time a man of the household of Sir Aymer burgesses, thereby defrauding them of the king's grace granted
the king's [half-Jbrother was coming one night from the mill to them; and from these they took £20 and more, not one
under Oxford castle, leading a horse with a sack of flour to penny of which went to the crown, but they divided it all among
make bread for the said Aymer; and when he came into the themselves.
parish of St Peter-le-Bailey, certain cri~1inals assau!ted him and
beat him so that within three days he died. Upon this Aymer fell v111. The said fifteen jurats chose the bailiffs each year from their
into a great anger, because this was shortly after his a_rrival in own number. At the end of the year, the mayor comes and
Oxford [in 1247], and he reported the matter to t~e ~mg. The shows that the bailiffs are in arrears by £6 1ss 4d, £10 or
king ordered the mayor and bailiffs to arrest the cnmmals, who ,/2IS 6s Bd. These sums are then gathered by the mayor and
immediately after the deed went into hiding. So the mayor and _Jurats from the lesser commune; but the king gains no honour
bailiffs with the fifteen jurats gathered £20 and more from the or profit, for the greater burgesses divide the money among
lesser commune of Oxford, to recompense Sir Aymer for the themselves.
death of his servant. But when Sir Aymer heard that the mo~ey
had all been taken from the lesser commune, he was moved with ix. When the bailiffs declare themselves to be in arrears by £6 1ss
pity, and at the suggestion of the masters of the university he 4d or £10, the mayor and the fifteen jurats by their common
directed the return to each man of what had been taken from counsel gather £20 or £26 I ss 4d from the lesser commune of
him. But of those £20 neither the mayor nor the bailiffs ever which the king has neither honour nor use. '
made restitution to those who had paid them, but divided them
amongst themselves. x. When Adam Feteplace was mayor [for the second time, in
125 I], William de Exemue, clerk, came to Oxford, and caused
v. In the mayoralty of Thomas under the Wall [1249-51], some all the burgesses to meet in the guildhall where the king's pleas
of the greater burgesses beat a man of the household of Earl are heard, in order that an aid might be demanded of them for
 TENSIONS AND VIOLENCI-: 205
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
204
the lesser _burgesses and the poor, that if any man should act or
the king; whereupon the burgesses withdrew from t_he bench ~o speak _agamst the mayor or any of the jurats in relation to an
consider what answer they should make. Meanwhile, the said of their statutes or provisions, so that the fact could be prov~
William addressed those sitting and standing around: 'Sirs, I
by two or three men, then that man could be imprisoned and he
recently heard a surprising complaint ma<le to the king in his should pay a fine of £5 to the mayor and £2 to each ofthejurats.
court, that wheneYer tallages, amercements, or presents are
paid to the king or queen or justices, the greater burgesses of xiv. Also in the time _of the same Adam, the greater burgesses mad\
Oxford take them entirely from the lesser commune and from an ~greement with the king for £ss 6s sd to ha\ e the town in
the poorer townspeople, while they themselves neve'. pay a their own hands, to which end they gathered over £100 from
penny but always remain quit, at which our lord the k1~g was the les:.er commune; but of themselves only three contributed.
very angry.' Then nearly all the people answered with one
Yoice: That is very true, and we are ready to say so to our lord xv. Also_ i~ the time of the said Adam the mayor and jurats made
the king whenever he will listen.' prov1s1on that no man of the lesser commune should make
woollen cloth that was not of 800 [threads] in width and the
x1. Also the said William de Exemue, on his return to Oxford from warp corresponding to the woof; as a consequence of ~hich no
London, delivered the tallage rolls to the greater burgesses;
poor man who should support himself by this trade is able to
and soon afterwards they demanded that poor persons liable
get_ work at ~II or to earn a Jiving. The jurats have six looms,
to tallage should pay at twice the rate~ at which they had ~en bestd~s the kmg's looms, on which they can make what cloth
assessed by their peers; but whether this was done by the will of they like;_ and no poor man dares contradict them in these mat-
William or the greater burgesses is unknown. ters;_but ~fany cloth is found in the lesser commune of\ess than

xi1. At that time [ J 252], the town being in the sheriffs hand ~y
800 m width, it !sconfiscated into the hand of the greater bur-
ges~es, and he with whom it is found is fined. Thus through this
order of the king, the mayor and ju rats asked leave of the shenff ordmance most of the lesser commune are driven to beggary.
to have a gathering of money among the poor workmen of the
town according to custom; and immediately they caused all the
xvi. '~he~ make provis!on that no fishmonger should buy sea fish
workmen of the said town, great and small, as many as were
commg to Oxfor~ 1~ any market within ten leagues of Oxford,
poor, to come together, giving as a reason, amongst others,
nor f~esh fi_sh w1thm five leagues, nor until it has been two
that they would in no way allow them_ to dwell among them
days m Oxford market. Also that no woman should buy butter
unless they were in their merchant guild, so that none c?uld or ch_eese?r eggs or such wares before noon. And if anyone is
escape them, even by making the excu_se of p~verty, until h~ convicted m such matters, he i~ to lose the wares and be subject
had satisfied them; nor did they pern11t questions as to ho~ to a fine.
this was to be paid for, but they compelled them to ~nter thetr
merchant guild, whether they wished to or not, _which for the xvii. Fishmongers used to haYe their stalls in the High Street on
unfrce was not even lawful. Neither that gathering of money,
market days at a yearly charge of 2d; but now they pay half a
nor others, which are always held every third year, have yielded
mark [6s Bd], or 5s, or 12d at least.
either honour or profit to the king and queen, but the greater
burgesses have always divided the pr~f,t among themseJ\'es.
xviii. They made provision that no cook should dare to boil or roast
And so by all kinds of device and deceit they crush the lesser
a~y ~ood outside his door unless he first have paid 'ls or ss for
people and the poor. his licence. Poor sellers of bread and beer, though they used to
pay ~d or I '2d at most, must now pay 4s or 5s or 12d at least.
xiii. ln the mayoralty of Adam de Feteplace, he and the jurats d~vised Despite paymg these exactions the poor of the lesser commune
among them an ordinance for the confusion and destruction
 TOWNS JN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE 207
206

are in arrears of £6 ISs 4d or £9 every year, and are tallaged XXV. When a man obtains a writ of right from the king's court con-
until the full farm of the town [the fee-farm rent of £6S Os 5d cerning any injury done to him in respect of his possessions, and
per annum] is paid to the king. · alleges his right either in person or by deputy, in the full court
before the fifteen jurats, they meet in a secret place, and quash
and overthrow the king's writ and the petitioner's claim. This
xix. Geoffrey de Stokewell stopped up a channel of the river Cherwell
running into the Thames after the departure of the justices, to was clear at the last coming of the justices, for many complaints
the destruction of the poor fishermen, and the damage of the were received before them.
whole town.

xx. Walter Bolled and Simon de Lundonia, who opposed that pro-
xxv1. A man of the lesser commune made a chimney for the smoke to
go out of his house, as is the custom of the whole town. Then
'
vision, had each to find sureties for a fine of £5 before he was came Adam Feteplace, because a little smoke came into his
released. house, and wanted to block up the said chimney. And when the
poor man tried to argue with him he beat him violently, and
xxi. When the town is surveyed by the king's order, five or six dangerously wounded his wife on the head. Nevertheless the
jurats go through the streets, and cause two or three loyal men poor man was condemned by the jurats to pay the said Adam
of the lesser commune to be called before them in each parish, to £5, which are still unjustly kept from him.
assess tallage on their neighbours together with the said jurats;
but these poor men do not dare to tallage their neighbours xxvii. On Tuesday before St Peter Enthroned [apparently 18
according to their ability, but they are surveyed and plundered February I25S], when the lesser burgesses were assembled
as it seems good to the said jurats. at St Giles' church to fix their seals to this document and to
consider the best way of making their complaint, som~ of the
xxn. In the time of Geoffrey de Stokewell, because one of the lesser greater burgesses came upon them and attacked them, call-
commune bought half a last of herrings at Abingdon, all his ing them robbers, and saying that unless they dispersed, they
herrings were taken from him and unjustly detained. would be deprived of all their goods. So they departed, and have
not since dared to assemble and seal the document.
xxiii. In the time of Adam de Feteplace, the greater burgesses gath-
ered money of the lesser commune, and with it bought three xxviii. On Friday in the week of St Matthew the Apostle [apparently
tuns of wine, and drank it together. At length it was said that 28 February 1253], the bailiffs of Oxford came by order of the
one part had more wine than the other, and they fought, and mayor andjurats to the house of Walter de Middilton the bearer
pulled one another's hair: which was neither to the profit nor of this little book, who always defended the poor, and forcing
to the honour of our lord the king or his men. But the poor are their way into his house they took away most of his goods, and
always destroyed and reduced to nothing. declared that he had forfeited all liberty of buying and selling by
which he kept his household, and they have continued to detain
xxiv. When the king's bailiff."> come to Oxford and make inquisition of his goods against gage and pledge. So the said Walter prays for
ordinances and assizes• of buying and selling, whether they are mercy and aid from the king, seeing that unless he obtains it
kept in accordance with the custom of the realm, twelve of the speedily, he will be destroyed, killed, and brought to nothing.
jurats, to bring the poor under tallage by guile, swear falsely
that the said ordinances have not been kept but broken. For this xxix. All the poor of the lesser commune beg the king that, for the
they make composition with the said bailiffs for ten or twehe love of God and the salvation of his soul, he should investigate
marks, and then tallage the poor of the lesser commune for £JS these articles, together with all the men of Oxford, clergy and
6s sd or £20, and divide the surplus among themselves. laity, except those whose names are here endorsed; command
208 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE 209

that the said Walter be treated peaceably; and have the inquisi- Winchester and Joh_n of Christchurch in New Salisbury, put
tion taken before himself in person lest it should be overthrown themselves upon [a Jury of] 12 of Salisbury. The jury say that
by others. on T~esday before the Annunciation [24 March 1276] Robert
of Wmchester and John went to New Salisbury and were har-
[ On the reverse of the scroll:] boured in Robert atte Novene's house and there drank; and a
boy was singing there about bakers. Walter de Taunton arrived
These are the names of the greater burgesses of Oxford: wishing to have sport, and heard the song. He returned, utterin~
Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Trutun Henry Perie threats, to Stephen de Harpeden's house and there found Robert
Geoffrey de Stokewell Thomas Mauger Henry de Wycumbe de Noneton lying in bed and looked for a stick; and Walter went
Nicholas de Stokewell Roger Arconer Walter Kepharm away without Robert de Noneton's knowledge or privity; and he
Thomas under the wall William the spicer Henry Henge beat Robert of Winchester and John so that they died on the fifth
Geoffrey the goldsmith William de 0. William Wythe day. Afterwards he returned to Stephen de Harpeden's house and
Geoffrey de Heynkesey Aufredus the spicer William Boydon there with Robert [de Lym] and the others baked bread; and
John de Colleshell John Halegod Richard the mercer Robert de Lym and Philip did not know of the deed nor shared in
John Cursy Laurence Wyth Robert the miller it. So three are acquitted. Walter to be taken ifhe can be found.
John Pady Thomas the spicer Jaym Simeon
Adam under the wall William junior, spicer Henry de Carnage (b) [Pleas before the royal justices at Wilton, 20 April 128 1J John
Walter de Kyngetona Thomas de Elmeley Allwyne, approver,• charges John of the forest ofrobbery and fel-
lowship in robbery and says that on Sunday after Midsummer [20
June] 1280 he was in his fellowship at Bristol and that they there
81. Urban crime in the late thirteenth century together stole cloth of Ireland, shoes and linen cloth, whereof he
had 4s as his share, and on the Saturday following at Malmesbury
The range of criminal cases which could be judged by urban courts where they stole cloth and shoes, of which he had Ss as his share
varied according to the privileges granted by the crown in civic char- and that he was his fellow in thefts there and elsewhere, whereof
ters. The most serious crimes, however, were reserved to the king: they he l~ad 6s 8d and more as his share. Both offer to deraign* by their
were tried before itinerant royal justices or (increasingly over time) the bod1e~ as the ~ourt shall decide. So to battle. Gages offered. A day
county sheriff Beyond naming the accused and their punishment, their was given, Friday []. John of the forest was vanquished, and so
records can shed light on the social context of crime. The first of the [condemned to death]. He had no chattels.
cases presented here shows how evidence produced in court can illumi-
nate the surrounding environment of organised crafts and sociability.
The second gives a glimpse of organised crime rings preying on urban 82.Dispute between the merchant guild and the abbot of
trade. Bury St Edmunds 1804

R. B. Pugh (ed.), Wiltshire Gaol Deliveries and Trailbaston Trials 1275- Here the kmg'sjustices attempt to resolve a dispute between the ancient
1306, Wiltshire Record Society, XXXIII {1977), pp. 41, 62. Latin, and powerful Benedictine abbey of Bury St Edmunds and the wealthier
transl. by the editor. burgesses of the expanding market town which had grown up at its
gate~. Economic growth and political experience gave rise to recurrent
(a) [Delivery of Old Salisbury gaol, 29 May 1276] New Salisbury. tensions of this nature in many such monastic towns. Their profits
Robert de Lym, Robert de Noneton and Philip the baker de from trade in Suffolk wool and cloth lead the mercantile and manufac-
Haghechereche taken and imprisoned for slaying Robert of turing elite of Bury to claim the right to have a protective guild. The
abbot, appealing to history (see also [to], [79]), denies the guild's
210 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLE NCE 211

pretensions. As a result of the quarrel, lesser traders and artisans find an alderman and a guild merchant in the aforesaid town and are free
a political voice to protest against their exploitation. The merchants burgesses, rendering judgments by their alderman of pleas pleaded* in
present a circumstantial case for the existence and legitimacy of their the court of the same abbot before his bailiffs in the town aforesaid. And
guild. The abbot denies that this is more than a social fraternity with- that without any trespasses or unlawful assemblies they meet at their
out legal rights (see [95] for a comparative instance of a fraternity guildhall in the same town, as often as need be, to treat of the common
with a substantial political role). The king's lawyers, in a judgement profit and advantage of the men and burgesses of the aforesaid town,
typical of such cases, uphold the rights of the monastic lords. as is quite lawful for them. And that they and their ancestors and pre;,
decessors, burgesses, etc., have used such a custom from time whereof
A. E. Bland, P. A. Brown and R. H. Tawney (eds), English Economic no memory is, to wit, of taking 2s Id from every man dwelling in the
History: Select Documents, London: G. Bell & Sons, 1914, pp. 128-SO. town, being in the tithing of the abbot of the place aforesaid, having
Latin, transl. by the editors. chattels to the value of 20s, that he may trade among them and enjoy
their market customs in the same town, and likewise of receiving 46s
Pleas at the town of Bury St Edmunds before William de Bereford, sd from every man of the town aforesaid having chattels to the value of
W. Howard and W. de Carleton, justices of the king, on Tuesday next £6 I 3s 4d to keep ;::maintain] their guild merchant.,., And that there is
after the feast of St Lucy the Virgin [l.'3 December] l.'305. Nicholas the following custom among them beyond this, to wit, that twelve bur-
Fouk and others by conspiracy premeditated among them at the town gesses of the aforesaid town have been accustomed to elect four men of
aforesaid and by oath taken among them, making unlawful assem- the same town yearly to keep their guild merchant, each of whom shall
blies of their own authority on Monday next after the feast of the have chattels to the value of £ 6 l.'3s 4 d ...
Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary [8 September] 1302, ordained and The jurors say that the abbot must answer whether the aforesaid
decreed that none should remain among them in the said town having Nicholas Fouke and others have a guild merchant in the aforesaid
chattels worth 20s who would not pay them 2s 1 d, which payment town or not. The abbot says that they have not a guild merchant nor
they call among themselves hansing-silver, which money they took on cognisance of pleas pertaining to a guild merchant, nor a commonalty
that pretext respectively from Reynold del Blackhouse and Robert the nor a common seal nor a mayor; but they hold a guild at the feast of
Carpenter, men dwelling the town aforesaid, and also beyond this 12d the Nativity of St John the Baptist [ 24 June: in a certain place to feast
of gersum* from each of the said Reynold and Robert. And likewise and drink together, there holding their unlawful assemblies and taking
... they decreed among themselves that every man of the same town from every man dwelling in the said town the aforesaid 2s Id and also
having chattels to the value of £6 1.'3s 4d should pay them 46s Sd, which 46s Sd, levying such money from the men aforesaid, that the payers
by that authority they took from Robert Scot, a man dwelling in the thereof may be of their fellowship, by distraints made upon them; and
aforesaid town. And also the same day and year they decreed among he does not deny that the ancestors of the aforesaid Nicholas and others
themselves that no man should stay in the aforesaid town beyond a have been long accustomed to receive such extortions of 2s 1 d and 46s
year and a day without being distrained to take oath to maintain their 8d, but against the Law Merchant and against the will of the aforesaid
aforesaid assemblies and ordinances . . . payers and against the peace, and beyond the amount of a third part of
The aforesaid Nicholas Fouk and others readily acknowledge that the their goods; and by such extortions and ransoms they claim to make
abbot is lord of the whole town aforesaid, and ought to appoint his burgesses within his liberty and lordship, which there pertains to the
bailiffs to hold his court in the same town. But as for the conspiracy abbot himself and to no other.
aforesaid, etc., they make stout defence that they are not guilty. And A day is given ... It is awarded that the aforesaid abbot ( recover) his
as for the abbot's charge against them that they have made unlawful damages of £199 l.'3s 4d against the aforesaid Nicholas and others
assemblies in the town, decreeing and ordaining that every man dwell- ... And let the same Nicholas and others be committed to gaol.
ing in the town having chattels to the value of 20s etc. as above, they Afterwards the same Nicholas and others came and made fine. And
say that the abbot makes plaint unjustly, for they say that they have let certain othe rs in the dispute be imprisoned for a month owing to
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE 213
212

their poverty. And the aforesaid Nicholas and others came before the a sword in his right arm, Thomas wounded him in the back with a
justices and satisfied the lord abbot; therefore let them be delivered dagger, and William de Cleydon wounded him on the head, so that he
from prison. fell. Immediately afterwards William de Leye cut him in the left leg
with an axe called a spar-axe, giving him the wound by the knee from
which he died. He lived for eight weeks and two-and-a-half days, and
SS. Disturbance of the peace in Oxford 1806 he received the last rites.
'
It was the responsibility of the king's coroner to summon a local jury
in a case of violent death. Coroners' rolls contain the juries' verdicts,
sometimes including circumstantial detail as in the present case. This
night-time altercation reveals the camaraderie of the artisans no less
84. Violence and crime in London 1 s 11

These cases brought before the mayor of London yield glimpses of

an urban world of taverns, gambling and latent violence. Criminal
'
than the perennially latent violence of the town. St John the Baptist
was the patron saint of tailors. records need careful interpretation by the historian: by definition, they
privilege crime; and the legal processes left poor offenders disadvan-
J.E. Thorold Rogers (ed.), Oxford City Documents, Financial andJudicia4 taged before their accuser (see also [50]). Such records, however, can
/268-1665, Oxford: Oxford University Press for the Oxford Historical provide an insight into the social values of jurors and witnesses called
Society, 1891, pp. 165-6. Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR. to testify.

On the Sunday after the feast of the Assumption [15 August], 1306, H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials ef London and London Life in the Xlllth,
Gilbert de Foxlee, clerk, died at his lodgings in the parish of St Peter XJVth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, pp.
in the East in Oxford, at about midday. The following Monday, he was 86-8. Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR.
seen by Thomas Lisewys, the king's coroner for the town of Oxford.
He had a wound in his left leg by the knee, about four inches long and (a) Process of inquisition and delivery, made in the time of Richer de
an inch and a half deep. An inquisition was held. The jurors declare Refham, mayor [1311], as to criminals, trespassers and night-
on their oath that on Thursday which was the eve of St John the walkers in the City of London, against the peace of our lord the
Baptist's day [24 June], the tailors of Oxford, together with others of king
the town, made a festival all night in their shops, singing and making
merry with harps, viols and other instruments as is customary there Elmer de Multone was attached* because he was indicted in the
and in other places, in honour of that feast. After midnight, when they ward of Cheap for being a common nightwalker, and in the day
discovered no one else to be wandering in the streets, they left their is in the habit of enticing strangers and persons unknown to a
shops and, with the others, led their dance into the High Street opp<r tavern, and there deceiving them by using false dice. And also
site the drapery. As they were playing there, Gilbert de Foxlee came because he was indicted in Tower ward for being a bruiser and
up to them with a drawn sword in his hand and immediately started nightwalker, against the peace; as also, for being a common rorere
a fight, trying to break up their dance. Seeing this, some people there [i.e. 'roarer']. And also because he was indicted in the ward of
who knew him wanted him to go away with them, urging him not to Cripplegate for playing at dice, and because he regularly entices
hurt anybody. But Gilbert would not promise, and breaking away from men to a tavern and makes them play at dice there against their
them he returned to attack William de Cleydon, and would have cut will. He appeared, and being asked how he would acquit himself,
his hand off with his sword as William went round in the dance had he said that he was not guilty, and put himself upon the country.
he not quickly withdrawn. Upon this Henry de Beaumont Cruisor, And the jury came, by Adam Trugge and others on the panel;
Thomas de Bloxham, William de Leye, servant to John de Leye, a_nd and they said upon their oath that he is guilty of all the trespasses
William de Cleydon rushed at him, and Henry wounded him with aforesaid. He was therefore committed to prison.
-
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE
214 215

(b) John de Rokeslee was attached because h: was indicted in the These are the injuries done to the mayor, bailiffs and community of
ward of Vintry and divers ot~er .wards, be'.ng hel~ s_uspected of Ox.ford by the scholars of the University of Oxford.
,.1 d of beating men commg mto the city, agamst the peace First, on Tuesday before the feast ofSt Valentine last past [10 February
e\ 1 an • d. d · h
of our lord the king. And also because he was 1~ 1cte m t e 1s55, the feast day of St Scholastica, patron saint of scholars], there
ward ofCripplegate and diverse other wards for bemg a ~ommon came Walter Spryngheuse, Roger de Chesterfeld and other scholars
nightwalker, against the peace, and ~nlawfully frequentmg t~v- to the tavern called 'Swindlestock' and there took a quart of wine and
erns in the city with prostitutes, against the cust?m of the City threw the said wine in the face of John Croidon, the tavern-keeper, an~
and the peace of our lord the king; and because ~e 1s well clothed, then with the said quart pot beat the said John without reason. The
) o business by which to support himself; nor has he
an d ye t 1as n h · . h h b' bailiff.<; came and prayed them amend and redress the same trespass
as he pretends to have. Also because e 1s m t e a it
any re ntal , • dh d in good manner. But they would not amend the trespass or redress it,
of beating men, against the peace of our lord th: km_g; an e oes but they issued forth from the tavern and at once they had bows and
much mischief in the city, and causes much m1sch1ef to be done, arrows and other arms ready for ill-doing at the Carfax,19 and the bail-
in the night-time. He appeared, and ~eing asked ho~ he would iffs arrested the bows and arrows, and the scholars made great noise
acquit himself, he said he was not guilty, a_nd put himself upon and great debate, for which reason the mayor, bailiffs and sergeants
the country. And the jury came, by ~dam 1 rugge and _others o_n approached the Chancellor of the University and prayed him to have
the panel. The jurors said upon their oath, that the said John 1s the malefactors arrested and to aid that the peace should be kept on
guilty. He was therefore committed to prison. his side. And when the mayor, bailiffs and sergeants returned from the
Chancellor, he doing none of those things that they had prayed, there
(c) Master Roger le Skirmisour [i.e. 'the skir~isher'J was atta_ched came two hundred and more of the scholars, armed in the manner
because he was indicted for keeping a fencing-school for divers of war, and beat and assaulted the mayor, bailiffs and sergeants, and
men, and for enticing there the sons of r:spectable persons, so wounded some of them, whereby there is despair of their lives, and then
as to waste and spend the property of their fathers and mothers they slew a child of about fourteen years and threatened to set the town
upon bad practices: the result being that they them_selv:s became on fire. And further, the next morning, when the mayor, bailiffs and
bad men. He appeared. And the jurors said th~t he 1s guilty of the good folk of the town were gone to Woodstock to complain to the king
trespasses. He was therefore committed to pnson. of the said injuries, the said scholars came with royal power and took
the wardens of the city and closed the gates and fought with shields
and arms by plan and openly, and set the town on fire in diverse parts,
85. Students and townspeople at Oxford 1355 and broke open and robbed diverse houses of lay folk, and wounded
many people and killed many. Because of this alarm of fire and because
This was the most dramatic of many riots in Oxford, where ~he clerical of the fighting the common people arose in aid and defence of their
immunity enjoyed by the scholars, stud~n~s an~ masters alike created
particular tensions with the secular admm1strat1on of th: mayor.
sides appealed to the crown: reproduced here is the detailed compla
B~: town.

of the mayor. The king, appealed to by both sides, regularly defe~ded 86. Attack on Italians in London IS59
the university, which provided clerks for royal government. He did so
on this occasion. Italian merchants in fourteenth-century London, even after the collapse
of major Italian banks when the English crown failed to honour its
H. E. Salter (ed.), Munimenta Civitatis Oxonie, Oxford Historic;~ debts in the IS20s, continued to enjoy royal privilege. The monarchs,
Society, LXXI, Oxford: Oxford University Press for ~he
Historical Society, 1917, pp. 126-8. Latin, transl. by the editor, r
o;.~~
l9 The central cross-roads of the to.,.n, where the Swindlestock tavern stood.
by GR.
216 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE
217

and particularly Richard II, spent huge sums on the silks and other to the federa_tions of guilds recorded in late medieval Germany and the
luxury goods in which they traded. In consequence they periodically Low Coun_tn~s, although the relative strength ofroyal government in
found themselves targeted by jealous Londoners.20 Apart from the England ~•m'.ted the scope and effectiveness of such initiatives here.
maintenance of peace, the mayor's concern in such a case was to bring ~or the s1~mficance of political_ly _in~u~ntial fraternities in seigneur-
such tensions involving foreigners to a peaceful solution, for the sake ial towns (1.e. towns under the Junsd1ct1on of ecclesiastical or secular
of trade no less than in the name of justice. lords), see also [16], [79], [95].

