CHAPTER III THE HISTORY OF THE GILD OR FRATERNITY OF EFINITE authority from the trade in The Fellowship had also for the moment secured the coveted The struggle monopoly of the retail sale of cloth in London, so far as the law for the mocould give it. But their monopoly did not last, nor was it ever nopoly of the complete. The Statute 38 Ed. III, c. 11 (1364), repealed the cloth. clause of the previous year, and in 1365 an ordinance of the Mayor again allowed a member of one Mystery to pursue another Mystery and to trade in all kinds of merchandise. The Statute 17 Ric. II, c. 2 (1393-4), allowed every man of the realm to put 1 The initial letter comes from Charter No. XI. 2 This ordinance, which reasserted what was called the 'Custom of London', was, however, generally resented, and hence the numerous translations from Gild to Gild in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. to sale cloths as well as kerseys of his own making, while that of 7 Henry IV, c. 9 (1405), allowed all Drapers and sellers of Drapery of whatsoever place of the realm' to sell in London by gross. Evidence also exists to prove that there was much evasion of the monopoly of the London Drapers. From a petition of the Fullers in 1369 it appears that they did some selling of their own goods. In 1375 we find two Fullers sharing the right to examine cloth with two Drapers, and in 1390 the Fullers were allowed to expose their own cloth for sale in their houses or elsewhere 3 (although this may have been by wholesale only, as had been allowed by the Charter), so long as the buyers used the cloth for their own use. The privileges of the Merchant Vintners of England and Gascony had been especially reserved in the Letters Patent, and no doubt the Drapers also met with competition from the Taylors or Linen Armourers, with whom, as we shall see, they had, in the fifteenth century, a serious quarrel with regard to the right of search. In the recitals of the Charter of 1502, which incorporated the Taylors under the new title of the Merchant Taylors, they claim to have occupied and used of old the buying and selling of all and every merchandise whatsoever, and especially woollen cloths as well wholesale and retail throughout the whole realm of England and particularly within our city aforesaid and the suburbs thereof. Nevertheless, in the fourteenth century the business of the Taylors was chiefly in making linen apparel, more especially linen lining for armour, and in making up cloth, and it was not till their later incorpora 1 Letter Book G, fo. 240; Riley, Memorials, p. 341. 2 Letter Book H, fo. 23. 3 Letter Book G, fo. 116. 4 Clode, Merchant Tailors, i. 198. 5 Cf. Regulations for Armourers, Riley, Mem., 145. The quarrel for the possession of the retail trade was not confined to London or to England. In several English towns the Drapers and Tailors were united in the same company. In Coventry the place of the Drapers was taken by the Shearmen, and the Mystery play was presented by the company of Shearmen and Tailors.' Ashley, Econ. Hist., ii. 213. In Paris the Fullers secured the privilege of selling to the public, though they were often called Drapers, till in the middle of the fourteenth century Royal Letters divided the Drapers into two classes, the Manufacturers and the Traders. Ashley, Econ. Hist., ii. 212; Unwin, Industrial Organization, P. 30. tion as Merchant Taylors, in 1502, that they definitely devoted themselves to the business of buying and selling. Nor, again, did the Mercers or Haberdashers as yet seriously compete. It may be held, therefore, that in spite of some exceptions, the Drapers really enjoyed by far the most considerable part of the trade of cloth in London both in gross and in retail. Of the other Crafts concerned in the making of cloth, the Weavers, the Dyers, the Fullers, and the Shearmen abandoned the retail trade of cloth and fell into a subordinate position to the Drapers. Thus we are told that in 1385 Brembre, in pursuance of his policy of attempting to keep people to their proper Craft, disfranchised William Southbrook free of the Weavers, as well as a Taylor for that they occupied Drapery', while in the early part of the fifteenth century we hear of one Shearman being fined, after the search of his measure by the Drapers, of another who was apprenticed to the Drapers, and later of Shearmen and Fullers entering the Drapers' Fellowship and having apprentices. I The Dyers, indeed, gained a Charter of Incorporation in 1471, but the Fullers and the Shearmen not till later.3 Meanwhile the Letters Patent of 1363 had especially reserved The Three the rights of those who enjoyed the privilege of holding fairs Great Fairs. in the suburbs. The great Fairs were three in number: one at Westminster, belonging to the Abbot; another at Smithfield, which belonged to the Prior of St. Bartholomew; the third at Southwark, belonging to the Prior of St. Mary Overy. Of these, the first was the most important and lasted thirty days, while the other two lasted but three. Cloth was sold at all these fairs, but more especially at that of St. Bartholomew, where the cloth market was entered by the great Cloth Gate. All the Clothiers and Drapers of England attended, as well as others concerned in 1 Strype, Stow, ed. 1755, p. 339, mentions other cases, but he gives no authority, and as he calls the Taylor a Merchant Taylor, a name by which they were not known till 1502, his accuracy may be doubted. 2 Ordinances, Appendix, vol. i, No. XVII; Accounts, 1413-42, Appendix, vol. i, No. XVIII. 