H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials of London and London Lift in the Xlllth, J. Taylor, "!·
R. ~hilds and L. Watkiss (eds), The St Albans Chronick:
X/Vth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, pp. The Chron_1ca ~a1ora of Thomas Walsingham, i, 1376-1894, Oxford:
302-3. Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR. Oxford Un1vers1ty P~es_s, 2008, pp. 122-5. Latin, transl. by the editors.
Reproduced by perm1ss1on of Oxford University Press.
Inquisition taken before John Lovekyn, mayor of the city of London,
and John de Chichestre and Simon de Benyngtone, sheriffs of the samt: On the day the king died [21 June 1377] a new community was formed
city, on J 8 October 1359, to enquire what malefactors and disturbers in th~ town of St Albans in honour of St Alban, the protomartyr of the
of the peace of our lord the king, with envious insolence and rancour, English. It marked the beginning of a very laudable and commendable
maliciously perpetrated a dreadful affray, in an attack made by certain expre_ssion of devotion. Indeed, it was decreed that whenever the mar-
mercers of the city upon some merchants of Lombardy in the same tyr's image was carried in customary procession every single person
city dwelling, and beat, wounded and dreadfully maltreated Francisco who was not excused by the community should be present with his
Boche) and other Lombards• in the said city, being under the protec- household; and th~t the stronger amongst them should, in honour of
tion of our lord the king ... upon the oath of Geoffrey Lovekyn and the martyr,_ carry m the procession around the image twelve torches,
eleven others. made at their own expense. But this expression of devotion did not last
Who say upon their oath, that on Monday after the feast of St John the long, for soon when dissension occurred in the realm and the rebellion
Baptist [probably the Decollation, 29 August] 1357, Henry Forester, of the common people broke out, it was shown that they were not the
mercer, Thomas de Meldone, mercer, and John Meleward, mercer, broth~rs of_St Alban but the synagogue ofSatan.21 This was made clear
made a dreadful affray in the Old Jewry, in the ward ofColemanstreet, by their att1tud_e and their entire behaviour during that period of time.
in London, and of malice aforethought by force and arms assaulted _In fact they reJe~ted the lordship of the abbey, destroyed the dwell-
certain persons, namely, Francisco Boche! and Reymund Flamy, ings and th~ cloisters, and in every way they could they threatened
Lombards, and wounded, beat and maltreated them and, against the the destruction of t_he _monasterY:. And they did not perpetrate these
peace of our lord the king, committed other enormities against them. outrages alon:, but invited the neighbouring towns to do the same, as,
They say also that Richard Phelip, mercer, abetted the said persons in reader, you will be able to discover more fully in what follows.~~
making this affray and trespass.

88. Revolt in Beverley IS81-82

87. A guild at St Albans and the Revolt of 1881
A coup d'etat in Beverley in 1881-82 replaced the town council of
The suspicious and hostile tone of the monastic chronicler is evid~nt t~:elve burgess:s with a broader gO\ernment, headed by an alderman,
in this description of the activities of a town fraternity. The formation l:Y.o chamb:rlams an~. a council of twenty-four. The old regime was
of links with such societies in other towns in the region is analogous led by the richest fam1hes; the new by artisans. The old guard were the

20 See also P. Strohm, 'Trade, treason, and the murder of Janus Imperial', Journal tf t1 Revelation 2.9.
British Studies, XXXV, 1996, pp. 1-2s. ft A reference to the Peasants' Re\olt in June tSBt.
218
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE
219

authors of the petition reproduced in (a), which secured the roya.l inter- wickedly prevented; and it is well known that such contentions
vention recorded in (b). A statement by the leaders of the coup 1s lack- evils and dangers have recently been more than usually commo~
ing. The precise relationship between these eve~t.s and the Peasants' in the town of Beverley, above all through lack of good govern-
Revolt of the summer of 1381 is unclear. The uprising was followed by ance. For that town, in accordance with ancient and approved
conservative reaction. custom used there undisturbed for fifty years, has been accus-
tomed to be peacefully ruled and governed by twelve good men
C. T. Flower, 'The Beverley town riots', Transactions of the Royal (probi homines) of that town elected for that purpose on St Marks
Historical Society, 2nd series, XIX, 1905, pp. 93-4 (a); A. F. Leach day [25 April] with the common assent of the burgesses of the
(ed.), Beverley Town Documents, Selden Society, XIV, London: Quaritch, town at the guildhall. But by a sudden change of that custom, in
1900, pp. 6-7 (b). French (a) and Latin (b), transl. by the editors, place of the twelve good men, you have this year newly appointed
revised by GR. and ordained an alderman and two chamberlains, and this order,
which has not been seen in the town for fifty years or more,
(a) [Early 1382] May it please our excellent and ~e~oubt~d lor<l except twice or less - the better government of the town by the
the king and his wise council to grant and ordam m this pres- common assent of the burgesses being abolished - you intend to
ent parliament that Adam Coppendale, Thomas de Beverley, maintain and to continue, although the government of the twelve
John Gervays, William Dudhill, John de Erghum and other men is far better for the good rule of the town; and this order, if
good people ( bones gentz) of Beverley - exiled from the town of continued, will clearly lead, as we are informed, to the wasting of
Beverley by barrators and rebels (barettours et rebellours) against the town and the displacement of its burgesses.
our said lord the king in the same town, who have arrogated to We enjoin and command all of you that with one assent you
themselves royal power, so that the good people have not dared come together peacefully as usual on St Mark's day at your guild-
to go near the town for a year and still do not, for fear of th:ir hall and . .. after due deliberation, putting aside all quarrels and
lives - may be enabled safely to return to Beverley and to live discussions, lay down and duly order such management, rule
there as loyal subjects. Let those guilty be compelled, on pain and government in the town that it and our people may be best
of losing their liberty. And may all the obligations imposed by and most quietly ordered and governed, our peace there kept, and
the said rebels in charge of the town be annulled. And may the friendship be maintained amongst you, now and in the future.
good people have their good old government, as it has been in
use for fifty years, granted and confirmed by our said lord king
and his ancestors. And may all the indictments, which were made 89. Interpersonal violence
maliciously before my lord John Bigot and his companions by the
rebels against the good people at the time of the Revolt (en ~em~s The circumstances and details of these incidents being unrecorded, they
de rumour), which indictments have been brought to the K1~g s are not easy to analyse. That the officers of the town of Nottingham
Bench before my lord Robert Tresylyan, be pardoned if possible, reported forty-four such events, most involving bloodshed, in a single
and if they may be annulled that this be done. And that due pro- year is, however, suggestive of an urban society which took ready
nouncement be made about the said rebels (trespassours), for the recourse to violence.~3 The instruments of attack were fists, trade tools
safety of the whole realm, for God and as a work of charity. or weapons such as knives, clubs and bows and arrows. One or two
of t_he _acc~sed were described by the jurors as 'perturbed', apparently
(b) 18 March 1382. Richard, by the grace of God king, etc., to all the an md1cat1on that they were perceived as mentally unstable. In these
good men and burgesses of Beverley, greeting. Through lack of
good governance it often happens that contentions oc~ur between
!!S For what i~ known of ~h~ justice system oflate medieval Nottingham, see T. Foulds,
the inhabitants and commons of cities and towns, evil and sc~• The mcd1eval town. m J. Beckett (ed.), A Cenunary History of Nottingham,
dal arise and various dangers are created, and a life of peace 15 Manchester, 199i, pp. 67-8.
220 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE
221

instances, however, they were none the less held responsible for their Joan was imprisoned ... Thomas Briddam, tinker, slapped the face of
actions and fined accordingly?~ The imposition of a fine indicates the a maid-servant of Joan de Crophill: Thomas comes, and pays 6d .. ,
court's judgement of guilt; the record does not detail the defence, if any, Thomas Fox, draper, lay in wait for, beat and wounded William Bunche
submitted by the accused. messenger of the sheriff of Nottingham: Thomas comes, and pays 6 ;
sd ... Margaret the wife of Hugh Spicer threw stones at the wife of
W. H. Stevenson (ed.), Records of the Borough of Nottingham, S vols, William Spicer, Hugh's son, and Margaret also drew her knife against
London: Quaritch, 1882-85, i, pp. 293-307. Latin, transl. by the editor, the same woman: Margaret comes, and pays 6d ... Margaret G!
revised by GR. took hold of William Leadenham violently with her claunde [meanin~
unclear], and threw William in her own house against a post, so that
Presentments of affrays before the mayor's court of Nottingham, blood issued from his head, and afterwards she went out into the king's
1395-96 highway and made a hue and cry against him: Margaret comes, and
pays 12d . .. Randolph Daniell shot Gilbert Barber in the thigh with
The decennaries [tithingmen or ward representatives] present an an arrow: Randolph comes, and pays 12d ... Thomas Benton, barber,
affray made with blood by Henry Hickling upon John Pulter, the son seized Hugh Wymondslow in the common hall by his breast with one
of Anna, Henry's wife, because Henry drew his knife and struck John hand and took his own drawn knife in the other, and said malicious
on the head: Henry comes and places himself upon the favour of the words to him, causing Hugh to despair of his life: Thomas comes, and
mayor, and pays 6d ... An affray made with blood in which Stephen pays 12d ... Joan, wife of Hugh Wymondslow, came into the common
Wade beat Agnes Irish with his fists: Stephen comes, and pays 6d ... hall and there spoke malicious words to Thomas Benton, barber, and
Thomas Fox, draper, first drew his unsheathed axe, and afterwards there slapped his face: Joan comes, and pays 12d ...
went into his own house and took a club in his hand against John
Hodings: Thomas comes, and pays 12d ... Agnes, servant of William
de Torlaton, came into the house of Robert Brinklow against his will, 90. Subversive fraternity of journeymen saddlers of London
and there nearly strangled Robert's wife: Agnes comes, and pays 6d 1S96
... Henry de Plumptre beat Joan Potter with a club: Henry comes,
and pays 6d ... Beatrice Matthew is a common scold* in the street of Officially recognised crafts, in London and in other cities, comprised
Houndsgate where she lives: Beatrice comes, and pays 6d ... Thomas independent master craftsmen, in control of their own shops. But
Fox, mason, was troubled (perturbatus fuit) and drew his axe against although less well documented, the qualified craftsmen without shops,
a stranger of the country whose name is not known: Thomas comes the journeymen, and the servants to masters in the craft (in this text,
and agrees to pay 6d, Thomas Arnold standing pledge ... Joan de the ·yeomen'), also regularly formed their own societies, guilds and fra-
Bawtry of Moothallgate was troubled (perturbatafuit) and threw Maud ternities whose existence tended to be looked on askance by the mas-
Donne down upon the pavement, causing blood to issue from her arm: ters. The church of St Vedast was adjacent to the hall of the company of
master saddlers. Here the masters seek and obtain a mayoral injunction
24 The term perturbatus in this context meant \vor½ed up' and perhaps also 'out of against the association of the lesser craftsmen.
control'. Dictionary of Medieval Latmfrom Bntuh _Sourc~s, ed. R. E. I~thai_n, Oxfo~d,
1975-201S, s.v. 'pcrturbare', I b, c. On the mcd1c,·al mc1denre of msamty and its
recognition as a mitigating circumstance in criminal trials, see N. D. Hurn~rd, Thi H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials of London and London Life in the XIl/th,
Ki11g·s Pardonfor Homicide before A.D. 1307, Oxford, 1969, pp. 159-iO; W. J. fllrner, X!Vth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, pp.
Care and Custody of the Mentally Ill, focompetenl, a11d Disabled i11 Medieval England.
Turnhout, 201s, pp. 109-40. ·Perturbatus· is not one of the terms ~oted by Turner 542-4. Latin, transl. by the editor, revised by GR.
as occurring in contemporary discussions of crime on p. 78. ?n the 1s~ue of mad~
in the perspective of medieval urban law:-courts, se~ W. J. fu_rner, A compa~1son
There had arisen much dissension and strife between the masters of
of the treatment of the mentally disabled m late medieval English common law and
chartered boroughs·, in W. J. Turner (ed.), Madness in ,Hedieval Law and CUJI0111. ~he trade of saddlers of London, and the serving-men, called yeomen,
Leiden, 2010, pp. 17- S9. tn that trade; because the serving-men, against the consent, and
222 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE
223
without leave, of their masters, were accustomed to array themselves such absenting_ of themselves by the journeymen, so leaving their
all in a new and common livery once in the year, and often held diverse labours and duties, against their wish.
meetings, at Stratford and elsewhere without the liberty of t~e said
city, as well as in diverse places within the city; whereby many incon- For amending and allaying these g~ievances an~ dissensions, the mayor
veniences and perils ensued to the said trade; and also very many and al~ermen commanded that six of the said serving-men should
losses might happen to it in the future, unless some quick and speedy a~tend 1~ the_ name of the whole of the alleged fraternity, and commu-
remedy should be found by the rulers of the city. Therefore the mas- nicate with six or eight of the master saddlers; both parties to be here
ters of the trade, on I O July 1396, made a strong complaint about it before the mayor and aldermen, on 19 July next, to make report to th~
to the excellent men, William More, mayor, and the aldermen of the court as to w~at was agreed between them. And further, the mayor and
city, urgently entreating that, for the reasons mentioned, they would aldermen_ stnctly forbade the said serving-men in any manner to hold
deign to send for Gilbert Dustone, William Gylowe, John Clay, John any ~1eetmg t~ereafter ~t Stratford or elsewhere outside the liberty of
Hiltone, William Berigge and Nicholas Mason, the then governors the city, on ?am of forfeiture, to our lord the king and to the city, of all
that they nught forfeit.
of the said serving-men, to appear before them on 12 July next. 011
10 July precept was given to John Parker, sergeant of the chamber, On 19 J_uly there came here both the masters and the governors of
to give notice to the same persons to be her~ on. 12 July. The gov- the serving-men, and presented to the mayor and aldermen a certain
ernors of the serving-men appeared and, being interrogated about petitio~, in these_w.ords: 'Gilbert Dustone, William Gylowe, John Clay,
these matters, they said that time out of mind the serving-men of the John H1ltone, Wilham Berigge and Nicholas Mason do speak on behalf
trade had had a certain fraternity among themselves, and had been of all their fraternity, and do beg of the wardens of the saddlers, that
accustomed to array themselves in a common livery each year, and they may have and use all the points which they have used hitherto.'
after meeting together at Stratford, on the feast of the Assumption Which petition having been read and heard, and diverse reasons shown
of the Blessed Virgin Mary [15 August], to come from there to the by the masters to the mayor and aldermen, it was determined that the
church of St Vedast in London, there to hear mass on the same day, in serving-men should in future be under the governance and rule of the
honour of the glorious Virgin. But the masters of the trade asserted masters of the trade: just as serving-men in other trades in the same
the contrary of all this, and said that the fraternity, and the being so city are wont, and of .right are bound, to be; and that in future they
arrayed in a common livery, among the serving-_men, ~ated f~om only should have no ~rate~n1ty, meetings, or covins [subversive assemblies],
thirteen years back, and even then had been d1scontmued m recent or other unlawf_ul thm.gs. And that the said masters must properly treat
years; and that, under a certain feigned colour of sanctity, many of the and govern their serving-men m the trade, in such manner as the serv-
serving-men in the trade had influenced the journeymen among them, ing-men in like trades in the city have been wont to be properly treated
and had formed confederacies, with the object of raising their wages and governed. And that if any serving-man should in future wish to
greatly in excess; to such an extent that whereas a master in the said ~a~e complaint_ to the mayor and aldermen, as to any grievance unduly
trade could before have had a serving-man or journeyman• for £2 or 1~fl1ct~d u~on him by the said masters, the mayor and aldermen would
£3 6s sd a year, and his board, now such a man would not agree with give lum his due and speedy need ofjustice in that matter.
his master for less than £5 13s 4d or £8 or even £ I O a year; to the
great deterioration of the trade.
And further, that the serving-men, according to an ordinance made 91. Rebellious weavers of Coventry appeal to the figure of
among themselves, would often cause the journeymen of the said mas- Lady Godiva 1495
ters to be summoned by a bedel,* appointed to this end, to atte_nd the
vigils of dead members of the said fraternity, and at making offering for The verses ~ere copied ~y an indignant clerk into the mayor's book of
them on the morrow, levy a penalty on them for absence; whereby the Coventry give a rare glimpse of a counterculture of resistance to the
said masters were very greatly aggrieved, and were injured through legislation of a city government perceived, at certain times more than
others, to be unjust. Notable also is the invocation of the semi-mythical
224 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND TENSIONS AND VIOLENCE

patroness of the city, Lady Godiva. She was the wife of Leofric, earl You have put one man 2 " like a Scot to ransom:
of Chester and lord of Coventy in the mid-eleventh century, at which That will be remembered when you have all [been] forgotten.
time it is likely that the two granted certain liberties to the town. By
Beware!
the later Middle Ages the story of Go<liva's naked ride, by which she
persuaded her husband to free the townspeople from taxes, was suffi-
ciently familiar to be invoked in justification of a protest movement.
The commemorative Lammas ride was a popular civic ceremony in the
city.

M. D. Harris (ed.), The Coventry Leet Book, 4 vols, Early English Text
Society, original series, London: Oxford University Press, 1907-I~,
pp. 566-7. English, revised by GR.

Within eight days after Lammas [I August] there was a bill set upon
the north church door in St Michael's church by some evil disposed
persons unknown, the tenour [tenor, i.e. substance] whereof hereafter
ensues:
Be it known and understand
This city should be free and now is bond.

Dame Good Eve25 made it free;

And now the custom for wool and the drapery.

Also it is made that no prentice shall be

But thirteen pennies paid should he.

That act did Robert Green,"';

Therefore he had many a curse, I ween.

And now another rule you do make

That none shall ride at Lammas but they that you take.~7

When our ale is tunned

You shall ha\'e drink to your cake.~•

.l5Lady Godi\'a.
1!6When he was mayor, in 1494.
27 The restriction on participation in this ci,·ic procession had been justified because of
the 'di\'erse riots and offences and great discords done and committed upon Lamm~
day caused by that that (sic] many in number undesired ride with the chamberlain.
Cowntry uet Book, p. 565. 29
Laurence ~aunders, a th~rn in the side of the political ruling group of Coventry and
28 An allusion to the wealth of the urban elite. a hero to some of the artisans. Saunders had been imprisoned by the mayor.
 ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
227

moral responsibility and openness to mutual charity in relations both

with the brothers and sisters of the society, and with other townspeo-
VIII. ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
ple. All of their practical undertakings followed from these principles.
The practical purposes of the guilds were very various, but participa-
tion in each case gave members an empowering sense of contributing
As the sources .m Sec·t·ion VII make dear' the diversity
. and economic
. h" h to a larger goal. Their generally modest resources limited the scale pf
h. rarch of the medieval town created a social enviro~'.nent m w tc their operations, yet, in addition to the halls which numerous societit:s
~e Yid be no natural community. These very cond1t1ons, however, erected for their ritual meetings [96], many hostels, almshouses and
t ere cou I . th del"1berate creation by townspeople themselves, of schools \\ere maintained by the late medieval guilds, and, if the need
go far to exp am e ' "bi d · d eel
hundreds of voluntary associations. More diverse, flex1 e an m _e for assistance always outran the provision, none the less involvement
voluntary than t h e pro,ess1ona
£" • 1 associations
. of craftsmen, the
d guilds in the setting up and running of these establishments helped to culti-
or fraternities of the medieval town brough~~o;~thr ;1~nb:h ::~u:~ vate human connections both within and beyond the guild which were
workin in various crafts, to serve ends w ic me u e . a potentially strong response to the fragmentation and alienation of
.insurance g and pubi.ic ch an.tY· I That charity
. . needs to be considered
. 1 d life in the town. The guilds' potential to act as a catalyst in the larger
t merely for .its s1gm
. .fican t yet linuted impact on the. actua nee s urban society is seen in the public presentation by the York fraternity
no the poor b ut a Iso an d ,nore profoundly as an expression
of . hof mutua1 of the Pater Nester, or Our Father, of a play in which the meaning of
' "d
concern and common I en I y. t"t The first two documents
. m t edpresent
p the prayer was expounded through a series of dramatic encounters
. indicate the wide range of medieval guilds. The Lon on _uy between Virtues and Vices : 97]. The engagement of dozens of fami-
section lite network dominated by wealthy Londoners with lies in a collective project for the common good is exemplified in the
of c. I SOO was an e TI · , tings focused on construction of two new stone bridges over the Thames at Abingdon, a
probable connections to the royal court. ietr mee d h ' d
. etr and song written by the members an t e a~ar substantial civic work undertaken in the fifteenth century by the local
refctt~ls o~ potheybest c~mpositions [92].~ The contemporary 'penny guild of the Holy Cross [ 98].
o pnzes ,or ·fi . h1
brotherhood' at Nottingham, by contrast, exemplt es a_ muc arger Such works did not exhaust the range or significance of the guilds'
class of associations with less socially elevated n;em[~:r]sl~f:ea;:ia~i~:~; activities. Their potential to channel political ambitions was especially
rd . as expressed on a more modest sea e . manifest in a large number of small me<lie\'a} towns whose constitu-
sot ar1ty "'.b t · .equired by the majority of such institutions were tions were stifled by the presence of lay or ecclesiastical lords. In such
small contn u tons r d h s - both
within the financial reach of artisans and shopkeepe_rs, an t e e be places as Abingdon itself; Stratford-upon-Avon, Ludlow, King's Lynn,
n and women - comprised the greatest proportion of the mem r- Boston and Maidstone, a prominent guild is recorded in each case as
m,~
11 s Many guilds however, attracted a social rang~ of mem~ers,_ as
sdiverse
P · individuals ' and groups perceive• d a_d vant ar, m. fratermsat1on
making a major contribution to the practical running of the town,
declared or indeed as playing the role of de facto civic government. Another
with significant others [94]. Their oste~s1ble adn pnmaihical The such instance is the cathedral town of Lichfield [95]. Between the
purposes were religious, char_itabl~ anhd, '.nd~r~:ua:~~:;;;b:r a se~se of late fourteenth and the early sixteenth century, the Lichfield guild's
most common aim was to cultivate m t em iv membership of between two hundred and a thousand men and women
made it (allowing for a proportion of members drawn from the hinter-
I G. Ross.,r, Tht Art ef Solidarity in the Middle Ages. G111la.t
• •j
m
• E 115~1
,,.1~ ui 12so-1550. land) a significant presence in a town of 1500 to 2500 inhabitants. The
Oxford, 2015. d Pu and its French
prevailing motif in the late fourteenth-century statutes is the proper
l. A Sutton 'Merchants, music and social harmony: t~I 1 t':>~99:n ~-17· A. Sutton, organisation of religious services in the town chapel of St Mary in the
a~d Lon<l~n contexts, circa ISOO', I.ondon .follrnai,' X '1,o d~J~uy and mercery', marketplace: the text exemplifies the way in which a secular urban
'The "Tumbling Bear" and its patrons: a ve_nue or t 11e L ~ Middle Ages. London.
in J. Boffey and P. King (eds), London and E11rop, m t e a" SOciety
0
not uncommonly took collective responsibility for the direction
J 995, pp. 85-1 I 0. fits spiritual affairs, including the hiring and firing of suitable priests.
228 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
229
The immediate context of a national royal enquiry into the activities zeal increasingly evident from the late fifteenth century to·
of the guilds, prompted by a petition in parliament originating in fears . , , impose reg-
u1at10n as a moral reform of what were identified as the less •
of subversion in the aftermath of the Peasants' Revolt, explains the . restramed
elements of the urban population [99], [118].+
under-statement, in this and other reports produced by the guilds
themselves, of their political potential. Reading between the lines,
however, it is possible to perceive that the scope of the guild's activities 92. A society of poetry and song in London c. I soo
was by no means confined to the ordering of masses, important though
these certainly were in the eyes of the membership. The reterences to
The London citizens who comprised this religious, musical and social
the jurisdiction of the guild in disputes involving townspeople hint
company emb~aced the courtly language and rituals of chivalry. The
at an authority which emerges more explicitly in later ordinances of language used 111 these statutes - the 'prince' of the company the• 1
1486. These show the master of the guild, together with a body called r , k . . , roya
1eas~ spea s to its_ soc1~l aspirations. Given the many connections
'the forty-eight', effectivedly regulating local affairs, for all the world
be_t\\een the merc_ant1le elite of the city and the royal court, some min-
as though the guild of St Mary were the legitimate town council of
gling of t~ese so_c1al _groups within the Pui is plausible and even likely.
Lichfield. In law, authority remained with the bishop until the incor- The precise derivation of the term, which is also found in northern
poration of the borough in I 548. In practice, however, the guild acted
F~a~ce applied ~o sim_ilar singing societies, is unknown, although an
- and probably did so from as early as the thirteenth century - as a
~n~m_al connect10n with the French town of Le Puy in the Auvergne
surrogate government for the town.'
1s ~n?1cated. In g~neral terms, the association closely resembles the
Guilds were not the sole context in which townsmen and women gath- rehg,ous and social fraternities which were so numerous in medie-
ered and formed networks for survival and for collaboration in joint val to"'.ns [ 9s:, [_94:, [ 95:, [ 96], [97]. Despite the refinement and
undertakings, and to build solidarity. Parishes, neighbourhoods and sol~mntty of the d111ner, the membership appears to have been socially
crafts, together with more informal friendship groups, each had a role. varied.
All of these manifested themselves in ritual and festive contexts which
simultaneously offered a focus for holidays and dignified the events H. T. Ril~y (ed.), Liber Albus, Liber Custumarum, et Liber Horn, s vols,
together with their participants. The mayor of Bristol's gifts of ale to Rolls Series, London: Oxford University Press 1859-62 ii (!)
Q .• ) , , ' pp.
the city's crafts which held a festival at Midsummer at once honoured 216--8, 11 {'l , pp. 579-94. French, transl. by the editor, revised by GR.
the workers and presented the civic government in a benevolent and
paternalistic light [100]. Keeping an eye on craftsmen on their days In honour o'. God, Our Lady St Mary, and all Saints, both male and
off became an increasing concern of magistrates towards the end of the female; and 111 honour of our lord the king and all the barons of the
Middle Ages. This anxiety, manifest in numerous by-laws, had several country, and for the increasing of loyal love. And to the end that
origins. The regulations were prompted by national legislation which, London ma~ be renowned for all good things in all places; and to the
from the late fourteenth century onwards, attempted to limit activities end th~t nurthfulness, peace, honesty, joyousness, gaiety and good
deemed wasteful of time and money, and to focus the free time of crafts- love, without end, may be main~ained. And to the end that all blessings
men upon what were perceived by king and parliament as useful mili- may be set ~efore us, and all evils cast behind. The loving companions
tary exercises. Despite these efforts, the fifteenth century witnessed a who dwell m and frequent the good city of London have ordained
marked commercialisation of leisure pursuits, in the forms, appearing confirmed, and established a festival that is called the Pui. And in orde;
on the edge of the metropolis and of all provincial towns, of archery that this festival may be maintained in peace and in love each one
butts, cock-fighting pits, gaming tables and tennis courts. Finally the should bind himself on oath, firmly, as a reputable man, that.so long as
authors of civic attempts to check these passions were inspired, with a there shall be five companions, he shall be bound to the sixth, and shall
be bound to obey all the commandments, good and lawful, of the Puz:
3 G. Rosser, 'The town and guild of Lichfield in the late Middle Ages', Transactions of
tht South Staffordshire Archaeological a11d Historical Society, XXVII, 1987, pp. :!Hi.
+ M. K. McIntosh, Co11troll111g Misbehaviour i11 Engla11d, /370-1600, Cambridge, 1998.
2SO TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL I-:NGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
l!SI
And each man ought to give, upon entering into the company, 6d for there be any one of the companions who is evilly disposed ·
his entrance, by way of remembrance ... And after this, each compan~ . d d th p · · In word o
m ee , e nnce and his twelve companions ought to k r
ion, on the day of the sitting (siege), shall pay 12d; and as to him who the utmost of their power, saving the rights of the kin mad ehpe~ce to
shall have a new song, his song shall acquit him. And the Prince ought London. g an t e city of
to provide the feast ... and if the Prince have need of assistance, he
ought to take twelve of the companions, of the most prosperous men
residing in the city, to aid him in advising about the day of the feast, A~d ~hereas the roy~I feast of the Pui is maintained and establish~d
and throughout the following year ... And on the day of the sitting, ~rmc1pally for crowning a royal song (clzansoun reale);5 inasmuch as it
there ought to be no one in the company, to eat there, or to stay, or to 1s by song that the company is honoured and enhanced all the
hear the singing, if he be not of the company ... And at each sitting, companions of the Pui by right reason are bound to ex~lt I gent1e
t tl1 t t f h . roya songs
they ought to have a new Prince; and the old Prince ought to appoint
him, with the twelve companions, at most, chosen each year ... And
when the old Prince and his companions have to make a new Prince,
o e u mos o t e1r power, and especially the one that is er
by assent o~t!1e compani~ns upon the day of the great feast
W~erefore 1t 1s here provided as concerning such songs, that each new
oft::;:i.
d

during the meal ( en plein manger), the old Prince and his companions Pri~ce, on the ~ay that he shall wear the crown and shall govern the
go through the room, from one end to the other, singing; and the old feast of the Put, and so so~n as he shall have had his coat of arms (son
Prince must carry the crown of the Pui upon his head, and a gilt cup in blasoun de ces armes) hung m the room where the feast of the Pui shall
his hands, full of wine. And when they have gone round, the old Prince be held, shall forthwith cause to be set up beneath his arms the song
must give to drink to him whom they have chosen, and must give him tha_t was crowned on tl~e day that he was chosen as the new Prince,
the crown; and that person shall be Prince. plainly an_~ correctly written, without any error. For no singer by right
And the old Prince and the new one ought to decide as to the songs, as ought to smg any royal song, or to offer it, at the feast of the Pui until
also those of the companions who understand it best, to the number of he shall have see~ the s~ng that was last crowned in the previou~ year
fifteen at the most. And they ought to decide as to the best of the songs, honoured according to Its right, in the manner described.
to the utmost of their knowledge, upon their oath that they will not fail, And that, for dec~din_g as to the songs, there be chosen two or three
for love, for hate, for gift, for promise, for neighbourhood, for kindred, who ~n_d erstand smgmg and music well, for the purpose of trying and
or for any acquaintanceship, old or new; nor yet for anything. And the examming the notes and the points of the song, as well as the character
0
best of the songs ought to be crowned, and the crown ought to belong ~ the words set (pur Les notes et les poinz de/ chaunt trier et examiner au.xi
to him who shall be crowned ... b1en com la natur~ ~e la reson enditee). For without singing no one ;ught
And if there is any one of the companions who marries in the city of to call a co~1pos1t1on of words a song, nor ought any royal song to be
London or who becomes a priest, he ought to let the companions know crown_ed without the sweet sounds of melody sung (saunz doucour de
melodzes chaunte).
about it, and each shall be there according to his oath, unless he has a
proper excuse. And the married person ought to give them chaplets, all And alth_ou¥h the ho~est company of virtuous ladies is a rightful theme
of one kind; and all the companions ought to go with the bridegroom to and_ a prmctpal occasion for royal singing (chaunt roiale), and for com-
church, and to make an offering, and to return from the church to the ~Smg and furnishing royal songs, nevertheless it is hereby provided
house. And if there be any one of the companions of the brotherhood who ~ a~ no lady or other woman ought to be at the great sitting of the
departs this life and dies, all the companions ought to be there, and to uz, ~or the reason that the members ought to take example and due
carry the body to church, by leave ofthe kindred, and to make an offering. ~arnmg, to honour, cherish and commend all ladies at all times and
m all. places, as m ~c h ·m tl1e1r
· a bsence as in
· their
• presence.
' And this is
And if there is any one who is unwilling to be obedient to the peace of
required by breeding and propriety ...
God or to the peace of our lord the king - whom may God preserve
the community of the companions does not wish to have him or his
fees, by whom the good company may be accused or defamed. And if 6
A ballad-royal was a poem or song writt~n in stanzas of eight Imes.
2S2 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
2SS
That he who shall be crowned for his song upon that day, may ride held at London on the Sunday after the feast of the Holy T ..
between the old Prince and new one in the procession on horseback
~unday after ~entecost, which is the fiftieth day after Easte~~~~d [t~e
which they shall make through the city after the feast ... for the convenience of the merchants of the company. ' this
As concerning the room where the feast of the Pui shall be served, it is
agreed that from henceforth there shall be no cloth hanging of gold or
of silk, nor shall the room be tapestried; save only that it shall be fairly 93. A penny brotherhood in Nottingham 1307
decked with leaves, strewn with rushes, and dressed out with tapestry
cushions, in such a way as pertains to a royal feast; save that the seat Religious fraternities were formed for mutual aid by t I
where the singers shall sing the royal songs shall be COYered with a social levels, including, in this case that of th otwnbspeop eat all
Th e case. , . • e poores ur an workers.
cloth of gold. belo\\ exemplifies what was in all prob b'l't
. . a l I y a very large
And that the crown of the Pui shall be found at the common cost, of the cIa'iS of such relatively mformal associat1'ons 'fh1's d
d b . · one entere the
price of one mark [ I Ss 4d], and not less. recor ecause members with a grievance took their case before th
borough court Although th · . e
And as to serving up the feast, it is also ordained, that all the com- . .· . ~ primary ostensible purpose of the uild
was to mamtam a candle m front ofan image ofth v· · M g •
panions shall be served amply, as well the poorest as the richest, in d I . h . e irgm ary ev1-
ent y m t e church of the Carmelite friars of Nottingham th '.
the following way: they shall be served with good bread, good ale and also had a material purpose the regulation of'wh· h. h ' re society
good wine; and then they shall be served with pottage, and with one h h ' 1c 1s ere re,erred not
to t e c urch court but to the secular justices of the town.
course of solid meat; and then after that, with double roast in a dish,
and cheese, and no more. And that after the companions shall all have
W. H. Steven~on (ed.), Records of the Borough of Nottingham s vols
eaten, neither of the Princes, the old one or the new, shall give a supper
Lo~don: Quar1tch, 1882-85, i, pp. 7S-5. Latin, transl. by th~ ed'1t '
on that day, or a dinner on the next. But straight after they have given revised by GR. or,
the crown to him who shall sing the best, they shall mount their horses
and make their procession through the city, and shall then escort the
R~bert Mimo~ and John de Graham complain of John de Raisen
new Prince to his house; and there they shall all alight, and shall have a
Wilham_ de Wuneswold and William de Cossa), that the latter thre~
dance there, by way of parting; and they shall then take one drink and
have un.1ustly broken an agreement made between them, because it
depart, each to his own house, all on foot ... had been agreed amongst them on Friday, 25 March I S07 . th
And whereas it has given a chapel, founded and begun in honour of g~rden of the Carmelite friars of Nottingham, that each of the~ :~oul:
God and of Our Lady, near the Guildhall, for all the company of the give every week throughout the whole of the year next followin
Pui, the which chapel cannot be completed without great assistance penny to the light of the Blessed Mary, so that at the end of th;• ~:;
from the alms of good people; it is hereby ordained that each one of the Robert, J'olm de Gr~ha~, John de Raisen, William and William c!me
company shall give of his means and do his almsdeeds for completing an_d _made account of this money, and found in each of thei h d fi
shillm . 1 . . r an s ve
the work of this chapel; that is to say, the richest Id every Saturday, h _gs, w iereupon it was then and there agreed between them that
and the others 'I.id each, or whatever each shall please to give, accord- ~~ s;~ Joh~ de ~aisen, Willi~m and William should have the afore-
ing to his affluence and his wealth ... ney m their merchandises, to the common profit of the Ii ht
And whereas the festival of the Pui is much honoured by the attend- and that Robert and John de Graham should audit every year ~h~
ance of companions, and by far the majority of the company are mer- account ~f the money with the profit, and that they should ordain the
chants frequenting fairs, because of which they cannot come to the Pui :~ney with the profit for the ~ommon profit of the light. And Robert
on the fixed day appointed for the great feast at London, as that day and Jo~n_de Graham ?n 25 April Is 11 came to John de Raisen, William
falls during the fair of St Ives and other fairs; it is hereby agreed by the "ithWilham an~ desired them to come to account for the said money
companions, that from henceforth the great feast of the Pui shall be th I' the profit, m order that they might ordain the common profit to
e ight, and they would not, but unjustly broke the agreement made
234 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE 235

between them. John de Raisen, William and William say that no such each year thereafter, on the morrow of the feast of the Circumcision
agreement was made between them. They submit to a jury. of Christ ;:1 January] , all the brothers and sisters not legitimately
impeded shall meet after the morning mass of the day at St Mary's
church and there have a solemn mass celebrated for the deceased
94. Guilds at Cambridge brothers and sisters of the guild, on pain of ½ lb of wax.
29 .September. I 303. The master of the Hospital of Shengay [ of tht
There survive relatively few internally generated records of the medi-
Knights H~sp1tallers: gave the fraternity S quarters of corn to havf
eval guilds or fraternities. The suppression of all the guilds in 1547 the fraternity and he agreed to give the fraternity 1 quarter of corn
(with the exception ofa very few London companies that were licensed each year and so was received into the fraternity.
to continue for commercial reasons), on account of their Catholic
practice of prayers for souls in purgatory, explains this archival void. Ma1>ter Thomas of Halys [rector of Hardwick church:; entered the
Records of these two Cambridge guilds survived in the archive of the fraternity for a fine of 2s of annual rent from his house in Cambridge.
academic college to which, by a deliberate decision, they gave rise. 30 A.pril IS07. On Sunday before the Ascension 35 Edward ~I] it was
The Cambridge guild of St Mary was founded before 1298; that of ordamed by the common assent of all the brothers that the chaplains
Corpus Christi before I 350. In the early I 350s the two guilds joined of the said guild shall celebrate two trentals ~of 30 masses] specially
forces, and in 1352 the brothers and sisters of the amalgamated guild for the soul of each brother - or sister] after his [ or her] death; and
used this society as the means to found a new academic college of the if he should leave anything by will to his guild then, as the alderman
University of Cambridge. Guilds and individual burgesses not infre- shall ordain, the said chaplains shall celebrate additionally more or Jess
quently founded grammar schools; this was a more unusual enter- according to the legacy.
prise. The foundation of Corpus Christi College was also a diplomatic
20 July Is 10. William Schurr entered by a fined of 6s 8d with wax,
bridge between the communities of the town and the University of
but this is remitted as he is to be the proctor of the guild in selling our
Cambridge. The guild of St Mary evidently had a commercial interest millstones.
in the sale of imported millstones. The enrolment as new members of a
guild ofindividuals who were already deceased was sometimes secured Henry de Foulburne, bedeman,• entered in return for his service in
by their descendants in order that their souls should benefit from the summoning the brothers of the guild whenever needed for his lifetime.
intercessory prayers of the company. On guild plays, referred to here, Joan the wife of John Culling entered by a fine of I comb* of malt with
see also [114], [115], [116]. wax.
lO November 1319. True sum of 15 millstones sold £22 5s 4d.
M. Bateson (ed.), Cambridge Gild Records, Cambridge Antiquarian
Society, XXXIX, 1903, pp. 3-5, 8-9, IS, 26-7, 37-40, 47, 49, 51. Latin, Records of the guild of Corpus Christi, Cambridge
transl. by the editor, revised by GR.
1350
Records of the Guild of St Mary, Cambridge
John Appelby and Joan his wife entered the fraternity by a fine of
30 December 1300. Roger Wollemonger and his wife entered the guild 6s8d.
and fraternity on Friday after Christmas, for a fine of2 quarters of malt
payable at the feast of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary [8 September] R~bert Herry and Sarah his wife both entered for 20s of which they
with [an offering of] wax. paid 6s and Peter le Cok is pledge for the rest.
At a meeting of the brotherhood on this date it was established by the Matilda the wife of John de Impiton entered the fraternity for a fine of
5s with 6d for wax.
unanimous consent of all the brothers and sisters then present that
286 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
287

Richard Fouke, Alan le lattener,• Katherine his wife and Juliana Fouke Simon Francis citizen of London and Matilda his wife entered the
entered the fraternity for a fine of 11 sin all. fraternity.
Alexander the vicar ofSt John's church in Cambridge became a brother Andrew Aubrey citizen of London entered the fraternity and gave, etc.
and gave 40d. Henry de Lacy, servant of the said Andrew, entered the fraternity and
Robert le Pipere and Alice his wife, John Pipere, Thomas Pipere and gave 6s 8d.
I mania his wife entered the fraternity for a fine of !Ss 4d and wax. Walter Neel and his wives, Alice [deceased] and Katherine, and Joh\i
In expenses for the procession 56s IOd. Item 9dpaid to John Sekersteyn Doxenford entered the fraternity and [Walter] gave 20sto the proctor
for masks [visers. for the guild play]. and promised in alms to the guild £40.

1351 1353

Robert de Blas ton, carpenter, and Alice his wife, and Adam de Newnham William de Lenne, skinner and Isabella his wife entered the fraternity
and Isabella his wife entered the fraternity and gave in alms 20s and and gave in alms I Ss4d and 12d for wax and spent towards the play (in
wax. And the said Robert and Adam promised by their faith to serve ludo) of the Children of Israel [the Massacre of the Innocents] 6s 8d.
the guild in the office of carpenters before anyone else, taking ld per
week less than others according to the current rate [secundum comunem
cursum] of the town; provided they are not in service and are given 95. Ordinances of a guild at Lichfield
sufficient notice.
Richard de Audele living and Thomas Audele, Richard Sombi and In a few instances we can study surviving registers of members
Alice Ribi, dead, entered the fraternity and gave 26s 8d in alms and 7d inscribed in particular guilds, into which supplementary records were
for wax. sometimes entered. The regulations which follow were copied towards
1400 into the register of the guild of St Mary at Lichfield. This guild
Master Roger Attetownshend de Wilbi and John his elder b~o~her, had acquired its first royal charter in 1387; however, its existence
Walter and Alice his parents, John his younger brother and Wilham, antedated that ratification, and it had probably been influencing civic
Roger's nephew, entered the fraternity and_ gave 4~s in ~lms and Ss for affairs for some time. The register of the guild records a wide social and
wax which John Hardy, stationer ofCambndge Umvers1ty and proctor occupational range amongst the members. The ordinances hint at the
of the guild, received for making a breviary for the same. extent of the guild's involvement in the secular life of the town. This
text of IS88, however, is reticent about the scope of the guild's activ-
1352- 53 ities, of which the full extent appears more clearly in other records.0
Regarding the religious and moral purposes of the guild, it is notable
Alan Oxebourgh and Helen his wife and Geoffrey Forster enter~d the how far the secular members were in command of the team of priests
fraternity and gave all the vessels and utensils needed for brewmg to employed to serve the society.
the use of the master and scholars of the hall of Corpus Christi and the
Blessed Virgin Mary of Cambridge, provided that they should be used G. Rosser (ed.), 'The guild of St Mary and St John the Baptist, Lichfield:
for no other purpose. ordinances of the late fourteenth century', Collections far a History ef
John Clement of Tamworth and Alice his wife. Henry and Ma~ilda, Staffordshire, 4th series, XIII, 1988, pp. I 9-26. Latin, transl. by the
parents of the said John, entered the fraternity; and he wa~ and 1s an editor.
excellent counsellor and helper of the guild or college (Gtlde seu col-
legio) in all its negotiations in London; and John gave the college a 6 G. Rosser, The Art ef Soltdarity in the Middle Ages. Guilds in England 1250-1550,
chalice and a vestment. Oxford, 2015, pp. 205-7.
2:18 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
2:19