3 Hazlitt, Livery Companies, 112. 34. The Shearmen sheared the fustian and levelled the nap of the cloth. The Fullers worked in the loose fibres of the wool. The Dyers originally dyed the wool and not the cloth, but by this time the process of dyeing and of fulling was often done by the same man. future history of the Fullers and Shearmen, see p. 119 of this volume. As to the Bakewell the cloth trade, and here the Drapers shared with the Taylors the right to search all cloth exposed for sale, and to mark it according to its width and length, the Drapers using the Drapers' ell or standard, the Taylors their silver yard.1 The fairs, however, lasted only for a short time, and, as the cloth trade increased in the provincial towns of England, the number of country Clothiers and Drapers, as well as of aliens, who wished to sell their cloth in London increased. To meet the difficulty the Mayor, Whityngton, and the commonalty of London purchased in 1395-6 Bakewell Hall or Blackwellhall, in Basinghall Street, once belonging to Sir Richard Clifford 2 and then to the family of Banquell or Bakewell, from whence it derived its name. The Mayor in the ordinances of 1398 ordered that to prevent the secret sale of woollen cloths and disorderly and deceitful bargains of foreign' Drapers3 in divers hostelries, all such should sell their cloths at Bakewell Hall only, and at fixed days and hours in the week, on pain of forfeiture; that no Merchant Stranger should sell to Merchant Stranger, and that the cloth so sold should be cloths and half cloths listed at both ends. The Statute Henry IV (1403) further enacted that Merchant Strangers should expend the proceeds of their sales Cf. Herbert, i. 47, 427. For the later quarrel of Drapers and Taylors over the right of search, cf. p. 116 of this volume. 2 Not to the Basings as Stow says. Sir Roger de Clifford sold Bakewelhall to the City in 1280. Cf. Memorandum to Ordinances of 1405; Letter Book A, fo. 135, p. 227 note; Wardens' Accounts, 1521-2, fo. 2 b; Rep. 7, 197. In 1286 and 1293 the City transferred it to John de Banquell and repurchased it in 1395-6. Cf. Stow, ed. Kingsford, i. 286, 288, 290, ii. 336. The position of the Hall in Basinghall Street may be seen in Mr. Kingsford's Map. It is now the site of the Law Courts. 3 By foreign is meant Englishmen not resident in London. Aliens could not purchase at the Hall, nor of any one except a citizen of London. Cf. Memoire du traitement des Françoys', Schanz, Handelspolitik, ii. 525. + Riley, Memorials, p. 550, quoting Letter Book H, fo. 327. Cf. also Ordinances of 1405, Appendix, vol. 1, No. XVII. In Letter Book K, fo. 255b, there is an interesting petition of date 1451 which complains of secret sale of woollen cloths, leather, and other goods between foreign and foreign to the great derogac'on and prejudice of the franchise of the City and the grete hurte of the trewe franchised people of the same City'. The lieges of the King, merchants of Guyenne, were, however, allowed to sell to each other. Cf. Ordinances of 1405. on commodities of the realm, the lieges of Guyenne alone excepted; a statute which was enforced by the Mayor on the petition of the Drapers.1 In To carry out these ordinances a Keeper was appointed, to whom an oath was administered that he would duly observe them." 1404 the Drapers were conciliated by being allowed to appoint the Keeper, though he was to be admitted, and could be dismissed, by the Mayor and Aldermen, while the Drapers were made responsible for any damage to the Hall by fire.3 Attempts were evidently made to stop all sale by wholesale by "foreigners (i.e. any but citizens) except at the Hall, but the Act of 7 Henry IV, c. 9 (1405), as before stated, confirmed the right of Country Drapers and sellers of cloth to sell their wares wholesale notwithstanding any franchises, and declared in its preamble that this had always been allowed." We Shortly after the Drapers had secured the royal confirmation of The Drapers their Mystery, the City of London was convulsed by the social, and the religious, and political upheaval which began with the Good movement of 1376-96. Parliament of 1376 and ended with the fall of Richard II. have already dealt with this episode in the Introduction. Whether the Drapers took part in the actual struggle concerning John of Northampton in their corporate capacity, or only as individuals, 2 1 Letter Book I, fos. 30, 37 b, 39 b, 40, 57-9 b. Herbert, i. 412; Letter Book D, fo. 87 b ; Ordinances of 1405, Appendix, vol. i, No. XVII, p. 259 of this volume. one. 3 Letter Book I, fo. 39 b; Ordinances of 1405, p. 259 of this volume. The Master of the Mistery of Drapers to elect an able, wise and sufficient person to see that all kinds of woollen cloth brought to Bakewellhall by Merchant Strangers be sold as by Law. The office of Keeper was an honourable and remunerative In 1472 Rich. Norman granted a house called the Gote in Chepe, the rent of which, 10, was to furnish a salary for the Keeper. To this Olney added another tenement carrying a rent of £6, on condition that he should succeed Norman. Norman also bequeathed plate and jewels worth £40 to the Keeper. 403, fo. 1 a, A. viii. 337. Again, in 1493 Maister Isaac, Alderman and five times Master (1488-9, 1492-3, 1497-8, 1500-1, 1510-11), pays £10 for rent of Blackwellhall, and in 1505-6 Maister Calley (Galley) gives 200 marks (£133 65. 8d.) for the office. 403, fo. 57 a, 80 a. Herbert, i. 397. 5 Cf. p. 30 ff. |