1. In 1387 the most illustrious King Richard II, vowed to God and box, t(1ey shall answer for it at the accounts, and restore it and
wishing to promote more abundantly the divine cult and the devo- repay 1t to the wardens for the new year.
tion of the people, in the eleventh year of his reign, granted and
gave his licence to Adomar de Lichefeld, Thomas_Taverner, Simon 1v. It is ordained that the master and wardens shall make provision
de Lichefeld, Henry Broun, Robert Teyntrel, Richard Mortymer for the honourable distribution of the uniform livery towards
and David Brydd, to make a guild and fraternity in the vill* of the feast of the Virgin Mary's Nativity [ 8 September] and th~t
Lichfield in honour ofthe glorious Virgin Mary, mother of God, as ea_ch. : member] shall pay for his own, so that on the feast day ~
is more fully contained in the king's charter. And so by the licences within the octave there shall be a general gathering of the broth-
obtained from the same king and from the reverend in Christ, ers and sisters of the guild, if the master and wardens consider
father and lord, Richard, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, the it appropriate reverently to hold a solemn service and a feast in
aforesaid guild was begun and founded in perpetuity. Many broth- honour of the glorious Virgin Mary.
ers and sisters began to flock into this guild, and they duly elected
from amongst themselves a master and four wardens, according to v. It is decreed that all the names of the brothers and sisters should
the terms of the royal grant, and they made by common agreement be. written in a register book with the gifts they make to the
various honest rules consonant with the law for the constitution gm~d. A_n~ when a~y brother or sister leaves this life, the day of
and support of the guild, in the form following. ~heir obit 1s noted m the same book, so that the obit may be kept
111 perpetual memory.
ii. First it is ordained that each year on the feast of the Conception
of the Virgin Mary [8 December], or within the octave of that ,·i. It is ~rder~d that no brother or sister should be received unless by
feast, a meeting of the brothers and sisters shall be held, and the discretion of the master and wardens, and that none should be
there the master and wardens shall be elected. No one, however, a_dmitted unles~ they be of honest conversation and good reputa-
shall henceforth be elected to the office of master or warden tion, and make to the support of the guild whatever contribution
who does not presently dwell in the town of Lichfield. And if is agreed with the master and wardens. And then they should
any man is chosen master or warden, and refuse the office, then make an oath on the Scripture at their reception in these words:
his name is to be cancelled from the register, and he is no more 'IN. from this hour onwards will be faithful to the master and the
to be counted a brother. And if a man is particularly suitable as brothers of the guild of the glorious Virgin Mary of Lichfield and
master or warden, he may be re-elected, although not compelled to their successor~ in the future; I shall be obedient in all their
to take the office again. The election is to be made like this: On lawful and honest doings; and the counsel which the master or
the day of the election, when the master, wardens and ~rothers of :wardens shall reveal I will not knowingly disclose to anyone. If
the guild are gathered at the common hall, the outgomg master 1t should come to my notice that the guild may be hurt or suffer
shall name six of the brotherhood, who shall then choose another grave loss then I will prevent it or cause it to be prevented so
three, and these nine together with the four wardens shall choose far as I am able. As a brother I shall faithfully observe the lawful
one man to be master, whom they judge to be most suitable, and ordinances made, and to be made in the future, by the master and
four wardens for the prosperity and rule of the guild. For the final wardens; may God and Scripture help me.'
determination of the election, the majority of the thirteen shall
ratify and determine it. vii. It is ordained that if any brother of the guild should be convicted
of adultery or any other notable crime, then he shall be publicly
111. The master and wardens are obliged at the end of the year to make defamed by the master and wardens of the guild; and if on the
an account before the brothers of the guild, of all the benefits third warning he will not desist, repentant, from such crime,
and profits received by the guild that year. And if the master or then he shall be removed from the guild, and on no account be
wardens together or severally lend any money from the common readmitted, for it is written: 'Let the name of such a malefactor
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL I-:NGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
240 241

be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with adm_ission of chaplains of the guild shall be done solely by the dis-
the righteous· [ Psalms 69.!28:. And if any of the brotherhood cretion of the master and wardens, together with as many of the
be inclined to some error or vice which is not notorious, as the more capable brothers of the guild as they deem expedient. And
master and wardens may establish, they are earnestly to warn the cl_1aplain to be admitted shall, before his admission, be duly
them about this failing, in accordance with the scriptural truth: examined by the other chaplains as to his ability. All the chaplains
•If thy brother trespass against thee [go and tell him his fault who should serve the guild must be of honest and good conver-
between thee and him alone': Matthew 18.15] , so that they may sation, or else, after reasonable warning, they shall be remov!d
desist from such crimes. from their office and others appointed in their place by the discre-
tion of the master and wardens. The chaplains shall be assiduous
viii. If discord should chance to arise between brothers of the guild, each day in the saying of mass in the chapel of St Mary, so that
after regarding the level and nature of the quarrel the master and with their help the parochial chaplains should be able to perform
wardens should amend it if it can conveniently be done. And no divine service more gloriously to the praise of God. One of the
brother should sue his brother in an ecclesiastical or secular court chaplains of the guild shall be chosen by the master and wardens
where peace should be restored by the f~aternity;. nor s~o~ld to be clerk, and shall write down the income and expenses of the
anyone seek the maintenance of some foreign lord m prejudice guild ... for a salary of 6s 8d per annum in remuneration. All the
to any member of the guild, on pain of loss of the benefits and chaplains of the guild shall be at the mass of the Virgin Mary
suffrages of the guild. and at the antiphon called 'Salve Regina' in the chapel of St Mary
in the marketplace of Lichfield, unless prevented by reasonable
ix. Goods and chattels given to the guild to augment divine service cause. Since when the solitary falls he has not another to help him
and charitable works shall be used according to the wish of the up [Ecclesiastes 4.1 OJ, and so that each should be a suitable wit-
donors and in their perpetual memory. Anyone holding tene- ness to the honest conversation and grave morals of the other, it
ments by grant of the master and wardens of the guild shall first is ordained that all of the chaplains of the guild shall be sleeping
pay due service to the chieflords of the fee and afterwards to the and ri<;ing in rooms constructed next to the chapel of St Mary
master and the brotherhood, according to Scripture which says: of Lichfield and shall dine together in a certain hall allocated by
'Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and the master and wardens at the common cost, unless they should
unto God the things that are God's' [Matthew 22.21]. be prevented by reasonable cause or sickness of body previously
intimated to their fellows. However, should it happen that any of
x. If any outsider should have a quarrel with someone of the guild, the guild chaplains should dine or even live with someone else in
let him inform the master, wardens and brotherhood, and after the town of Lichfield for three, four or five days in the week or
due consideration of the facts of the case let them intervene to for a whole week together, he shall none the less pay his weekly
bring a good end to such discord. contribution to the costs of his fellows.

x1. If any brother or sister should fall, without fault of their own, into xiii. It is ruled that the clerk who serves as deacon in the chapel
poverty so that they have not enough to live on, then le~ them_ be should, from the voluntary gifts of parishioners and guild mem-
helped by the discretion of the master and wardens, cons1d~rat1?n bers, be faithful in observing the mass of the Virgin Mary and
being given to their previous state and the nature of their 1:1'~- the antiphon called 'Salve Regina' each day, unless prevented by
fortune, according as God provides for the growth of the guilds reasonable cause.
resources.
xiv. When Philip de Strethay, master of the guild, and Roger de
xu. No chaplain shall be taken to serve the guild on the supplication Ridware, Thomas Wysse, Richard <lei Chambre and Richard
of any individual, even of a member of the fraternity; but the Couper wardens, by common consent of the other members
242
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL un:
admitted William de Wilnehale, priest, to be perpetual chaplain, wall-plate to meet the rafter~: . 'footlaces or jowe pieces' [jop
· "" d 1 • es or
as is more fully declared in a writing sealed with the common corm~es~ an sou aces [ diagonal braces in the roof]. The rafters shall
seal of the guild, the same William was bound to _undert~ke the be 8 mches broad or better at the foot and 6}v inches at the top d
. h d
5 _me es an 4 inch~s respectively in thickness. The high dais at the
,~
office of listing and distributing the livery on the instructions of
the wardens of the guild, and of keeping a list of the names of high bench of the said hall : shall hav(j trimmed timber, 4 feet broad
those receiving the livery, to be delivered to the wardens when C~eaning obscu:eJ. : Th~re ~hall ?eJ windows and 4 gapias [? dormt_r
required. \\ mdows] sufficient to give !tght mto the said hall. And the said higp
bench with the two side benche~ will be of oak timber, duly made, and
the stairs of sufficient breadth of oaken planks. And there will be two
96. Building a guildhall in Canterbury 1488 chambers on the south end of the said guildhall, I 8 feet long beside the
street, 'with double stage jettied' Cwith two stories, each projecting,
The five men who commissioned this guildhall to be built were evi- above] according to : modelled on: the scantlings [timber-framing]
dently the representatives of an unspecified fraternity in Canterbury. of the new chambers of the Lion [ a large inn in Canterbury] by the
The agreement with the builders, ofa kind which became standard from street, or better, in the most cleanly wise that may be. And at the north
the fourteenth century, gave those named in the contract a lump sum end o~ the said hall, a chamber with a stage jettied and of the [same]
to cover the full costs of materials and labour. The completed wooden scanthng as the chambers by the street. Also the said carpenters shall
structure was then to be handed over to plasterers for finishing. find all manner of timber, carriage, and all other manner of things that
belong to timber-work in the stairs, boards, stanchions, laths, and all
L. F. Salzman, Building in England down to I 540, Oxford: Clarendon other things belonging to carpentry craft for the hall and chambers
Press, 1952, pp. 510-12. English, revised by GR. aforesaid. And the foresaid hall and chambers to be made and per-
formed by the feast of St Peter ad Vincula [ I August] next ensuing;
The indenture• made on 20 December 1438 between William Benet, and to all these covenants performed according to the writing above-
John Sheldwich, Gilbert German, William Bryan and John Benet, citi- said, the said William Benet, John Sheldwich, Gilbert, William Bryan
zens of the city of Canterbury of the one part, and Alan Echyngham of and John Benet shall pay or do to pay unto the said Alan, Richard, John
the parish ofWoodchurch in the shire of Kent, yeoman, John Tuttewyf Tuttewyt: Piers, William Harlekyndenn and William Tuttewyf£ss 6s
and Piers Colyn of the same of the same parish and Richard Wademan, Bd, according to the obligations thereof made in full payment of [the
carpenters and Willliam Harlekyndenn of the same parish, yeoman and total sum of] £43 6s Bd, both for all manner of timber and carriages for
William Tuttwyf of lvychurch in the same shire, yeoman, on the o~her boards and laths and for their handiwork and workmanship of all the
part, bears witness that the said Alan, Richard, John Tuttewyf, Piers, said work, provided that it be done well and cleanly and all ready to tile
Willliam Harlekyndenn and William Tuttewyf bind themselves .... and to daub [plaster] by the said day of St Peter ad Vincula.
and undertake to make unto the said William Benet, John Sheldw1ch,
Gilbert William Bryan and John Benet in Canterbury aforesaid a hall
called ~ guildhall (an Ildhalle), good and sufficient and well-timbered 97. Guild of the Lord's Prayer, York
of heart oak, 41 feet and I O inches long, well and cleanly made. That
is to say, [having] three tie-beams (myddylbemys) 12 i~ches thick, and !his is _one of almost five hundred surviving returns to a royal enquiry
18 inches broad in the middle, each supported by suttable pendants ~nto gmlds of 1388-89. The enquiry had been demanded by parliament
: vertical posts], 'enbowid' [bevelled] in the best :'ay. It will ha\'e tn 1388 because of fears of sedition within the guilds, a circumstance
sufficient wall-plates [the horizontal beams supporting the ~oof] and Y.hich will have encouraged those responsible to specify certain aspects
the spandrels of the bays will be filled with mountants [vertical studs ?f their activity, and not others. These ordinances therefore give an
supporting the tie-beams at the centre], liernes [ribs], braces, rafters Incomplete picture of the scope and influence of such associations. This
with ashlars [short vertical struts rising from the inner surface of the guild, like the vast majority, included both male and female members.
244 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE
245
The ordinances make clear the guild's ambition, through its various iv. And because vain is the gathering of the faithful with t
activities, to reach out to a wide public. k fk. di. b . ou some
wor o m mess emg done, therefore the brethren h d
th· d. , h .f. ave ma e
1s ?r mance: r at 1 1t happen that any of the brethren be robbed
J. Toulmin Smith and L. Toulmin Smith (eds), English Gilds, Early or his goods or chattels happen to be burned or he be 1·mp · d'
English Text Society, original series, XL, London: N. Trtibner, 1870, . ' nsone
for any wrongful cause, or be brought to want through an · ·
pp. 137-40. English, revised by GR. · fi y v1s1-
t~t1on rom_ God, th_e other brethren shall, for kindness' sake, he~
lum a~cordmg to !us need, under the guidance of the wardens qf
1. As to the beginning of the said guild, be it known that a play, the guild, so that he may not perish for lack of help.
setting forth the benefit of the Lord's Prayer, was once played in
the city of York, in which all manner of vices and sins were held '. ~!so they are bound to find one candle-holder, with seven lights
up to scorn, and the virtues were held up to praise. This play met m token o~ the seven supplications in the Lord's Prayer. Thi~
with so much favour that many said, 'If only this play could be shall hang m the cathedral of York, and be lighted on Sundays
kept up in the city, for the health of souls and for the comfort of and feast days, to the glory and honour of God almighty, the
citizens and neighbours.' Hence the keeping up of that play in m~k~r of that prayer, of St Peter, of the glorious confessor St
times to come, for the health and amendment of the souls as well Wilham, and of all saints.
of the maintainers as of the hearers of it, became the whole and
sole cause of the beginning and fellowship of this brotherhood. v1. Also they are bound to make, and as often as need be to renew a
And so the main charge of the guild is to keep up this play, to the table showing ~he wh~le meaning and use of the Lord's Pray~r,
glory of God, the maker of the said prayer, and in order to hold and to keep this hangmg against a pillar in the said cathedral
up sins and vices to scorn. church near to the aforesaid candle-bearer.

ii. And because those who remain in their sins are unable to call vu. ~!so they. are bou_nd, as often as the play of the Lord's Prayer
God their father, therefore the brethren of the guild are, first of 1s played m the city of York, to ride with the players thereof
all, bound to shun company and business that are unworthy, and through the chief streets of the city of York; and to distinguish
to keep themselves to good and worthy businesses. And they are themselves more becomingly while riding in this way, they must
bound to pray for the brothers and sisters of the guild, both alive all be clad in the same suit. And to ensure order during the play,
and dead, that the living shall be able so to keep the guild that some of the brethren are bound to ride or to walk with the players
they may deserve to win God's fatherhood, and that the dead may until the play is wholly ended.
have their torments lightened. Also they are bound to come to
the burial services of the dead brothers and sisters of the guild. viii. And once in the year a feast shall be held, and fresh wardens shall
And if anyone does not leave enough to meet the cost of such be chosen by the guild, and a true account shall be given to the
services, the rest of the brethren shall bear that cost. And if any newly chosen wardens of all that has been done on behalf of the
brother dies and is buried away from the city, the brethren shall guild during the last year.
hold services for him [or her] within the city of York.
ix. Als? it is ordained that no one shall be allowed to enter this guild
Ill. Also it is forbidden that any brother of the guild shall, in the until he has been questioned by the wardens of the guild as to
belief that he will have help from his brethren, be forward in whether he has bent his will to live rightly, and so to deal with
getting into any lawsuit or quarrel, or in upholdi~g any _wrongful the guild and its affairs that he may be at one with the wardens.
cause whatever, on pain of losing all help and fnendsh1p, or any
relief, from the guild. x. [~~ an additional clause] a chaplain shall, once a year, celebrate
d1vme service before the guild, for the good of the brothers and
246 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE

sisters of the guild, alive and dead, and for that of all who help the Fiv~ w~eks after ere they were found,
guild. Moreover, the brethren are accustomed to meet together !heir km and their knowledge [acquaintance] cau ht them u .
every six weeks, and to offer special prayers for the welfare of I hen the commons of Abingdon cried on the king,g p with care.
our lord the king and for the good governance of the kingdom of ~pon _dukes and lords that were in this land.
England, and for all the brothers and sisters of the guild, present fhe kmg b_ade them begin upon God's blessing,
and absent, alive and dead, and for all those who help the guild or And make 1t as strong as they could with stone lime or d
U
pon t he d ay of' S amt
. '
Alban they began this game, san .
its members.
~nd/ohn Ht~cl~yns !_aid the first stone in the king's name.
~ir I l~rs Bes1l,hs, knight, courteous and heend [kind],
x1. The guild has no rents or goods, apart from the properties needed For his fathers soul and his friends· he did as he should.
in the playing of the play, which properties are oflittle worth for He gave them stones enough unto the work's end,
any other purpose. And the guild has one wooden chest, in which :'"_s many as they needed, fetch them if they would.
these properties are kept. I hen crafty men_ for the quarry made crows ofyre [ iron],
Wedges, and weights, and many hard hoes,
Geoffrey Barbour bade pay them their hire.
!hen must the~ have moulds to make on the bows [arch-stones].
98. Building the Thames bridges at Abingdon _I_hey ~ocke<l [tough~] for carts, and cast [dice] for their choosing.
_I, hey found out the fundament [foundation] and laid in large stones
This poem was written in 1447-48 by an ironmonger of the small I l~ey raised up the arches by geometry in rising, ·
monastic town of Abingdon. John Formande was a member of the Holy :Vtth eleven labourers laving [baling] at once.
Cross guild, which played a leading role in the major undertaking to con- fhere was water enough, stone, lime and gravel
Workmen as wise as they could find any, •
struct, from 1416, two stone bridges across a bend of the river Thames
~~1d ever bade the Barbour pay for their travail,
(where there were two river crossings) and a causeway between them,
_I_ill a thousand marks be spent each a penny.
thereby redirecting the main road between London and Gloucester. I hen the strength of the stream astonished them strong,
The verse, copied on vellum, is preserved in a unique fifteenth-century !~ labour and lanng much money was lore [lost].
copy in the almshouse which was built by the guild at the same period. l here loved them a lad, was a water- man long,
He helped stop the stream till the work were afore.
L. T. Smith (ed.), The Itinerary ef John Leland in or about the years It was a solace to see in a summer season,
158.5-1548, 5 vols, London: G. Bell, 1906-10, v, pp. 116-18. English, Three hun_dred I wisse [estimate] working at once.
Four and four, ruled by reason,
revised by GR. ,:o wit\\ ho wrought best were set for the nonce.
Of all works in this world that ever were wrought 1_he people proved their pm~er with the p1ckoys [ pickaxe7 .
Holy church is chief, their children be chersid [Christened], 1 ~e mattock was man-handled right well awhile. ~
For by baptism these bairns to bliss be brought, With spades and shovels they made such a noise
Through the grace of Go<l, and fair refreshed. T~at men might hear them thence a mile.
Another blessed business is bridges to make, ~ :ves wen_t out to w~t [ learn] how they wrought:
There that the people may not pass after great showers. FI\ e score m a flock, 1t was a fair sight.
Dole [grievous] it is to draw a dead body out of a lake In board cloth~ [ tablecloths] bright white bread they brought
That was fulled in a font stone [baptised in the font] and a fellow of ours. Cheese and ch1c~ens clearly adight [ prepared]. '
King Harry the Fifth in his fourth year Thus were the ditches dug in full hard ground,
He hath found for his folk a bridge in Berkshire. J\nd ca:t up to arear [ make level] with the way,
For carts with carriage may go and come clear, ~then ._thereupon] they were set with a quick mound '"a hedge"'
That many winters before were marred in the mire. o hold m the banks for ever and aye. ~ .,
And some out of their saddles fell to the ground, The good lord of Abingdon left of his land,
Went forth in the water, whist no man where. For the breadth of the bridge, eighty feet large.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND ASSOCIATIONAL LIFE 249
248

is then. Richard Formande, ironmonger, has made this table and set it
1t was a great succour of earth and of san<l. here in the year of King Harry the Sixth 26th [1447-48].
And yet he abated the rent of the barge. .
A hundred and fifteen pounds were truly paid
By the hands of.John Huchyns a~<l Banbery a~so
For the way and the barge, thus It must be sa1<l. 99. Regulation of games
Thereto witness all Abing<lon, and many one more.
For now is Culham hithe [ ferry landing-place] come to an en<l,
A series of national statutes attempted to ban the playing of varioui,
And all the country the better an<l no man the worse.
games.' City governments translated these rules into civic ordinances,
Few folk there \\ere could that way wend. . .
whose repetition is an indication of their limited effectiveness.
Butthey waged a \\ed "'let·t
_ ·so,nething as· .a t>ledge]
. or paid ofthe1r purse,
And ifit were a beggar :who] had brea<l 111 his bag,
He should be right soon bid for to go about. H. T. Riley (ed.), Memorials ef London and London Life in the Xl/lth,
An<l of the poor pennyless the hirewa:d [toll-man] would have X/Vth, and XVth Centuries, London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868,
A hood or a girdle, and let them go without. p. 580 (a); M. Bateson (ed.), Records efthe &rough efLeicester, ii, London:
Many more mischiefs there were, I say: C. J. Clay, 1901, p. 290 (b).Latin, transl. by the editors, revised by GR.
Culham hi the has caused many a curse.
Blessed be our helpers, we have a better way,
Without any penny for cart an<l for horse. (a) Proclamation made on Friday before the feast of St Bartholemew
Thus accorded the king and the convent [24 August], 141 I: That no manner of man or child, ofv,hatever
And the commons of Abingdon, as the abbot '."ould. estate or condition he be, be so hardy as to wrestle, or make any
Thus they \\ere cessed [ ~ssesse_d] and set a~I m one assent, wrestling, within the sanctuary or the bounds of[St] Paul's, nor
That all the breakings of the bridge the to\, n bear should. in any other open place within the city of London, upon pain of
This was prO\ ed act also in the Parliament, imprisonment for forty days, and making fine to the chamber,
In perpetual peace to have and_ to hold.
after the direction of the mayor and aldermen.
This tale is told in none other 111tent
But for mirth am.I in memory to young an~ to old.
Now e\'ery good bo<ly that goes on_ this bridge, (b) Borough ordinances of Leicester 1467. That no man of the town
Bid [pray~ for the barber, gentle Geoffrey, . nor of the country play within the franchise• of this town for
That clotl~ed many a poor man to bed and tong [dress], . silver [i.e. for money] at no unlawful games that be defended
And hath help to rents to hold up [finance t~e upkeep of] this way. [prohibited] by the statute and law and by the parliament, that
The which rents right true men have taken 111 l~and, is for to say at dice, cards, hazard, tennis, bowls, picking with
And graciously go\·erned them now a good while:
Whoso IHI\ e them hereafter with tt:uth h~t he ~tand, arrows : blowing arrows through a hollow trunk at a target of
It shall be known openly he does hunself beguile. numbers] , quoits\\ ith horseshoes, penny prick [in which pieces
I council e, ery creature to keep him from the curse. of iron were thrown at a stick on which a penny was placed],
For of this treatise \\ ill I no more tell. football, nor checker in the mire [an unknown game], on pain of
And be not too coYetous to your own purse, imprisonment. And the owners of the house, gardens or places
For peril of the pains in the pit of hell. where the games are practised, as often as it is so found, shall
Now God give us grace to folio\\ truth ~ven [evermore], pay to the chamberlain~ 4d, and every player 6d to the same
That we may ha\e a place in the bliss ol heaven. AMEN.
chamberlains, to the use of the commons.

r. [i.e. rebus] A.B.l.N.D.O.N. R.F.I.

i 12 Richard II c6, 11 Henry IV L4; I i Ed\,ard IV c.s. There are references to games
Take the first letter of your forefather, the worker of wax, and I a~dt~~ played by cluldrcn 1n mcdie, al tonn~ in H. Hanawalt, Growing Up in Medieval
the colour of an ass; set them together, and tell me if you can w a Londo1L The 1-;I perimct ef Childhood m Hts/ory, Oxford, 1993; N. Orme, Medieval
C}11ldrt11, New Haven and I..ondon, '2001
250 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

100. Festivities of the crafts at Bristol

For craftsmen and women the feast day of their patron saint would be IX. RELIGION AND CULTURE
an annual holiday. In Bristol by the fifteenth century the various crafts
had been grouped together for their collective celebrations on one of
two nights in the year. The measure documented below appears to have
been intended to contain the potential for disorder by discontinuing The ruling officers of every medieval town invested the place with a
the gathered celebration of all the crafts together, the mayor instead religio_us identity, claiming on this basis the reverence of its subjects. 1
sending gifts of wine to each oftne companies for consumption in their Devotion was recruited in this way to the service of ecclesiastical and
respective halls. It was an arrangement which presented the mayor and political authority. The relics incorporated in the spire ofSt Paul's cathe-
his officials in a paternalistic light, while simultaneously attempting to dral (n London epitomised the distinction and pre-eminence claimed by
limit the public revelries of the crafts, together, perhaps, with the per- the bishop [104]. The plays with religious themes put on in the streets of
ceived possibilities for political association on such occasions. York were perceived to be 'for the honour and good of the city, the mayor
and al~er~en_' [l 14]. The provision by households of bread for blessing
E. W. W. Veale (ed.), Tlze Great Red Book of Bristol, 4 vols, Bristol and ~1s.tnbut10~ after mass might be regulated, as at King's Lynn, by
Record Society, !9SS-5S, i, pp. 125-6. English, revised by GR. the c1v1c c?~nc1l, whi~h thu~ identi_fied itself as a religious authority
[108]. Stnkmg, also, 1s the mcreasmg extent to which town councils
Memorandum that on 20 May 1451 William Canynges, mayor of of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries took it upon themselves to
Bristol, Thomas Hore, sheriff [and others] with all the notable and legi~lat~ for the moral behaviour of the townspeople. Frequently tres-
worthy persons being assembled in the common council house of the ~assmg m the spheres ofresponsibility of the church courts -perhaps, at
town, having ordained, established and granted that the drinkings on ~•mes, e_ncouraged by a sense that ecclesiastical regulation was relatively
St John's night [23 June] and St Peter's night [28 June] from this meffect1ve - urban rulers adopted the role of moral guardians of the
time forward shall utterly be left among persons of crafts going on tow'.1. There was in this attitude a degree of inconsistency and prag-
those nights before the said mayor, sheriff and notable persons and m~t1sm. The regular condemnation of prostitutes by borough courts
their successors. And that the mayor for the time being shall ordain might appear expressive of complete intolerance; but symptomatic of a
at his expense wine to be disposed to the said crafts to their halls on more widespread compromise is the evidence from London, whose gov-
St John's day under the form that follows; and the sheriff for the time ernors attempted more realistically (albeit with only partial success) to
being on St Peter's day in like manner. Always provided that the said concentrate the practice in a designated area [11 I], [11 i].2 However,
persons of crafts shall send their own servants and their own pots for notwithstanding such accommodation to social realities, there is in the
the said wine. moral legislation of towns prior to the Protestant Reformation an evi-
To the weavers 10 gallons; fullers• 10 gal.; dyers 5 gal.; tailors 8 gal.; dent desire, not merely for tighter policing of unruly social elements but
skinners 4 gal.; butchers 6 gal.; bakers 5 gal.; brewers 5 gal.; smit~s, for spiritual reform in the godly commonwealth [I IS].
farriers, cutlers, locksmiths and cardmakers 4 gal.; masons S gal.; till- Yet late medieval religious culture was too multivalent to be manip-
ers [i.e. tilers] s gal.; carpenters s gal.; hoopers S gal.; barbers and ulated in the sole interest of bishops or magistrates. The secular
wax-makers 4 gal.; corvesers• 8 gal.; tanners 4 gal.; whitetawyers• 4
gal.; bowyers and fletchers 2 gal.; wiredrawers S gal.; shearmen 5 gal.
I On the themes of this sc1.11on sec further G. Rosser, 'Urban culture and the Church
1300-1540, in CUI-IB, pp 335--69, with bibliography.
2 ~ in general R. M. Karras, Common Tf'omen: Prostitution and SuualilJ in Medieval
Engla11d, Oxford, 1996. On the tendency to occupational zoning by sex workers sec
P. J. P. Goldberg, Women, Work, and Life Cycle in a Medieval Economy: Wo111e11 i11 rork
and 1"orkshirec. / SOO-I SZO, Oxford, 1992, pp. 15 1-'2.
252 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTURE
25S

rulers of Salisbury who in the fifteenth century contributed to the devotional and fraternal ties, forged over a lifetime as so many means
lengthy, expensi\'e and ultimately successful campai_gn to secu~e the
papal canonisation of a local holy man, Osmund, deliberately aligned
:o address ~he challenge~ of life in the late medieval town [105].
fhe collective memberships of both crafts and fraternities consoli-
themselves with a pre-existing popular cult.~ Nor were the cathedral da_ted identities at once ~ious and ~ivic by honouring the town's patron
chapter or the ci\'ic council of Norwich indifferent to the popular sto- saints and through their promotion and performance of plays based
ries of miracles attributed to William, a local boy reputed to have been on sacred subjects [106], [114], [I 15].8 Those plays, some of whose
martyred by Jews. The veneration of the chi!~ saint ~rought ~onour texts we are fortunate to be able to read, were not (as has sometimJs
both to the church and to the town which claimed 1nm as their own been imagined) bland and merely conventional tableaux, but were by
[IOI]. Such instances exemplify a recurrent theme in the history of turns funny, disturbing and provocative. Their potential to challenge
the Christian Church, which is the interpretation of a universal lan- and subvert social assumptions is illustrated by a passage from the
guage in the dialect of a particular pl_ace and community._ For a~) its Chester play of Christ among the Merchants [I 16]. The larger cycles,
possible utility to government, that dialect has the potential at times of which that from Chester is an instance, were at once an expression
to appear heterodox or subversive. Religious localism can account ofreligious ideals and a celebration of civic community. The town clerk
not only for officially adopted cults but also for the rare. in~idences of of Chester in 15S I-S2, in the preamble to a public proclamation for the
heresy. The particular form taken by a local cult of the V1rgm Mary at plays, declared that they would be performed 'not only for the augmen-
Coventry led to accusations of Lollardy there:' Official condemnation tation and increase of the holy and Catholic faith of our Saviour Jesus
might in turn be disputed. In 1440 a priest named Richard Wyche was Christ and to exhort the minds of the common people to good devotion
ordered to be burned at London for heresy. But the watching crowd and wholesome doctrine thereof, but also for the commonwealth and
took him for a martyr. They erected a cross at the site, and began to prosperity of this city'_!>
make offerings of money and wax e.x voto images, until the city author-
That double potential was echoed in other fields of cultural produc-
ities dispersed them by casting about animals' dung as a preventative tion, including the iconography of urban church decoration. Although
of 'further idolatry'." Religious belief was not easily controlled or vastly depleted by Reformation and seventeenth-century iconoclasm,
manipulated by authority. enough evidence survives to show how the fabric of a medieval city
A defining characteristic of the town, in contradistinction to other church functioned as a site for the construction of both social and
places, was the diversity of its religious institutions, and a consequent religious identities, and for the negotiation of relationships between
degree of choice open to men and women of the laity. The presence particular families and neighbourhood societies and a more inclusive
in the larger centres of mendicant friaries was largely welcomed by vision of the town community.10 The monumental inscriptions embed-
the secular community [102], although at times resented by more ded in the walls of the church of Long Melford announce at once the
anciently founded Benedictine religious houses [IOS] and also by pride of successful wool-merchants and their desire to be remembered
some parish priests who jealously complained of the evident ~p~eal as contributors to a common religious purpose [ 110~ . A stained-glass
of the friars. 6 Fraternities, too, added to the texture of urban rehg1ous window in a York church, which combines text and pictures in a vision-
life, and further accentuated the scope for the agency and variety of ary prayer on the end of the world, is a rare survivor of a much larger
lay religion.' Urban wills are eloquent of a creative range of both class of imagery which, like the plays, did not merely repeat famil-
iar platitudes but engaged the senses and the minds of contemporary
s A. H. Malden, The Ca11onizalio11 efSainl Osmu11d, Wiltshire Record Series, II, 1901. witnesses through arresting and potentially unsettling testimonies to
4 J. Crompton, 'Leicestershire Lollards', Tr,m.,actio11s ofthe L,iastershire Archaeological
a11d Historical Sociel)•, XL!V, l968-fi9, pp. I l-44, at pp. 29-.~0. 8 Sec in general R. Beadle and A. J. Fletcher (eds), The Cambridge Compan1011 to Medieval
5 R. Flenley (t-d.), Si.r Tow11 Chronicles ef E11gla1ul, Oxford, 191 l, p. IOI; J. A. F. English 1 heatre, \Ind t-dn, Cambridge, \1008 ; M. G. Bnscoe and J.C. Colde,\ey (eds),
Thomson, The Later Lo/lards Nl+-1520, Oxford, 1965, pp. 148-50. Co11/e.rlsjQr Earl;· E11gli,h Drama, Bloomington and Indiana, 1989.
6 J. Rohrkasten, The J\.fe11dica11t Houses if Medieval Lo11do11, 1221-1539, Munster, 2004, 9 D. Mills (ed.), The Chester Mystery Cycle, East Lansmg, 199'.l, p. xii.
i Sec Section VII 1. 10 In general see R. Marh, Image and Devoti<m i11 Lair ,11,fediroa( England, Stroud, 2004.
254 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND Cl' LTCRE
255
another order of reality, close to and yet critically distinct from that of Monmouth, the author of the text from which th
which prevailed in the everyday world of the town [109]. t ke (fi ) ese extracts are
a_ ' n, w~s. ro~1 l I 50_ a monk in the cathedral priory where the sh .
In addition to the material and spiritual support offered to their own of St Wilham was displayed to pilgrims As the s l rme
d "b . . o e source for the
members, guilds or fraternities often provided charitable support to a events escn ed, Thomas cannot be relied upon for any of h' • r
wider community. The Boston fraternity of Our Lady made variable t' H" · · . . 1s in10r-
ma wn. is principal narrative is a melodramatic account of William'
weekly distributions to particular paupers of that town, in addition suppose~- murder, pr:sented as the epitome of a larger clash betwee~
to its management of a poor house for thirteen long-term residents, the Jewish community and the Christian population of th · f
who were recruited after interview from towns throughout the region. N · ·h Th 1 · e city o
or~v1c • e ta ~• lik~ ma_ny another miracle story from the Middle
Other community-run infirmaries specialised in caring for epileptics or Ages, presents an idealised image of innocent youth cut off in ·t ·
the blind [107]. Such ventures were always insufficient to the need: I1ich Id b ·1i d . 1 s prime
w . we wo~ e 1 -~ v1sed to read as a simple source for the histor
the scale of sickness and indigence would always outstrip the capacity of chil_dh~d 111 the penod. 1·1 But given the evident intention to use th~
of largely modest and locally run charitable initiatives. 11 But it would material in sermons a~d teaching provided for the local population in
be wrong to conclude from this that townspeople were hardened or the_ cathedral ofN?rw1ch, it can be taken that the miracle narratives of
indifferent to poverty. When making their last wills and testaments, wl11cl~ ~wo_ are copied below, give at least a plausible account of the p~r-
few were in a financial position to be able to make a large material dif- son~ht1:s involved and of their circumstances. The arrival at Norwich
ference, and recorded bequests to the poor tended to have less of a prac- ofpilgnms not only from L~nn, at the other end of the county, but also
tical than a symbolic value [105].12 But the same evidence shows that '.rom as far afield as York, gives some indication of the circulation and
the poor were kept in mind, and the collaborative efforts of parishion- 1mpactoft~ese n_arrat(ves. The unique surviving manuscript of the text
ers and guild members during their lifetimes evince a clear sense not was made m_a C1_sterc1an monastery around 1200; earlier copies at the
only of the material value of neighbourly assistance to those in need cathedral pnory in Norwich will have been destroyed in a fire in _
1272
but of the social and spiritual benefit to the giver. Beyond its practical
contribution to welfare, urban charity offered scope for participation, M. Ru_bin (ed.), Thomas o.(Monmouth. The Life and Passion <ifWilliam ef
and consequently for a redeeming sense of personal contribution to the Norwz_ch, London: Penguin, 20 14, pp. 151-s, 179-80. Latin, transl. by
common good, to a wide range of townsmen and women. 13 the editor. Reproduced by permission of Penguin Random House.

At tl~at time in King's ~y~n, in the parish of St Edmund, there was a

101. The fame of a city shrine: William of Norwich certain w~man called Gilh~a, daughter of Burcard the Carpenter. She
lost her <;1ght by some accident and was condemned to blindness of
In March 1144, the dead body of a boy was found in a wood outside
Norwich. The truth cannot now be discovered, but the story began to
her eye:-fo: three years. To add to the misfortune, so terrible a pain
developed m her eyelids and oppressed her with ltuffering that for
circulate that a Norwich boy had been murdered by Jews of the city. It t.ree whole Y:ars her eyes were always closed, as if stuck together
is also evident from the sources that the matter was disputed, and that ith glue, as 1f she would ne,er be able to open them again. When
many called the official ecclesiastical narrative into question. Thomas ~~ree years had p~s~ed, !ihe decided to seek refuge in the haven of the
coessed mart,rr Wilham, as sole and singular remedy; and wi th greater
nfidence, since she had learned by common report that others simi-
II C. Dyer, 'l'o\'crty and its relief in late medieval England', Past and Present, CCXVI, 1
2012, pp. 41-78.
n:ly condemned to blindness ~ad been cured at his tomb. Her young
ll! P. Maddern, 'A market for charitable performances? Be<1uests to the poor and their
phew walked before her, leading the way with a cord around her, and
recipients in fifteenth-century Norwich wills', in A. M. Scott (ed.), E.rptritnetS of
Charity, 1250-1650, Farnham, 2015, pp. i9-l03.
1s G. Rosser, The Art of Solidarity in the Middle Agts. Guilds in England 1~so-15so.
Oxford, 2015, eh. 2.
256 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTUHE
257
she finally arrived in Norwich at St William, thanks to that guide. And I 02. The Franciscans come to English towns
so, standing in front of the altar, she began to pray and, after saying a
small part of the prayer, the rest was interrupted by a sudden attack of The first arrival of the Franciscans in En I d .
pain. Indeed, her head was troubled and both eyes were seized with a efforts to e::.tablish base::. in ; ser1:es ot· Egan!. Im 1224, and their early
fiery heat; and she plucked at her forehead and cheeks with her nails. b · · ng 1s 1 town
y one o~ their _number. While the mission of the s; ~re reco~nted
Wild with anguish, the wretch rolled on the ground and, as ifin a fit of Orders of Franciscans and Dominicans (bot! f◄ d \\O Mend1ca;it
madness, she rolled on the pavement, filling and disturbing the whole ~ot confined to to\\ ns, their preachin .and :st~~n ed in 1216) wl s
church with immense and frightful cries. But among the pangs of pain t1cularly targeted at the urban popufation,pwhict...,~:orts w~re par-
she cried out with a clear voice, saying from time to time: 'Gentle boy! church leaders to be in particular need f . ·I . s perceived by
Martyr William! Have pity on me, a wretch! You who have so often , th . . . . o sue l care as towns often t
gre\\ . e1r prov1s1on of parish churches and clergy Br th Th ou -
had pity on others!' was evidently concerned to und • 1· . o er omas
er me at every stage th b. l
A multitude of people had come to the church that day and they gath- poverty of the early friars. At the time of his writing e ad so ute
ered round the spectacle. Seeing the violence of her pain, everyone controversy was growing in the new Order about its' arou_n .. 1250,
shared her sorrow, and, inwardly moved to pity, they poured out both buildings and other property Tho . . . . acqms1t1on of
urb . mas ,,as at pams to emphasise that
prayers and tears. It was such a miserable sight that men and women II a1.~ property was held by others for the 'use· of the friars. Even
alike cried, made vows and wailed. For who could watch such things a ov.mg, hov.~ver, fo~ th~ effect of this debate upon Thomas's text
and be so stony-hearted as to keep their eyes from weeping? At last, he pr~bably gives a fair impression of the dependence of th I'
after much suffering and torment, as we truly believe by the impulse Franciscans upon tl e ear y
WI ·1 h . ie su~port, amongst others, of the urban laity
of divine mercy and the interventions of the merits of the blessed s b\e t/i"1~~~st1c chronicler g~ve prominence in his account to th~
martyr, gradually the pain began to abate. When she felt the coming ;e;:,~: ia g1. ts and beneficent mfluence of aristocrats and wealth
of the celestial remedy she got up from the ground and stretched her nts, this should not be taken as evidence that the fria . _Y
hands to heaven; and the eyelids which before were closed and which n~t also popular \\ ith humbler townspeople, many of whom a rsc:re;~
for pain she could not open even a little, now she opened; and imme- shbghtl~ _Iat_er records a,; members of guilds or fraternities att;:i1ed to
diately something like a spurt of blood flowed out, bursting from both ur an maries C9SJ.
her eyes. Without delay, the night of her long-standing blindness was
dispelled, as if by a dawn of new light reborn ... she came closer to Father Cuthbert (ed ) Th Ch 1 ,r
·' e ro,urre 0 Thomas o• Eccleston Fd" b I
the tomb of the holy martyr, prayed and offered a candle, which was and London: Sands 19 . :; · , " m urg 1
by GR. . , , 09, pp. 2 5-9. Latm, transl. by the editor, revised
brought to her; and, turning to the people, she announced that she had
received her eyesight.
After this the numb , f th b 1 . .
Around that time a certain Thomas of York also came, a man feeble and b . ,k er o . e ret iren mcreasmg and their sanctity
disabled in his whole body, who guided his progress with two staffs, r:co~11ng nown, the devotwn of the faithful towards them increased
known commonly as crutches, sustaining his weak body. He set off ;w:;;~e,:n~tey became anxious to provide the brethren with suita.ble
from York as best he could to go to the holy martyr William to receive h . g . . d erefore at Canterbury Alexander, master of the priests'
ospice, ma e over to them a pi t f d . . .
the grace of health, and, making little progress, his lengthy journey suffi . I b . o o groun and built them a chapel
took up many days. Faith supported the weak traveller and hope drew re ~1ent y . ecommg for the time; and because the brethren would
on the disabled one. Being led by them, he finally came to the tomb of w;:t~to~h~ng ~~ their own. it was given to the city and the brethren
the holy martyr in Norwich, obtained the remedy of desired health and, h , owe to ive there at the will of the citi7.ens. Most especially
as a sign, he left his crutches there. a~cwhed,;er, wert·ecthe brethren cared for by Master Simon of Longton'
eacon o anterbury and M t •. H f . '
noble c .. ' as er enry o Sandwich, and by the
for the oun~ess, t!1e Lady Inclusa d~ Baginton, v.J10 in all things cared
m e\en as a mother cares for her sons, diligently gaining for
21;s TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
RELIGION AND CULTURE
259
-
them the goodwill of princes and prelates, with whom she was held in
Brother Elias, who was so lame that he had b . .
favour beyond measure. they sang the office solemnly d. to e carried mto the choir
accor mg to note d I . '
At London the brethren were befriended by Sir John lwyn, who bought so much that the tears ran freely d I . r: ' an t le novice wept
• own Hs ,ace as he . N
them a plot of ground and gave it to the city, but piously assigned the
use and profit ofit to the brethren at the will of the citizens. He himself
afterwards entered the Order as a lay brother and left us examples of
novice afterwards havin d' d
Brother William ~f Ashb; a~~ a ;tst sang. ow this
holy death at York, appeared to
asked how he was he replied· 'Ior ampllton, and when Brother William
• • am we ; pray for me.'
perfect penance and high <levotion. Sir Joyce fitz Piers added to the
At Shrewsbury the king gave tl b h
ground. His own son, a man of good parts, afterwards devoutly entered church was built by a bL1rges. le redt Rr~nl a plot of ground; but the
the Order, and still more devoutly persevered to the end. The chapel - s, name ic iard p· d d
offices by a burgess nan1ed L B m e, an the other
was built by Sir William Joyner,'5 at his own cost; he also gave at awrence ut Br t1 w·11·
ter,"' in his zeal for poverty d d. I . o 1er '. iam, the minis-
various times upwards of £200 towards the other buildings, and until to be removed and mud w;l~r ere t ~e sto~e walls m the dormitory
his death he continued unweariedly in spiritual friendship with the by the brethren with admirabl p~t '.'P
_m their stead, which was done
brethren, bestowing upon them frequent benefactions. For the building cost. e e\ ot1on and meekness, and at great
of the infirmary Sir Peter de Helyland left £100 at his death. To Sir
Henry de Fowie, and a young man of good bearing, Salekin de Basing,
was the aqueduct chiefly due, but their offerings were largely increased
JOS. Franciscans arrive in Bury St Edmunds
by the king's munificence. Many other and ever-increasing gifts have
l seen in my own time in London, both as regards buildings and books
and additions to the ground and for the relieving of other needs: gifts The irony in this extract is characteri. . . f I .
encountered by the new friar . st1c o t ie Jealousy and hostility
to be admired by mortal men, and provided for the brethren by the
of the older Benedictin s _m 1:1any towns, especially from members
most sweet Jesus in order that they, more than others, should love and e monasteries, such as the author of this passage.
honour him who is the same now and for ever.
At Oxfor<l the brethren were received by Robert le Mercer, who let AL. Gd ransdcn (ed.), The Chronicle of Bury St Edmu d
on on: Nelson 1964 . n s 1212-180 1,
them a house in which many learned bachelors and many nobles took ' , p. 22 . 1Jatm, transl. by the editor.
the habit. Aftcrwar<ls they rented a house from Richard le Mulliner, on 125i. On 22 June the Fria M.
the ground where they now arc, but within a year he gave the ground Edmunds b stealtl , rs mor entered the town of Bury St
and house to the city for the use of the brethren. The ground, however, in the housfof Rog:~ d~h~ ~e!~brated . mass in an audible voice
was exceedingly narrow and of no great length. north gate, in the presence o;:l;~o~~~;t~ght, on the east side of the
At Cambridge the brethren were at first received by the burgesses, Simon, the prior and at tl .. f 1 • ut unknown to the convent.
who made over to them an old synagogue near the prison. But as the sub-prior, the sacrist and ,~;:n ,m\ t l ~ a~bot-ele~t, together with the
neighbourhood of the prison was intolerable to the brethren since both of the abbot-elect, went to tl { ot l;s representmg the point of view
they and the gaolers had to use the same entrance, our lord the king ":hen the above-mentioned ~~i l~f
a ut nev':~th~less, ~n the same day,
gave them £6 lSs 4d, which was sufficient for them to buy out the dinner, the friars' orator and TI tl nd :h~
friars had JUst begun their
lease from the court of the exchequer. Then they built a chapel so very were razed [by fire] to tte gr:und~e butldmgs belonging to the house
poor that one carpenter built it in one day, and in one day set up four-
teen bundles of planks. So on the feast of St Lawrence [10 August],
though there were as yet but three clerical brethren, namely, Brother
William of Ashby and Brother Hugh of Bugden and a novice named
16 W"!r
15 Mayor in 1239. Fi 1~m <le No tting ham (d. 1254), m inister. ·J ' , .
ranc1scan Order. , m c large oftlw Enghsh pro\'ince of the
260 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTURE
26]
104. Relics in St Paul's steeple, London 105. Urban wills

The construction of St Paul's, as of other medieval cathedrals, was a The wills and testaments of medieval townspeople surv· ·
. . ive m very large
ciYic no less than an ecclesiastical project. The incorporation within the num bers. A sma 1I but significant proportion has been p bl. h d •
crosi,, on the spire of sacred relics was perceived as offering protection · d. · f ·
m e 1t1ons o varymg degrees of completeness) Copies 0 f ·11
u is e (albeit
not only to the church but to the urban popul~tion as a ':"hol~. The first · d · d. · w1 s were
reg1s~ere_ m. 1verse ecclesiastical courts, depending upon the weal/Ji
of these records comes from a secular chronicle compiled m London, a~d d1stnbut1on of ~roperty of the testator. The most socially elevateil
the second from a ,\ell-informed monastic writer based in York. w1ll-n_1akers a_rpear m the well-preserved registers of the court of the
~rchbishop o~ Canterbury. Humbler ~eople, whose wills were copied
G. J. Aungier (ed.), Chroniques de London, Camden Soc!ety, XXVl~l, m local church
. . courts,
. , are
. more patchily represented 1'n the surv1vmg
· ·
1844, p. 38 (a); W. Childs and J. Taylor (e~s), The Anomm~lle Chromcle record. An md1v1dual swill and testament was influenced by the
. expec-
1307 to 1334, Yorkshire Archaeological Society Record Series, CXLVII,
1991, p. 89 (b).French (a) and Latin (b), transl. by GR (a) and by the
tations of the clerk :owh_om it was dictated, and remains in any case
no r~ore th~n a partial guide to the testator's activities over a lifetime.
editors (b). Bu~ 1t remams_ a_valuable trace ofpriorities at a particular moment. The
soCJa( and rehgwus loyalties recorded in these testaments are traces
(a) In that year [ I 314J the cross of the bell-t?w~r of St Paul's church o~ t_he e~onomic diversity and the range of spiritual choices which
was brought down to be repaired, and w1thm th~ ol~ cross w~re d1st111gu1shed the medieval town from the countryside.
disi.:overed relics, that is to say, a corporal for smgmg mass m,
white and complete without any damage, inside whi~h was fo_und ~- J. FSur~1ivall (:d_-), The Fift.y Earliest English Wills, Early English
a part of the shaft of the Cross ofOur Lord Jesus Christ, made mto ext oc1ety, origmal series, LXXVIII, London: N. TrUbner 1a82
the form of a cross; a stone from Our Lord's tomb; another stone pp. 112-15 (~);~-Flood (ed.), St Albans W ills 1471-1500, Hertfo;dshir~
from the spot\\ here God \\ as when he ascended into heaven; and Record Publications, I_X, Hitchin: Hertfordshire Record Society, 19 93 ,
another stone from the mount of Calvary where Our Lord's Cross pp. S-4 (b), 40 (c). Latm, transl. by the editors, revised by GR.
,, as set up. And there was found a purse, and in the purse a piece
of fine red cloth wrapped around bones of the eleven thousand (a) 18 May 1439. I Nicholas Charleton, citizen and skinner of
Virgin Martyrs together with other unidentified relics. These London, i~ whole and good mind being, thanked be almighty
relics Master Robert de Clothale showed to the people when he God, ordam and make my testament of my last will in this form
!
preached on the Sunday before the feast of St Botolph [ 1 JuneJ. that follows. First_ I bequeath my soul to almighty God, my
Aftern ards on St Francis' day : 4 October] the same rehcs were maker, our lady_ Sa1~t Mary, and to all saints of heaven, and my
put back into the cro~s \\ ith se,·eral ne" ones. bo~y to be buried m [St] Paul's great churchyard of London
before the cross. And I bequeath to the new work of the same
(b) At this time [ 1~14::i the cross was taken ~own fr?m the ste~ple church 20~. A~d to the high altar of St Augustine's church where
· at St Paul's in London. In it \\ere many rehcs; and 1t was repaired I am a parrsluoner, f~r my tithes and offerings negligently for-
and put back up with these relics and others on St F~ancis's day gotten, 6s Bd. And I will and ordain that in all haste possible after
after Michaelnm,, and on that day there was chantmg by var- my decease, ~hat I have four trentals [ of thirty] of masses sung
ious canons and "icar:. of the said church on staging forty fehet for my soul m three _h~uses of friars of London, that is to say,
higher than the cross; and at that time there was a great rig t the Pr:achers [D_om1mcans], Whitefriars [Augustinians] and
from torches and \ arious other music there, because of the great G_reyfriars [Franciscans] , and I bequeath therefore to each house
importance of the relics that were placed in the cross. o! [the] three 4 0d. And I bequeath 1000 halfpenny loaves to be
given to poor men by my executors within twelve months after
my decease, that is to say, to every poor man that comes, a loaf.
262 TOWNS IN MEDlr:VAL r:NGLAND RELIGION AND C't'LTU RE

!i!6S
Also I bequeath to the brotherhood ofmy craft of Corpus Christi,
soul and all true Christian souls, as they ho b
to the common box thereof, 6s 8d; and to the common box of God's will. And of this testament I make m pe est [ to] please
the brotherhood of Our Lady in my craft, 6s 8d. Also I bequeath 'h y executors that . t0
say, l omas Gloucester, clerk, my brother Will' A, II is
to every prisoner in the prison of Ludgate, and each of the two Th A ·· ' iam ard and
counters [additional prisons] of London, a loaf of I lb, to be omas ston, ~1t1zens and skinners of London. And be u
to each of my said executors for his labour in this p t ~ ea th
I
delivered when corn is of reasonable price within a year after my
death. Also I devise and ordain I 00 lbs of wax to minister to the
IOOs. In witness of which thing, to this testament Iahr to e ':!~
sea.I W ritten
· at London the day and year abovesaid. ave Al set ' ,'t''
service of the Salve [Maria, i.e. 'Hail Mary'] of Our Lady's chapel and b th · · so, OH!r
in the said church of St Augustine, that is to say, two tapers of . a oved bese prov1s1ons'. I, the said Nicholas Charleton, ordain
assign an equeath by this testament to the said Joan m •s:-. '
1 lb weight there to be lit and burn at Salve ti~e as long as the the t d · h , y w11e,
said IOO lbs weight of wax will last. And I will that Thomas erms an estate m t e tenement with the appurtenan h
I dwell in in Watling Street in the said parish of St A ces ~ at
Gloucester my brother, that is my executor, and the wardens h · ugustme,
t e which I hold to farm ,:on lease] of the master and convent of
of St Augustine's church aforesaid have the governance of Lhe
St Bartholemew's hospita! beside West Smithfield of London, to
said wax and light as written above. Also I bequeath to each of
have an? to hold to the said Joan the said terms, estate and tene-
my apprentices dwelling and standing with me in [the] manner
me_nt with the appurtenances during her life, provided the terms
of apprentices at [the] time of my dying 20s. Also I bequeath
of 1t last so long, she bearing, yielding, paying and supporting
to Thomas Bayle, my servant, 20s. Also I bequeath to "!'homas
thereof the farm year]?': and other charges during her life, as I
Dymmok, skinner, of Gloucester, my best .!Fown of t~e hvery of
am bound to do by writing to the said master and convent. This
[the] skinners' craft, both fur and cloth, 1f he be ahve. And to
testament was proved befor~ ~aster John Lyndefeid commissary
Watkyn Asshwell my second best fur a~d _gown after the advice
etc., S July 14 39. And comm1ss1on was made for the appointment
of Thomas Gloucester my brother. And 1f1t so be that any of the
of the executors named and for the administration of the goods.
said persons that l have made beques~ to die before my dec:ase,
then I will that the same goods of him or them that so die be
(b) Will of John Felowe, barber, of St Albans, 2 5 June 14 7 l. J leave
divided into two parts by my executors, that is to say, one part
to the alms of the brotherhoods of Corpus Christi and Our Lady
?1Y body t?
be buried next to my former wives Joan and Agnes
m_St_ Peters ch'.irchyard. To the high altar of St Andre w's chapel
of my craft; the second part to the wardens of St Augustine's
: itht the precm~ts of St Alban's monastery for forgotten tithes
church, to the use of the same church. And the third part to be
20d. T~ the fabric of the new rood loft in the same chapel 20d.
expended and given by Thomas Gloucester my b~other and ~y
For repairs to the charnel chapel• in the said town 2od.18 To
executor to poor people of the parish of St Augustme a bovesa1d,
the anchorite of St Peter 12d and the anchoress* of St Michael
and other parishes where there is need. Al~o I beque_ath to the
12d. ~o Tho~as Blythe 20s in ready money of such ofmy good
brotherhood of St Nicholas founded by parish clerks m Lo~don
utensils as his mother may choose. To John Blythe six of the
ss 4d. Also to the brotherhood of St John of the craft of tailors
b~t~er razors. All my other razors and scissors are to be equally
of London ss 4d. And the residue of all my other goods, chatt~ls
d1v1ded between John Blythe, John Eynesham, my former serv-
and debts that be not bequeathed above after my debts be paid,
ant, and Robert Overton, my servant. To the said John, John and
my burying also and funeral expenses done, and this testament
Robert all my round basins and all things belonging to me in 'le
fulfilled, I bequeath and will that it be divided by my e~ecutors
Shavynger Shope' to be equally divided between them, except
into three parts, of which I bequeath two parts to my wife Joan~
to have and to hold to her for ever more, in the name of her par Ii Thi! chapel of St Andrew was rebuilt c. l 'ffiO as a parochial church for the to,rns-
and dower of my goods to her in any wise belonging; and the peoplc, thcrt•by rchcl'mg the monks of the n -gular intrusion of laity within the
monastery church of St Pl!ter
third part of the same residue, I bequeath to my exe~utors, by 18
them to be disposed in masses, alms and works of chartty for my Tht cham el chapel was maintained by a fratern ity of All Saints, 1t stood in the
corner of the abbey churchyard.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTURE
264
265

the two larger and better round basins _which belong to Jo~n my This indenture• witnesses that on 1 September 1430 J0 h Sh
Th , n eldon
present wife. To Joan my wife, all the instruments belonging to omas Eldbek, Henry Coton and Robert Burges, wardens ofth • '
the art of surgery and bloodletting. To Agnes my servant, two · f c .
d rawers of t I1e city o oven try, with John Stafford, John Rocheforde w1re-
pairs of sheets ... I bequeath my tenen~ent in Holywell St~e~t to John Blakman, John Benett, William Deister William Cl b k '
.. . . • ay ro e,
my wife Joan for the remainder of her life. After her death 1t is_to Nicholas Jones, John ~traunge and Thomas Stafford with other worthy
be sold by my executors and the money used to pay a chaplain, · ~
men. of the .same craft m the name of all the persons of the cratit, I1avm
at a competent salary, to celebrate mass for two years ... for_ the their devotion to almighty God and to the blessed sacrament th h' t
good of my soul, the souls of my paren_ts and my former :wives
. 11 Ch . . ' e w ic
1s a nst1an men's belief, and considering a devout thing called th
... Provided that my wife Joan pays a priest [to celebrate] m the new ca~opy over the altar in the ~hurch ~fSt Michael of the said city i~
chapel of St Andrew for a whole year after my death ... out of her the ':'h1ch the blessed sacrament 1s worthily at this time kept, the which
own goods mentioned above. keeping must have c~st a_nd reparation, came before Thomas Paynel!,
then mayor o~ the said city, Laurence Cooke, Thomas Wildgryse . ..
(c) Will of John Payes, fletcher,• of St Albans, 17 June 1478. I & other more in St Mary's Hall, praying and desiring out of devotion
bequeath a twopenny wax candle to burn before St E~asmus on that they hav: to the said sacrament, and worship to the said city, to
the day of my death. To my housekeeper, wido:W Idoma, for her ha_ve the keep_mg and the governance of the aforesaid canopy and all
good service to me I bequeath a gown edge~ with red, a mu:rey things b~long~ng t_hereto. ~he _which the mayor and other worthy men
[purple] hood, a brass pot, another b~a~s pmt pot and a pair of there be1~g w1~~ him, con~1dermg their desire and holy devotion grant
sheets. To the wife of my brother Wilham Pyes one red gown them their ~et1t1on, thanking them of their desire and good will. And
d a murrey hood. To the two sons of Matthew Clerk, fletcher, at request of the warden and other men of the said craft, this indenture
~~eave all the tools of my trade to be equally divided between is registered in a book called the mayor's register in St Mary's Hall, for
them. The residue of my goods I bequeath to Matthew Cle:k, pe:pet~al_remembrance to be had in time coming. And this indenture
fletcher, and John Peerson of St Albans, draper, whom I appoint abides m fhomas Peynell's bag in St Mary's Hall.
as my executors. Witnessed by Robert More, draper, and Edward
Loryng of St Albans.
107. Guild charity

106. Craft patronage of civic religious ritual Each of these guilds or fraternities was so prominent in its respective
town as to have functioned, in the absence of a chartered corporation,
The wiredrawers of Coventry were amongst the humb~e~t- crafts of th~ ~s a surrogat~ town council. The membership of these bodies was
town. Their request to be given the honour of responsibility f~r _a ne\\ m e_ach case diverse: they comprised artisans and shopkeepers, pro-
canopy over the high altar of St Michael's ch~rch ~ay have origm_a~ed. fess10nals and merchants. They included both men and women. The
in their involvement in its manufacture. St Michaels and Holy Tn~i~y focus _of their charity ranged from individually identified recipients
were the two parish churches of the medieval town, and both had civic ~o guild-run almshouses. The rare and fragmentary survival of the
functions. ~nternal_ acco~nts of medieval guild~ means that we have only a partial
impression o't*the~e communally ~upported _f~rms of fratern_al charity.
M. D. Harris (ed.), The Coventry Leet Boo~, 4 vol_s, London: Oxford T~e palmers guild of Ludlow evidently originated as a society of pil-
Uni\ ersity Press, 1907-13, pp. 131-2. English, revised by GR. ?"1m~, although by the later Middle Ages pilgrimage had ceased to be
its principal raison d'etre.
It is ordained that the craft of the wiredrawers shall keep the canopl
ov~r the high altar in [the church of] St Michael in ~oventry, a;d~~ Shre\~sbury, Shropshire County Record Office, MS. S56/S21 (a);
appears by indenture• made, the tenor of which follows m these wo · Norwich, Norfolk Record Office, King's Lynn MSS KL/C38/ 1-s 1 (b);
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTURE
'l66
267

British Library, MS. Egerton 2886 (c); Wisbech Town ~useum, MS and then he died ... and granted to Robert Spycer ofN · h
~~b
Records of the Guild of Holy Trinity 1379-1547 (d). Latm, transl. by t he year 52s, and to Robert Paston of the same for th
• ree quar-
GR. ters o f the year, 5s, and
. then he died · · · [50 individual r ec1p1ents
· ·
ac: 1together named this• year.] Total expenses on alms [th e sum of
(a) The palmers' guild of Ludlow 1our separate officers sub-accounts] £22 2s od.

[Rent-collectors' accounts, l S64:>5] Cost of the hire of t~o (c) The guild of St Mary, Boston
horses going to Wyston [?] to bring the vestments ~f the guild
for the burial of two sisters of the guild on two occasions on the 1514-_15. In money distributed to thirteen poor people of both
order of the warden S ~9.d. sexes tn the almshouse or bedehouse• from 4 June to 27 M
[Stewards' accounts, 1425-26] Given in al~1s for the relief of viz. for 51 weeks at Ss Sd per week £22 2s Od ... For red clo;: f~~
Reginald Draper de la Pole, a brother of the guild who was lately [livery] clothing and for crowns [to sew on to the robes] for the
robbed by false thieves Sd.19 poor people in the bedehouse £4 7 s 2d.
(Stewards' accounts 1426-27.] In alms given to several pen- 1516-17. Alms given to Mr Downham for one whole year at 2d
niless brothers and sisters of the guild and to other poor people per week 8s 8d. To a certain woman coming from Ely to Boston
at Easter 2s 10d. to enter the bedehouse 6s Sd. To the widow of ... Lynwode Id per
[Stewards' accounts, 1427-'18] Given in alms to He~ry ... of week for one whole year 4s 4d. To the widow of Pavy, a pauper,
Chester to help him because he was robbed by false thieves 20d Id per week for 56 weeks 4s Bd. For food for one Hobchirche for
... Given in alms at the burial of Agnes Nightingale 6d. eleven weeks Ss Sd. Paid into the hand of one called Fuller before
[Stewards' accounts 1533-34] Paid to the poor people in the his admission to the bedehouse 12s.
[guild] almshouse at Christmas [sum illegible]. 1517-18. Alms of the guild. Paid to Alexander . . . at the
[Warden's accounts 1540-1] Received from Elizabeth Jonys tavern of the alms of the guild at 6d per week; to a person of
for her admission as a sister of the almshouse 20d. Peterborough at 4d per week; to a certain old woman called ...
Downeham at 2d per w~ek; and to Mother Lynwode at Id per
(b) The guild of Holy Trinity, King's Lynn wee~; all for 55 weeks this year (less Bd overall) 58s 11 d. Paid to
Mr fhomas Crawe for the purchase of a cloak provided for a man
1343-44. Alms given to the anchoress* of South Lynn (20s), late of Peterborough out of the alms of the guild 6s8d. The rents
Clarice Sorel, a poor woman (6s 8d), Little John with the broken of_John Lovell (1Ss4d) and of Christopher Robson's wife (Ss4d)
back (6s ad), the hermit of the church of St Nicholas (5s) [and 21 paid by the alms of the guild.
others] £18 l IsOd. .
1s85-86. Alms paid to the hermit in the hermitage outside the (d) The guild of Holy Trinity, Wisbech
south gate of Lynn 6s Sd for the year ... to Bliss of Hell from the
same alms 6s Sd ... to the anchoress of All Saints church in South 1506. We ordain that the stewards in hall and servers at the
Lynn 20s ... [and SO others] £18 14s4d. , ~itchen board sha~l s~e. every brother and sister honestly served
1406-7. Alms paid to ... Katherine, who was the anchore~ss m the hall upo~ fr1n1ty Sunday next coming. And when the
servant 6s ad ... to Alice Stacy in Bolwerrowe 4s, to Katherine alderman and his brethren have dined we will that all the poor
Taylour in Spynnerlane 2s .. . to Richard Coke for half a year Qs people then there present shall be sat at a table in the said hall
6d and then he died ... to Gilbert de Ketleston for half a year IOs and s:rved with such meat as shall be left [by] the said alderma~
and then he died, to Thomas Coke for a quarter of a year 2s Bd and his brethren, by the aforesaid stewards.
1512. Agreed that Andrew Johnson and William Kyng shall
19 Figure lost but calculated from other details on the account. have the rule and supervision of the almshouses, to select such
268 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL J-:NGLAND
RELIGION AND CULTURE

persons as are most in need (maxime debiles) in the houses accord- 269
holy bread together. And if there should b t
ing to their discretion, with the counsel of the alderman and their ··t t d h e wo occu · d
other brothers of the guild. s1_ ua e toget er, one paying 6s 8d and the others pie tenements
give the holy bread sharing according to th . s 4d rent, they shall
th t e1r rent Pr .d d
a n? tenement or shop paying 6s 8d in earl r . . ov1 e always
who live by begging shall be const . yd y ent by Itself, nor those
108. Civic religion: blessed bread . . ' rame or compell d
contr1but1on for holy bread. e to make any
From the early Middle Ages there developed throughout Christendom
the custom, at the end of the weekly parish mass, of distributing to the 109. Urban piety · t · d
congregation at the church door what was known as 'blessed bread'. m s ame glass: a parish church in y ork
Blessed (not consecrated) by the priest, the bread was provided by
members of the parish in turn. Organisation of the responsibility to In the church of All Saints, Pavement in York f
early fifteenth-century (c 1410) . d ' . ' one o a series of
provide the bread which, once blessed, was then redistributed to the · wm ows contains as r· f.
accompany texts loosely based d . e ies o images to
community, was most often undertaken by the parish, and in some Conscience' zo Th 18
.. d"d . up~n a evot1onal work, 'The Prick of
· 1 act,c poem circulated q ·t ·d I ·
continental instances by fraternities. Here, however, in an instance eval England TI 1· . • . ui e wi e Y m later medi-
of the religious roles undertaken by secular urban governments, the . le mes m question are apo I ·
associated with each couplet d; ict h . ea )'.Pt1c, and the pictures
arrangements are overseen by the civic council. The date of this record At the bottom the lay donor. p ht e ,m_pendmg end of the world.
from King's Lynn is 1424-2.-S. . • s were s own m pr .R H
and his wife Cecilia, and Abel Hes I and I. -~yer. oger enryson
window shows the Corporal A t y f M llS wife Agnes. An adjacent
D. M. Owen (ed.), The Making of King's Lynn, London: Oxford cso ercy. Its donors, a man and a
woman, appear in the glass below.
University Press for the British Academy, 1984, p. 142. Latin, transl.
by GR. Reproduced by permission of the British Academy.
!~~~?o;::,,~hCe[plainLoteddglassSof
o· , ,
'.'II
Saints' church, North Street, York'
n on· oc1ety of A · · •
Each inhabited house in the town of Lynn worth 20s or more in annual pp. 151-202· with S Pow;ll 'All S . , n~quanes of London, 1969,
rent shall give holy bread and a candle when required. And if the Text and im;ge in the Prick ',re a!nts c_ urch, North Street, York:
house is occupied in divided tenancy to a total value of more than 20s onsczence wmdow' in N M
Prophecy, Apocalypse and the Da0 ol'Doo ( d)
. ' . organ e . '
a year, then each shall give holy bread, sharing the cost according to PP · 292-316· Eng1·1s h, revised
. ry ~. m, Donmgton: Shaun Tyas 2004
the proportion of their rent, and one of them shall offer a candle. And by GR. ' •
if it should be several shops under a single roof to the total value of 20s T he first day forty cubits ct>rtain
per annum or more, they shall give the holy bread between them and the sea shall rise up abO\ e eYery mountain
share the cost according to the level of their rent. And if it should be The second day the sea shall he ·
so lo\\ as all men shall it see.
a principal tenement which has diverse tenements annexed under the
The third day it shall be plain
same roof and not divided, the principal tenement being worth 20s per and stand as it was again.
annum or more and inhabited, that principal tenement shall give holy The .fourth day fish· es. sI1a11 ma ke a roaring
.
bread for all without any further contribution from the others. And if that Jt _shall be hideous to man 's hearing
such a principal tenement should not be occupied, then the adjoining The fifth day the sea shall burn .
tenements, should their rents amount to 20s per annum or more and and al_! the waters that may run.
should one of them be rated at 6s 8d at least and in occupation, shall The sixth day shall spring on trees
give the holy bread between them and shall contribute according to with bloody drops great grisly bears.
their rent. And should there be three separate tenements or shops
together, each paying 6s sd per annum rent, then they shall give the 20 For this text, see R. Harma (e<l ). Richard M, .' .
Amplified Read111g Text, Oxford: 201.S. oms s Prick </[Conscim ce: A Corrected and
 TOWNS IN MEDIIWAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTURE
271
270
Dent, John Clopton, John Smyth and Roger Smyth, with the help
The seventh day houses will fall, of the well disposed men of this [town] did these seven arches new
castles and towers, and every wall. repair A.O. 14[8 t]. Pray for the soul of Master Giles Dent, late parson
The eighth <lay the rocks and stones
of Melford, of whose goods John Clopton, Mr Robert Coteler and
shall burn together a\1 at_once.
The ninth <lay a great dying shall he Thomas Elys did this arch make and glass, and the roof over the porch
generally in every country. A.O. 14[81].
The tenth day for neven (?]
earth shall be plain and even. On the upper south side efthe nave:
The eleventh day shall men come out Pray for the souls of Roger Moryell, Margaret and Kateryn his wives,
of their holes and go about. . of whose goods the said Kateryn, John Clopton, Mr William Qwaytis
The twelfth day shall <lead men s bo1_1es
;, summonsed] and nse all at once. and John Smyth did these 6 arches new repair; and did make the table
be somen sett [ · · at the high altar A.O. 1481. Pray for the soule of Thomas Couper the
The thirteenth day in truth shall
stars from the heaven fall. . \\hich the 2nd arch did repair. Pray for the soul of Lawrence Martin
The fourteenth day all that lives then and Marion his wife.
sha\1 die, both child, man and w?man.
The fifteenth day thus shall het~de, On the north porch:
the world shall burn on every side. Pray for the souls of William Clopton, Margery and Margery his
wives, and for the soul of Alice Clopton and for John Clopton, and for
all those souls that the said John is bound to pray for.
110. The piety of merchants: inscriptions at Long Melford
church On the lower windows on the south side:
. th backs of Suffolk sheep, whose wool was Pray for the soul of Roger Moriell of whose goods this arch was made.
Long Melford grew rich on_ ~ d. the Cloptons and others of Long Pray for the soul of John Keche, and for his father and mother, of
traded by local me~chanhts J~hc uf ~~ly Trinity was all but completely whose goods this arch was made. Pray for the soul of Thomas Elys
M lfi d •i1 The parish c urc o . . th and Joan his wife, and for the good speed of Joan Elys his wife. Pray
e or . d 1495 The series of inscnpt1ons on e
rebuilt betw~en c: 146~· a~ c~~urch .functioned to advertise the distinc- for the soul of John Pie and Alice his wife, of whose goods this arch
exterior and mtenor O t. e. . d civic pride which motivated was made and these two windows glazed. Pray for the souls of John
tive combination of ChnstJ\anl ~1ety alno funded this magnificent pro- Distr' and Alice, and for the good speed of John Distr' and Christian
ifts of the c ot uers w l
t Ile gener_ous g. . ·11 .· ··bi . the following texts include some his.,.. ite.
ject. The mscnptions are stl \ 1s1 e,
details now lost. On the lower windows efthe south chapel:
Pray for the souls of Lawrence Martyn and Marion his wife, Elizabeth
N. Pevsner' The Buildings ofEng_land: S1iffolk, 2nd edn, Harmondsworth:
Martin and Joan, and for the good estate of Richard Martyn and Roger
Penguin, 1974, PP· s43- 7 . English. Martyn and the wives and all the children of whose goods ... made
A.D. 1484.
On the upper north side ofthe nave: d Marion his wife, and for
Pray for the souls of Roberlt h~par~;e :; whose goods Master Giles Around the Lady Chapel:
Thomas Cowper and Mabe is " I e, Pray for the soul ofJohn Hyll, and for the soul of John Clopton Esquire,
and pray for the soul of Richard Loveday, butler with John Clopton,
. . f: ·1 . the adjacent county of Essel<, see
2 I For a , i, id case-study of a s1f11~lar
E Power 'Thomas Paycocke o oggcs 1a ,
~';11 l :~ EsscJ< clothier in the days of Henry
of whose goods this chapel is embattled [i.e. the church walls were
completed with battlements] by his executors. Pray for the souls of
v ·I I', m h~r M.edil!Val People, 10th edn, London, 1963.
272 TOWNS IN MEDir:VAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTURE
· 27S
William Clopton Esquire, Margery and Margery his wives, and for all iii. I~ any of them that hold any stewh
their parents and children, and for the soul of Alice Clopton. and for his will · h' 1 • ouse tarry any
wit m l!s house as a prison fi man against
John Clopton and for all his children and for all the souls that the said to him, or for any other cause (b t _efr hor any debt that he owes
John is bound to pray for, which did this chapel new repair A.O. 1496. Pe rsons to t Ile lord 's prison as. theulawI wills
t e stewhold b .
er rmg such
Christ be my witness that I have not done this to earn praise, but in doe~ shall pay 20s at every time and as f1 .. ), he that otherwise
order that my soul should be remembered. 0
ordmance. ten as he breaks tl\is

iv. That no stewholder receive an

11 I. Customary of the Southwark stews any man's wife, ifit be known .. ! woman of rehg1ous
. .
[life], nor

The liberty of Southwark, on the south side of the river Thames, was v. If any woman of the bordel let [ sta J
in the Middle Ages under the jurisdiction of the bishop of Winchester, still at the door and let hi1 y any man, but [and not] sit
whose substantial London residence was located here. The franchise,•
being part of London yet beyond the control of the mayor's officers,
or if she draw any man bn i~
or come, choos~ whither they will,
other thing, she shall mak y fits gown or by his hood, or by any
became a magnet for the prostitution which was banned within the e a ne to the lord of 20s.
city.~~ The officials of the bishop's jurisdiction oversaw the area desig- vi. If there be any stewholder's
nated for the ·stews', for which the following regulations were recorded h . lie t I1at draws any
,....·c: •
ouse without his will her h b d man mto her
in the fifteenth century. The rules were recorded in two separate, over- the lord in 40s. ' us an and she shall be amerced* to
lapping, lists, of which the longer and apparently older is printed (with
minor omissions) below. Their precise date of origin is uncertain, but Vil. Th a t no stew holder hold an woma .
they were said at this time to be of great antiquity. Part of the motiva- board, but that they should by d hn that hves by her body to
tion for the imposition of these regulations is hinted at in the allusion oar w erever they like.
to the nearby gatherings of parliament and the royal court, just across viii. That no woman be found within the I d, .
the river Thames at Westminster. from Michaelmas r-2 9 Septemb J C or ship on holy days
after 8 o'clock in ;he mor . er ·t10 andlemas [2 February]
J. B. Post, 'A fifteenth-century customary of the Southwark stews', . mng unt1 12 noon d I h
Journal of the Society of Archivists, V, Abingdon: Carfax Publications,
1977, pp. 418-28. English, revised by GR.
and from Candlemas to r:.
V01ded at one o'clock in th f ' an t 1at t ey be
a ternoon until 5 o'clock at night;
th
there on holy days f~om 6 0 '.~::~~~as,h at tl~ey be not found
1
and then b 'd d b t e mornmg to I I o'clock
e vo1 e y one o' I k . h '
1. First, that no stewholder that holds and keeps any stewhouse o'clock at night. c oc Ill t e afternoon until 6
have nor keep any woman dwelling with him but his wife, and a
washer, and a man (and no woman) as his osteler. ix. If there be any woman that live b h b
against the use and custom ofth y er ody and keep a paramour,
ii. That the women that be at common bordel be seen every day in prison and make fi f e manor, she shall be three weeks
what they be; and a woman that lives by her body to come and ' a ne O 6s 8d and then b
cucking-stool,* and forswear the lo~dship ... e set once on the
go (provided she pays her dues as the old custom is, that is, 14d
a week for her chamber) and at all times to have free licence and x. If any woman be found within the I d .
liberty, without any interruption of the stewholders. to rest, the king bein t W . or ship after the sun is gone
. g a estmmster and hold' h .
parliament or council until th b mg t ere either
the custom of the ma~or sh \s~~ e ip upon the morrow, after
22 M. Carlin, Medieval Southwark, London, 1996 , pp. 2 IS-19. so does of 6s 8d ... ' e s a ma e a fine at every time she
 RELIGION AND CULTURE
TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND 275
274
to lie with a man, but [unless] she Street in London, and elsewhere; and used to hire them out to the same
xi. If any woman take any money . . and then arise, she shall friars, chaplain~ and other men, for whatever sum they might agree
lie with him till it be the morning ume upon, whether m her own house or elsewhere, she retaining in her own
make a fine of 6s 8d. possession the fee thus agreed.
nant within the lordship receive any And in particular, on Thursday 4 May last, by the compassing and pr~
xii. That no stewholder nor no ~e 'f h be known [to be] with child, curing of the said Elizabeth, and of a certain chaplain whose name fs
woman that lives by h_er bo y I ~ee ain of paying to the lord 20s, unknown, she sent the same Joanna, and ordered her to accompany the
after reasonable warnmg, upon p said chaplain at night, that she might carry a lantern before him to his
and the woman to pay 6s 8d. chamber (but in what parish is again unknown); it being her intention
woman within his house that has any that Joanna should stay the night there with the chaplain; while the said
xiii. That no stewho11er keep no l cl' se] but that she be put out, Joanna herself, as she says, knew nothing about it. Still, she remained
. kness of burning [venerea isea ' there with the chaplain the whole of that night; and when she returned
sic ·, . of making a fine to the lord of 20s.
upon t 1e pam home to her mistress on the morrow, this Elizabeth asked her if she
had brought anything with her for her work that night, to which she
answered that she had not. Whereupon the same Elizabeth used words
112. Prostitution in London ofreproofto her, and ordered her to go back again to the chaplain on the
r- t enth century illustrates, secular following night, and whatever she should be able to lay hold of, to take it
. cl t· m the later 1our e
As this recor ro . the regulation of moral behav- for her labour, and bring it to her. Accordingly Joanna by her command
urban government became dra~n mt~s to be the concern of the church went back on the following night to the said chaplain, at his chamber, and
iour - generally taken b~ canon e;:r:r .social order. However, the aspi- again passed the night there; and on the morrow she rose very early in the
courts - as an aspect of its chonc l candal could be eliminated or at morning, and bearing in mind the words of her mistress, and being afraid
. . · , rnors t at mora s
ration of c1v1c gO\ e . I . was continually frustrated. to go back without carrying something to her, she took a breviary that
least confined to parucu ar areas . belonged to the chaplain and carried it off, the chaplain himself knowing
. cl Memorials of London and London Life in the X/Ilth, nothing about it; which breviary she deliYered to Elizabeth, who took it,
H. T. Riley (e .), . cl . Longmans, Green & Co., 1868, PP· well knowing how and in what manner Joanna had come by it. And after
XIVth, a11d XVth Cmturzes, 1,o~ on. ,· . d b GR this, Elizabeth pledged• this breviary for 8d to an unknown man.
48+--6. Latin, transl. by the editor, re, ise y .
And many other times this Elizabeth received similar base gains from
. wife of Henry Moring, was brought the same Joanna and her other serving-women, and kept them for her
On 27 July 1385 Ehzabeth, t~1el t the ma or the aldermen and the own use, living thus abominably and damnably, and inciting other
before Nicholas Bre~bre, km~~l' ll beca~se: on the information of women to live in a similar way, she herself being a common prostitute
sheriffs of London, m the gu1 r- ,a_ ' f Joanna her serving-woman,
· d the con,ess1on o , h and a procuress.
diverse persons an on . . were iven to understand t at
the mayor, aldermen and shenff:ft of e!broidery, which she pre- Whereupon, on the same day, the said Elizabeth was asked by the court
Elizabeth, under colou~ of 1e er. ed this Joanna and diverse other how she would acquit herself of the charge; to which she made answer
tended to follow' too~ m annd r;~:1;d them to serve her in the manner that she was in no way guilty, and put herselfon the country [appealed
women as her apprentices, a I th of the matter was that she to judgement by jury]. Therefore the sheriffs were instructed to
. • h tart· whereas t 1e tru . • d summon twelve good men of the place to appear on 28 July, to make a
of apprentices m t a ' t tl at after so re t a1. n·1ng them' she mc1te
did not follow that eraft, b u 1 ' h with her and in her jury, and the said Elizabeth was in the mean time committed to prison.
h ther women w o were d 11
the same Joanna and t e o 'th friars chaplains an a On which day the good men appeared: Robert Tawyere and eleven
service to lead a base life, and to consohr~ w1ompany' both in her own others, who declared upon their oath that the said Elizabeth was guilty
· d to have t eir c ' B d
other such men as d es1re b h W 11 in the ward of roa
. the parish
· of All Hallows y t e a
house, m
276 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTU RE

d that she was a common prostitute 'l.77

of all the things imputed to hderb, an tlirough ~uch women and such- ing;
procuress An ecause . . h f. and if anybody should be found so wandering after the h
"d h . b our
a_nd a common . . . had befallen the city, and great pen~ m1g t a oresai , e 1s at once to e taken and imprisoned by the town
hke deeds many scandals . . f ture it was therefore adjudged, officers, and kept in prison until he shall be released by the mayor
arise through such transact10,ns i~ u f ~ndon in such cases and in or his deputy and the community.
according to the ~ustom or ~~eb:~~r: of doing the like, that the said
order that other \\Omen m f I ·1dhall to Cornhill, and be put
Item: it was ordained the same day and year that nobody may
play at dice in the town under pain of imprisonment; and also hd
Elizabeth should be ta~en ron\!~et:u:e to remain for one hour of the who as host has received him shall pay to the community 40d.
upon the thewe [or cuckm~-,.stoo I . e d And afterwards she was to
b · public y proc a1me .
day, the cause emg f h . d there to be made to forswear the (b) ~Ordinances of the borough of Leicester, 1467] Also that no
be taken to some gate o ht e ch1ty, an Id never enter it again, on pain of brothel be held within this town, or any prostitution or prosti-
. d h l'b t so t at s e wou
city
threeanyears' i er Y,
t e imprisonment and tieI same punishment of the thewe, at the tute dwelling, but that the burgess living closest report them to
discretion of the mayor and aldermen. the court. And that they are to be banished at the first warning
on pain of imprisonment and fine and ransom to the king. Also
concerning all manner of scolds* that are dwelling within this
118. Moral regulation by secular authority town, man or woman, that are found defective by sworn men
before the mayor presented, that it shall be lawful to the mayor
. A es civic councils showed an increasing to punish them on a cucking-stoo!• before their door as long
During the later Middle g l b haviour of townspeople. As these as he likes, and then to be carried forth to the four gates of the
concern to regulate the _mora e occasion prepared to cite their town.
d h I al inhabitants were on . . f
recor
. 1 bs s ow, such offences be 1.ore the city courts. The impos1t1onh o
fi oc
ne1g l ~ur~ ?r . artici ation of townspeople, no less t an (c) On 28 July 1483, a great many people from the parish of St
social d1sc1phne reqmred the p .. p . t take on the role of moral Gregory in Micklegate [ in York] came into the council cham-
it did the willingness of the magistrates o
guardians. ber before the mayor and complained that Marjorie Gray, also
known as 'Cherrylips' (Cherzlippis), was of bad disposition and
1'h First Ledger Book ef High Wycombe, governance of her body, and also a scold with her neighbours,
R. w. Greav~s (ed.), (a); M. Bateson,
Buckinghamshire Record ~oc1ct~,
e .·,
C ·,;6,-_1490
1 1947
Records ofthe Borough efLezce;ter, n, ~n ks
, .
42
'don· J [ Clay, 1901, p. 291 (b);
2 vols, Stroud:
not for the first time causing serious harm to the neighbourhood.
She was ordered by the mayor to remove herself beyond the
boundaries of the city by evening of the following day and not
L. C. Attreed (ed.)_, The Yor House rk::t Histor 'fr~st, 1991, p. 72S to live in the same city again, under penalty of the tumbrel [or
Alan Sutton for Richard)IIA an~ yifth; Borough:/ Nottingham, s vols, cucking-stool*J and imprisonment at the will of the mayor.
(c}; W. H. Ste".enson {ed. • ~cor s ;47-9 (d); P. M. Briers (ed.), Henley
London: Quar1tch, 1882-8~, I, pp. . XLI 1960, p. 109 (e). (d) Presentments of jurors before the mayor's court, Nottingham,
Borough R ecords, Oxfordshire
. Record
. Society,
GR '
Latin, transl. by the editors, revised by . September 1484. George Hoton, horner,* Richard Hardstrong,
litster,* Thomas Hackett, mason, Thomas Duke, litster, John
, h Maundy Thursday 1397, in Bolton, junior, shoemaker, John Bilham, roper, Joan Porret,
(a) 4 April I 398. Memorandum: f at on ·t of the town [of High
housewife, Henry Mcrill, cooper, Emma Annelsley, housewife,
the presence_ofthe mayor anddcon;.:~;~:a_t no man of whatever Margery Smith, widow, Catherine Stringer, housewife, John
Wycombe], it was o~de~ed an ag f W combe is to go out Marshall, shearman, Joan Saddler, housewife, Nicholas Wilson,
condition dwelling w1thm the boro~gh ~ y i ht (post decimam
f
wandering in the town after ten o doc bi at n e for his wander-
horam noctis), unless he has some reasona e cau
labourer, John lsfeyth, labourer, Joan Sandiacre, housewife, and
Christopher Tinkler, tinker commonly keep a brothel and disor-
derly conduct in their houses by days and by nights.
 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION ANO CULTURE
279
278
. d b the warden and the community of in s~ many plac:s, to the great loss ~f the c~mmons and of strangers
(e) 21 March J49S • Itf is agree ~fh
Henley-on- ames
J that if John Archer ever
.
commg to the city on that day for this occasion. So they petition that
the burgesses o [ h d disturbs the parishioners m in order that these pageants should be maintained and sustained by
comes drunk and rude to churc . an ·uch occasion he shall pay a the commons and artificers of the same city, in honour and reverence
church during mass, then on e, ery s of Our Lord Jesus Christ and to the honour and profit of the same ci;y,
fine of ss 4d into the common box. the mayor and aldermen should ordain that the pageants should l:,e
played in those places delimited and assigned by those officers pre\fi-
ow,ly (which places are listed in a schedule attached to this petition),
114. Civic drama at York or in other places designated each year by the mayor and council of
. . . ious la -cycles put on, at York and in the chamber; and that anyone infringing these ordinances should pay
The precise ongms of the rehg I pt y y until the sixteenth-century a fine of '1-0s to the council chamber of the city. Also that, if any of the
.. fi the fourteent l cen ur pageants should be delayed by the default or negligence of the jurors
other c1t1es, rom . h the city government eventu-
. ncertam But a1t 11oug : of the various crafts], they should pay 6s Bd to the chamber ...
Reformation, are u · ) 1 . med oversight of these events,
ally (by the early fifteenth centu~ydcta1 rior to the JS80s) by the craft- Places where the play of Corpus Christi will be played. First at the gates
. . . t d (at an uncertain a e p . l h
they were m1t1a e d d rformed. It seems hke y t at of Holy Trinity in Micklegate. Second at the door of Richard Harpham.
•h they were stage an pe . . p .
speople b y "' om focused on the story of Christ s ass1on, Third at the door of John ofGyseburne. Fourth at Skeldergate-end and
in their first form the scenes, ith costume and gesture but North Street end. Fifth at the end ofConyngstrete towards the Castle
were presented as tableaux o~ wahgofinfist, wnth century we find the first gate. Sixth at the end of Jewburygate. Seventh at the door of Henry
. . I
only mm1ma speec . .
h Early m t e
clear ev~dence for wntten ~la~
cart, wluch was drawn thro g .
1,
t~:
H the organisers o
ee
t . Each play was performed on a
s~-reets to a series of stations in the
f the complex cycle of plays per-
Wyman in Coney Street. Eighth at the end of Coney Street next to
the common hall. Ninth at the door of Adam del Brigg. Tenth at the
gate of the monastery of St Peter. Eleventh at the end ofGirdlergate in
course of a ar d ~re . ces throu hout the city ask for the m~y- Petergate. Twelfth on the Pavement. And it is ordained that the ban-
formed at various v1ewmg ~l~ T~e reference to the plays bemg ners of the play with the city arms should be deli\ered to the pageant
or's approval for a revised itinerary . . d' ate that diverse groups had of Corpus Christi by the mayor, to be set up in the places where the
l •· appears to m 1c •
'played in so many paces. . their respective plays in a great van- pageants are to be played; and that the same banners should be brought
developed the habit ofpe~ormmg I t these dramatic presentations back each year on the morning after Corpus Christi to the chamber and
. 'fh ft1on requests t 13 f h
ety oflocations. e pe _1 1 b . of the religious feast and o t e delivered into the hands of the mayor and chamberlains of the city, to
. d· mtary ce e ration
be co-ordinate ma ud . . d t ble from its context to c.1S95. be kept there for the whole year following, on pain of a fine of 6s Bd
city. Although undate 'it is a a payable to the community by any who fail to deliver them.
d Book i Surtees Society, CXX,
M. Sellers (ed.), York Memoran uml I ' ~()-2. French and Latin,
Andr ews & Company, 19 , PP·
D ur ham: . GR 115. Plays for Corpus Christi at Beverley
trans.l by R · D avies and revised by · ·
. . h ourable mayor and aldermen of As at York, so also in a number ofother towns, the later fourteenth cen-
The commons of York petition the onreat expense regarding the per- tury saw cycles of pageants, mounted by artisans, become incorporated
the city' that whereas they are put to gf Cor us Christi, these pageants into the civic calendar.~-~The orchestration of these events, typically at
formance of the pageants on tbhe <la! otoma;y because they are played the feast of Corpus Christi, was rendered complex by the emergence
cannot be performed as has een cus .
. I risti lay and civic go"emment,
1 L. M. Clopper, 'Lay and clerical impact on civic religious drama and ceremony', in
l!!I P . J.P.Goldberg, 'Cra\gt~lds,~~:,~:7;:e2~al r!rk, York, _1~97 PP~ ~"'1; : 24
in S. Rees Jones (ed.), T e ove 1
t· the York Corpus Christi Pay
3 M. G. Briscoe and J. C. Coldwey (eds}, Contutsfor Early English Drama, Bloomington,
p J P. Goldberg, 'From tableaux t~ tex . 1989, pp. 102-36.
1~2s·. Viator, XL111. 2012, PP· 247-,6.
 I

280 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTU RE

281
d b occasional disputes over the burden
of new groups and plays, an yb h overnment of Beverley in said worthier sort at the feast of Corpus Christi next, this present year,
of costs. These records _o!
t~e ffi oro~f in~ asked to adjudicate where through four of them and under the supervision of the twelve keepers
Yorkshire show the rnumc1pal o /~rs. ec afts over their various roles. of the community, at the costs and expense of the said worthier sort,
tensions had arisen between t ie I\ erse r ,
shall cause to be made a fit and proper stage (pagendam), and a proper
play to be played on the same, under penalty of 40s.
l , Town Documents, Selden Society, XIV,
A. F. Leach (ed.), Bever ey - L t" transl · by the editor, revised And further that the honour of God and the reputation of the town
London: Quaritch, 1900, pp. S'2-,. am,
by GR. of Beverley may be exalted with greater devotion and repute, most
of the aldermen and stewards of the crafts in Beverley, that is mer-
Orders for the Corpus Christi play and procession cers, clothworkers, tanners, weavers, tailors, shoemakers, watermen,
dyers, fullers, saddlers, bakers, butchers, smiths, skinners, and others,
. 1390 he whole community, that all the craftsmen for themselves and their crafts and for the whole community, so far
It was ordered m , by t . and drapers tanners, masons, as they were empowered, submitted themselves to the award of the
f B verley that 1s mercers ·•
of the town.o e '. Is s.miths, plumbers, bowlers (boilers), turn- twelve keepers, as well in respect of the erection of castles (pro ereccione
skinners, tailors, goldsm1t 1 ' * b hmakers horners,* spooners, castellorum) as for the maintenance of the Corpus Christi play. At which
· di utlers latteners rooc ·' . h
ers, g1r ers, c , fi11 rs * coverlet-makers, cartwng ts, the said keepers gave their award as follows: that each and every craft,
ladlers, furbishers,* weavers, u el.' makers bakers butchers, fish- which was accustomed to have and set up wooden castles in honour of
wmakers bowyers, s 10e .' , • h.
coopers, arro b' b s vintners, saddlers, ropers, hairers, s ip- God and St John of Beverley, or in future shall have them, shall hence-
mongers, chandlers, ar e:~ have their plays and pageants (ludo~ et forth for ever set up and cover them in ornamental fashion, under a
men, glovers, and workm Corpus Christi day, in the fashion penalty of 6s 8d to be levied on every craft neglecting to do so for any
pagentes) ready hence_forth. o~ e:er:f the town of Beverley• to play in cause whatever; and that every year for ever it shall play the scenes
al10nour
nd formfothfethb:dayn:;~~~i~:t~mder
o ' the penalty of every craft making of the Corpus Christi play which it has been accustomed to play, and
which shall be assigned to it at the discretion of the sworn governors
default, of 40s. h b d
of the town, upon reasonable notice given by the twelve keepers; and
. d honour of God and of t e o y
On s April 1411, to the pr;•r a~on of the worthier and lesser corn- that the worthier sort of the town shall each year cause to be played, in
of Christ, and for the peace u un . unitate digniorum et minorum the form declared above, a play on their stage, under a penalty of 40s to
mons of the town of Beverley (pro pacifi.cha t conference held between be levied for the use of the community from either the worthier sort or
. -U B er/act) there was a s or
communtum VI e ev , N' h I f Rise Adam Tirwhitt, John from lesser members of the community neglecting this.
William Rolleston, m~rchant,d ic Bo a: o and ~thers worshipful men Dissension having arisen between the aldermen and stewards ofdiverse
fH I W'lliam Wilton A am ar er, ' .
o o me, I , d. d d. . ribus) not having liveries every
of the worthier sort (reveren .ts rt. tf;~verle; and not playing in other
crafts as to the carrying of wax lights or torches each year in the pro-
cession of the revered feast of Corpus Christi. Therefore by the assent
year like others of the ?ther era ts old e hou I~ they have not hitherto and consent of the aldermen and stewards of all the crafts listed below,
plays, that the worthier sort s~o~t ;h:ir c!st, maintain and cause to and of others assembled in the Guild Hall, in the time of Thomas
been accustomed to do so, ere~tb . way a pageant at the feast Mayne, John Bewholrne, and their fellows, the twelve keepers or gov-
be played, in a~ l:onourable an hec~;~n!orthi,er sort for themselves ernors of the town of Beverley, on 19 March 1430, it was ordered, and
of Corpus Chr1st1. Whe~eupon t e as the were empowered, sub- decreed to be perpetually observed, that every year in future on Corpus
and others of the worthier sort, so fr. d yent of Richard Aglyon,
Christi day the stewards of each craft listed below shall pass with their
mitted themselves to the award an DJUl gemw·111·am Melbourne, and
light in the said procession in their order in the form underwritten, and
Thomas Coppand a le semo. · r ' William a ton, 1 ·t of the town f ° no one else of their craft with them, under the penalty stated below;
their fellows, the twelve keepers of ~h: com;ti~• (his form, that the
Beverley. Which twelve keepers gave JU geme but each year to come with their aldermen shall hold, keep, and behave
themselves in an honourable and decent way behind the most holy
282 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND
RELIGION AND CULTURE

body of Christ, as the solemnity of that feast demands. And every man 28S
of the crafts listed who is found disobedient to this order shall forfeit
to the community 40s without any pardon. Next to the priests of the
pay to the community of the town ofBeverle f◄
in the said play, I0s, Nicholas Falconer beil r
every default [error]
undertook to redeliver to the current twel kg us surety. And also he
guild of Corpus Christi [come] the guild of the Blessed Mary, the guild d fh' 1·1· ve eepers of the t
of St John of Beverley, the merchants, drapers,~" butchers, bakers, car- en o is I e, all the necessaries in his possession b I . own, at the
penters, smiths, tailors, skinners, dyers, turners, weavers, shearmen,
fullers, seamen, shoemakers, barbers, glovers, coopers, fishers, tilers,
the guild of St Helen, the guild of Pater Noster, the guild ofSt John the
play, under penalty of 20.s: that is· I car 8 h
an~el'sfwhi~gs, I deal pole.' I snak~ (wor~e),
pairs o s 1rts, 1 sword.
:;~~:::ti:::t
e ongmg to the said
vki~ors,C.
oc rngs, ri
Baptist, the guild of St John in May, and the guild of St Peter of Milan.
Penalty paid by the smiths for not playing their play on Corpus Christi
116. 'Christ and the Merchants' fro~ the Chester play cycle
day. Because Thomas Lorymer, Robert Marshall, John Lorymer by
the Cuckstoolpit, John Lorymer over the smiths' row and their fellows
failed in their play on Corpus Christi day 1392, it was therefore held
by John Kelk, Stephen Coppandale, Richard Aglyon and their fellows,
J~ ~s~~~ta~:~e;~~~e1
1
t~:p~blic _play in Chester at the feast of Corpus
It is possible that th:2:~r;yhen •~ was clearly already well established.
keepers of the town of Beverley, that they should pay to the commu- .rn d'1cated by the ei I t · per
• ormances
. were less extensive than 1s
.
nity of the town of Beverley 40s, as was ordered by the whole commu- the sixteenth and ~ l• surv\vmg copies of the play texts dating from
nity in ancient times. And thereupon, on Friday after 15 July in the play of which an extr::; i::;r;~~::~e~:;: ;enturies. Th~ particular
said year came Thomas Lorymer, John Lorymer by the Cuckstoolpit, sixteenth century, and in all probability in th:~~:;!~:~1ed m the early
John Locksmith, Thomas Locksmith, as well for themselves as for by the shoemakers. This section of th d ·11 I g century also,
their fellows, and offered to the twelve keepers 40s. which they had of the civ· J . e rama I ustrates the potential
forfeited. And because they behaved obediently, therefore the said 40s ~c_P ays, not merely to teach or to entertain but to rovoke
bot part1c1pants and audience to reflect critically on the p p ' T
were handed back to the said Thomas Lorymer and his said fellows, on
this condition, that if the said Thomas or his fellows made default in
~~ ues of urban society and on the part which they should pl:;~it~~!
their play, that is 'The Ascension of Our Lord', on any Corpus Christi
day on which the other craftsmen of Beverley play, that then without
D. Mills (ed.), The Chester Mystery Cycle, East Lansing· C II .p
delay they ought to pay to the community 100s. And for the due and 1992, pp. 245-7. English. · · 0 eagues ress,
faithful performance of this agreement, the said Thomas Lorymer and
his fellows above written bind themselves collectively and individu-
ally to the said keepers and their successors in lOOs, to be paid within
twelve days after [any occasion when] they shall have made default in
their said play.
On Friday after the Translation of St William ofYork, 1391 , came John
of Arras, hairer, in the Guild Hall before the twelve keepers of the town The J. · ·
n , esus, szttmg upon the ass, seeing the city, shall weep and shall say:
of Beverley, and undertook for himself and his fellows of the same craft
to play a play called 'Paradise' every year on Corpus Christi day when Jesus: Ah, Jerusalem, holy city!
the other craftsmen of the same town play, during the life of the said Unknown today it is to thee
John Arras at his own proper cost, willing and granting that he will
that peace thou hast - thou canst not see -

25 Added in a later hand. The drapers did not become a distinctly organised craft until 26 'Hosanna to the son of Da\'id Blessed . . h I .
149S. Hosanna in the highest': Mat;hc": ·21 ta e t tat cometh ,n ~he name of the Lord:
here by cathedral choristers. ·• . Palin Sunday antiphon. evidently sung
284 TOWNS IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND RELIGION AND CULTUru:
285

but bale thou shah abide.~' else thus bold durst he not be otherwise
Much must thou dreigh yet some day seffer yet to make such array. put on such a display
when woe shall fall on every way, everywhere
and thou beguiled, sooth to say, deluded; truth 1st Merchant:
with sorrow on all side - It seems well he would be king
that casteth down thus our thing belongu~s
destroyed, dolefully driven down. sadly cast down and says his father's wonning dwelli'1g
No stone with other in all this town in this temple is.
shall stand, for that they be unlieven unbelieving Say, Jesus, with thy jangling idle talk
to keep Christ's come observe; coming what evidence or tokening sign
and God's own visitation, showest thou of thy reigning,
done for Mankind's salvation; that thou darest do this?
for they have no devotion, reverence
ne dreaden not his doom norfear;judgement 2nd Merchant:
What signs now showest thou here
Then Jesus shall ride towards the city and all the citizens shall lay down their that preves such power validates
garments in the way. And when he comes to the temple, he shall say to the mer- to shend our ware in such manner destroy
chants as he descends from the ass with a whip: masterly, through thy main? like a lord; power

Do away, and use not this thing, stop Jesus: This temple here I may destroy
for it is not my liking. pleasure ~nd through my might and my mastery power
You make my Father's wonning dwelling-place 111 days three it edify
bulld
a place of merchandise. trade and build it up again.

1st Merchant: 1st Merchant:

What freke is this that makes this fare~8 Aha, Jesus! Wilt thou so?
and casteth down all our ware? This word, as e\'er mot I go, may
came no man hither full yare far very long shall be rehearsed before moe. repeated; more people
that did us such annoys. harms Caiaphas I shall tell.

2nd Merchant: Then Jesus shall eject the buyers and sellers with his whip.
Out, out, woe is me!
My table with my money Jesus: Hie you fast this temple fro, hasten;from
is spread abroad, well I see, scattered for merchandise shall be here no moe. trading; no more
and nought dare I say. In this place, be you never so throw, fierce
Now it seems well that he shall you no longer dwell.
would attain royalty; wants to become a king

'.!7 'You <lo not know what peace you ha,c - you cannot see it · but you shall endure
misery.'
:.!8 'What fellow 1s this that creates this disturbance?'
 GLOSSARY

comb
measure used for dry goods, equivalent to four
bushels*
GLOSSARY cordwainer leather-worker
coroner
corveser official representing the legal interest of the crown
cobbler
cucking-stool
affer horse chair to which a woman guilty of certain offences
alum aluminium sulphate, metallic salt mordant used to fix was bound for public humiliation
currier tanner ofleather
dyes in cloth custumal
amerced fined written collection of the customs ofa city (or other
anchoress female hermit living in a walled enclosure body such as a village)
Cytherea
approver one who gave king's evidence (in return for clemency) classical Greek goddess oflove (also known as
assize Aphrodite)
law or ordinance, commonly concerned with prices of Danegeld
food and drink a tax for security of the realm
dauber
attach in law, to seize the property of an accused person in one who plasters walls with mud and straw
demesne land attached to a manor
order to bring them to court deraign
bast fibrous tree bark used for plaiting into screens and to maintain one's right by battle
distrain
matting constrain by sequestration of belongings
enthymeme
bedehouse almshouse where the inmates offered prayers (bedes) argument consisting of a single premise and
for their benefactors and others co~clusion as opposed to a syllogism made up of
bedel officer who walks in front of dignitaries, bearing a lllaJor and minor premises and conclw,ions
farm
mace or staff rate of tax paid in lieu of diverse obligations
fealty duty owed by a tenant
bedeman of the town crier fell
town the skin or hide of an animal
feoffor
bloodwite fine imposed for drawing blood one who transfers real property to another
fletcher maker of arrows
brokage fee for haulage of goods, the rate being dependent on folk-moot
the distance involved periodic meeting of freemen of a town
forestaller
burgage rental property in a town one who intercepts and buys goods before they come
to market
bushel measure used for corn and other dry goods, franchise
equivalent to four pecks liberty or privilege, attached in medieval towns to
butt large cask of wine (or other goods) property of the Church and some secular lords
frank pledge
card comb with metal teeth for combing wool system ofjoint security to which all males over 111'
card maker one who makes cards* years were required to be enrolled
frippercr
carnival annual festival in the period before Lent dealer in second-hand clothing
fuller
carriage toll on carts one who shrinks and thickens woollen cloth by
chaprnan merchant or trader dampening, heating and pressing it (originally by
charnel chapel mortuary chapel, for the bones of the d~ad . . walking on it, hence walker*)
furbisher
chirograph indenture• on which a legal document 1s written m one who removes rust from and burnishes armour
and weapons
duplicate and the word 'chirographum' is written and gersum fin e
cut through to demonstrate the authenticity of each
girdler maker of belts
part
guild merchant association of leading traders of a town
288 GLOSSARY GLOSSARY
289
haberdasher seller of miscellaneous household goods and items of miskenning
clothing fi~e for procedural irregularity in court
moneyer mmter of the king's coin
hairer maker of hair cloth or hair shirts murder-fine
Hansard member of one of the international companies levy on a community where a Norman had been
murdered
(Hanse) of German merchants mystery association of a craft
heriot tribute paid to a lord out of the goods of a tenant ora
who died money of account introduced in Anglo-Saxon
hide area of land, usually about 120 acres England; equivalent to about 2s
osculatory
horner worker of horn pax, a tablet with an image of Christ, passed around
and kissed in the mass
huckster normally female pedlar or hawker of petty goods osmund
subdivision ofa county (originally understood to bar of(usually Swedish) iron
hundred palmer pilgrim
comprise 100 hides*) . . parmenter furrier
Husting court premier judicial court and court ofrecord m medieval passage toll on travellers
London pattens overshoes or clogs
implead to sue (in court) pavage
indenture duplicate document separated by a zig-zag cut, so toll levied to defray the cost of maintaining roads
pentice
that the two parts can be matched a sloping rainwater roof projecting from the side of a
indulgence partial remission of the penalty in purgatory due for building over a door or window; also, a structure like
Sill
a veranda connecting two buildings
perch measure oflength, about 10 feet
infangthief the right to judge a thief caught red-han~ed . phial small container with a stopper
journeyman qualified master of a trade working for hire (without pipe
a shop of his/her own) large cask of wine (or other goods)
plead submit or respond to a legal suit
kilderkin cask containing approximately 16 gallons (half a pledge pawn
barrel) pontage bridge toll
landgable land tax or ground rent potash
lastage toll on goods brought to fairs and markets aluminium potassium sulphate, used in dyeing; see
alum
lattener maker of articles in latten, a mixed metal like brass potter
litster dyer maker of brass pots and other brasswarc
reeve sheriff
Lombard a person (often a merchant or banker) from north regrater
Italy one who buys goods (especially food) before they
lorimer maker of horse's bridles and small ironware come to market, in order to sell them on at a
profit
madder red plant dye scold malicious gossip
mark sum of money: 6s 8d scot a land tax
marshal horse-shoeing smith . . scotale
marten animal similar to a ferret, hunted m the Middle Ages collective drinking to raise funds, sometimes with
pressure to attend
for its skin sea-coal
mazer wooden drinking vessel originally so-called because found washed up on the
mercer dealer in fine textile fabrics sea-shore, notably in the north-cast of England; from
merchet payment for obtaining a lord's permission for a c. I SOO so designated, whether \\ ashed-up or mined in
marriage origin, because it \\as transported by sea
seised
having legal posses-;ion or seisin*
messuage urban property seisin legal o\\nership
 GLOSSARY
290

one who finished newly woven, washed and brushed

shearer
cloth by cutting off loose threads
area of independent jurisdiction
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souter cobbler
stallage rental for keeping a stall in a market .
staple body of merchants holding by royal hcence :he
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exclusive right to handle the export of certain goods Boroughs, Ne\\ York, ~001
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sumpter pack or baggage horse Worcester, Alder.shot, 2003
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tawycr one who prepares leather for working
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the" e cucking-stool* Medieval England, Woodbridge, '.!002, pp. !l 18--41
timber quantity (forty skins) of animal furs
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train-oil oil from the blubber of a whale, seal or walrus
Oxford, 2004
tranter hawker or trader of petty goods with a horse and
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trencher flat piece of wood for putting food on when eating
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,, alker fuller• Britnell, R.H., Growth and Decline 111 Colchester, 1800-IS:JS, Cambndge, 198H
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 INDEX

gates 2.S
London 2, 4, 5, 8, 10, l l, IS, 19, 20- 1,
gen<ler24,75-<i,94--5,2SI 23-5,29, 32-S,55-44,49-50.
INDEX Gl'Offrey of Monmouth 32, 34-,,; 70, 7S, 94, 96-8, 102 3, 116,
Gloucester G, 29, 7 I
I 19-20, 139-44, 145, 151-6,
goldsmiths 50, 76, 8Cl-'2, 97-8, 139 169-60, 163, ]72-4, 175-6,
Grimsby 71
179-81, 186,188,190,197,
guild ruerchant 10, 61!, (;8 70, 89, 21S-14, 215-16, 221- 5, 226, •
90-1, 146
249,251-ll,258,261- 3,272-6
Abing<lon 25, 195,227, 246-9 charters 9-1 I, 148-51 guilds and fraternities 26, 28, 133-4, Charing Cross 70
alabaster-workers 76, 98-100 Chaucer, Geoffrey 118, 132-5 136, 157-8,216-17, 221- S, charters 52, 59-6 I
almshouses 27, 246, 266-7 Chester 32, ++-5, 51, 55-8, 7 I, 253 '2116-1-9, 1152-S, -2(;5- 8 St Paul's cathedral 37-8, 70, 260
see also hospitals children see youth schools 38
anchoress \!63, 1166 Cirencester 49 haberdashers 96-7 Southwark 272-~
anchorite 263 class 1.'i, 20- 1, 49, I Is, 11 7-18, I 34, Hales0\1 en l 4--1 5 Strand 50
Anglo-Saxon towns 4-7 185, 197 Halifax 20 ,,arcls 145, lS!-6
animals in the town 2, S9-40, I 85-7, cloth trade 19-20, 85-6, 89, 90-1 hawkers 101-s
\Vestminster 37, 49, 70, 76, 100- 1,
189 clothing 93, 97, 119, !SS, 156-7, 165, Henley-on-Thames 278 141-4, 146, 178-9
apprentices 50, 74-5, 84, 91-3, I I I, 264,267 Hereford 71, 196 Long Melford 20, 25S, 27o-2
157-8,262,274 Colchester IS, 19, 33, 70, 94--5, 132 heresy 252 Ludlow 227, 266
armourers 180- I communes JO High Wycombe 55, 68-70, 276-7 Lyons, Richard 119
archaeology 1-4 cooks S9, 78, 80-1, 1411-3, 153, 158, hinterland 13- 14, 19, 37, I 15
171,205 hospitals '27 Maidstone 227
bakers 80-2, 86, I 5S, 150, I 7 I, 2m) Coventry 19,115, SS, 71,147, 165---6, see also almshouses Manchester 15
Bath 51, 71 186, 188, 198, 223-5, 1152, housing 2.~. 50 172-1-, 175-9 Mells 20
Bede 5, 34 264-5 Hull 76-7, 10s-11, t6<;-7 metal trades 8(}-<2, 89-90
beggars see po\'erty crafts 74-6 Huntingdon 70 see aLw goldsmiths; smiths;
Be\'erlcy 70, 160, 197-8, 217-19, Crown, urban relations with the 5-6, hygiene see sanitation wiredrawers
279-83 9-10,25,32, 51- 2,54--66, 77-9 Mumcipal Reform Act (1835) 12
Birmingham 15 immigration 28, 79-81!, 113-1.S music 2 12, 229-33
Boston 227,254,267 dancing 42, 212-1s, 2s2 see al.to transnational migration musical instruments 2, 109-10,212
brewers 85---6 Domesday Book 5, 51, 55-9 Ipswich 5, 52-3, 61 - S, 71
bridges 25, 246-9 Dominicans 1161 ironmongers 80, 246 Newcastle-upon-Tyne 19, I 48-5 1
Bridgwater 92-S Durham 70, 146, 160 Northampton 24, 7 I
Bristol 8, S:2 3, l6-8, 71, 85-9, 114, Je\1ish population 115, 121-4, Norwich 8, 19, 23, 27, 29, 48, 7 1, 145,
I 15, 170, 174-5, 228, 250 Exeter 12, IS, 19, 32-S, 72, 147 "154-6
147, 156-8, 196,252,254-6
Buntingford I 5 Eynsham 5+-5, 66-8 Nottingham 71, 76, 89-90, 98-100,
Bury St Edmunds 51-2, 58-9, 66, 70, Kempe, Margery 118, 135-7 183, 184--5, 186, 189, 220-J,
195, 199-200,209-12,259, fencing-school 214 King·s Lynn 7 I, I 17, 124--5, I S5 9, 226,233-4,277
263-4 fire,dangerof57, 153-4, 173-4 lSS-4,227, 2.Sl,266-9
butchers 71, 78, 80-2, 125-31, 187 fishmongers 45, 80-1, 95, 104, 107, officials 10, 32-S, 46-7
125,127,131,157,160, 205--6 La,·enham 20
Oxford Q, 6, 11, 2S, 70, 114-15, 122-4,
Cambridge \!9, 7 1, 1 I 4-15, I 76-8, 196, food 45, 95, 78, 157-8, 171,205 lawyers 141-4
l4G, 19fi-7, Q0l-8, 212-IS,
!lS4-7,!l58 street food S9, 171 Leeds 20
214-15,258
Canterbury 5, 6, S5, 47, 70, 242-3, 257 Franciscans 162-S, 257-9, 261 Leicester 70, 89, 146, I ~8, 163-5,
Carlisle 29-30, 47, 71 fraternities see guilds and fraternities 186- 7,249,277 pageants 169
Carpenter, John 46, I 5 I leisure 22 parliament 12
castles 5---6, 25, 37 gambling 2,213,249,277 see also games plague I 7-18
Caxton, \Villiam 7fi, 100-1 games 2, 22, S9-4S, 108-11, 228-9, Lichfield 26, 71, 227-8, 237-42 plays 8S, 245, 25 I, 253, Q78-85
Cely, William l l 1-12 249,277 Lincoln 70
see also pageants
296 INDEX

pollution see sanitation tailors 76, 8()-4, 129, 212-1 s, 262

population 8-9, 15-18 tanners 80-2, 92-S, 128-9, 157
ports 44-5, 51, 57, 76-7, 108-111, 170, taverns 78, 124, 144, 156, 188,
174-5 213-15
poverty 17, 26-7, I 19-20, 254, 2(l6-8 taxation 11-12, 16, 18, SS, 54-56,
printing 100--1 116-17, 124-Sl, IS7, 146,
pri\·acy 24, 171-S, 180 19()-4, 198,201-8,224
prostitution 79, I SS, 251, 272-6, 277 time, regulation of 96, !OS, 188,273,
276-7
religious life 28-SO, Si, 40, 1S5-i, 217, topographical analysis 4
227-9,233-46,251-85 town halls 25
Ricart, Robert 46-8 trade
Rome 1 internal IS-15, 19, 76
historical memory of 2, S2, 36-46 international 5, 19-20, 44-5, 76--7
rubbish see sanitation transnational migration 49-50,
I 15-17
St Albans 71, 216-17, 264 see also migration
Salisbury 29, SS-4, 64-5, 71, 187-8,
208-9,252 unh·ersity towns SS-4, 12 I
sanctuary 146, 158-61 see also Cambridge; Oxford
sanitation 22-4, 155, I 70-1, I 7S, 180,
184-5, 187, 192-4 walls 25, 148
schools 37-8 maintenance of 58, 161-2
see also Oxford; Cambridge; students Warwick 71
seals IO, 25, SO, 41, .5S, 61, 6:l, 68, 153, water supply 26, S7, 154, I 70-1,
15.5, 157, 164, !WI, 1107, 211, 181-5
242 William fitz-Stephen S2, 36-44
Shaftesbury S5, 71 Winchelsca 7 1
shops 20-2, 50, 76, 96-8 Winchester 4, 18, SS, 45, 47, 71,
Shrewsbury 7 1. 125-s I. 259 101-2, 181-'2, 190-2
skinners 8 1-2, I so, I 75-{l, 261-S wiredrawers 116, 140, 264-5
smiths 88-90, 11!6, I 80-1 Wisbcch 267-8
Southampton 2, 5, 49, 7 I, 76, 103-8 Worcester 29, SS, 7 I, 90-1, 96
Stamford SS, 70, 72 Worcester, William 48-9
Stratford-upon-Avon 27, 114,227
streets 40, 45, 50, 54, 67-8, I 53, 155, Yarmouth 71
171,177, 178-9, 181-2, 187-8, York 4, 6, 12, 19, 27, SS, 47, 70,
192-4,245,278-9 7S, 79--84, I 15, 146- 7, 161,
Stroud 20 167-9,227,24S-6,251,25S-4,
students 114-15, 121, 196,214-15 2<>9-70,277,278-9
see also Oxford; Cambridge youth SS, 41-S