granting a fair to the bishop of Llandaff and confirming a market at Highworths in Wiltshire, contained the clause : "so that it be not to the injury of the neighbouring markets and fairs "1; and subsequently this became a stereotyped formula. But it was not easy to determine with precision what exactly constituted either an injury or a neighbouring market. In this connexion the following passage in Bracton2 is of primary importance: "A market may be called neighbouring and the nuisance tortious ", if "raised within six miles and a half and the third of a half. And the reason is, according to the saying of the elders, because every reasonable day's journey consists of twenty miles. The day's journey is divided into three parts. The first part, that of the morning, is to be given to those who are going to the market. The second is to be given to buying and selling, which ought to be sufficient to all, unless they be merchants who have stalls where their goods are deposited and exposed for sale, to whom a longer delay in the market may be necessary. But the third part is left for those returning from the market to their own homes, and for doing all those things which must be done by day and not by night, on account of the snares and attacks of robbers, that all things may be in safety. When therefore a market has been obtained within such a limit, it will have to be levelled since it is a hurtful and tortious nuisance, because it is so near". Bracton's doctrine is supported by Edward III.'s charter to London in 1327, in which he granted that no market should be conceded to any one within a seven miles' radius of the city4, and also by a sixteenth-century charter to Boston 5; but practices conflicted in different parts of the country. In 1281 the king's attorney laid it down that “a market ought to be five miles distant from another 1 Records of Cardiff, iii. 8 (Llandaff); Hist. MSS. Comm. Rutland, iv. 55. 2 Bracton, f. 235. I.e. an action lies at civil law for the recovery of damages.

4 Letter Book F, 126. Similarly the charter of Yarmouth forbade markets within seven leagues: Rot. Parl. ii. 334.

5 Thompson, Boston, 346.

"

• Placita de Quo Warranto, 184. An ancient claim of the citizens " of York was that " by the law of the land no man ought to have a free

...

borough, market or fair unless it be distant . . . at least six miles": Drake, Eboracum, 257.

Rival

traffic.

1

market"; while again a market at Lyme 1 was condemned on the ground that it was "distant more than five miles, but less than six ", from that of Bridport.

The competition between rival centres of traffic was centres of carried on with remarkable vigour in the centuries that followed the Norman Conquest, and legal doctrines were unable to restrain their growth within moderate limits. In the presentments of juries many complaints are raised as to the infringement of existing claims. Already in Domesday Book 2 we are told how " in this manor there used to be a market . . . and it was held on Saturday; and William Malet set up another market on the same day in his castle, and thereby the bishop's market is so spoilt that it is of little worth". In 1324 Dunwich alleged that it was impoverished by the grant of fairs and markets to religious persons and others; and a few years earlier (1304) Newcastle-upon-Tyne complained that the prior of Tynemouth held a fair for fifteen days at which ships now discharged their cargoes, since it was nearer the harbour 4. striking of all was the attempt on the part of London to compel all traders to resort to its markets, by forbidding its citizens to attend any fair or market outside the city 5. This ordinance aroused the utmost alarm, and it was declared that, if persisted in, it would "be to the utter destruction of all other fairs and markets within the realm". The men of Bristol made a similar attempt to crush their rival at Bath'. Where the rivalry of the markets was at its height, the hostility excited by the struggle frequently culminated in open conflict. The account given by a mediaeval

1 Placita de Quo Warranto, 185.

Most

2 Domesday Book, ii. 379. Compare ibid. i. 120 b, where the market was "reduced to nothing" on account of the market held hard by (proximum). Rot. Parl. i. 426 a.

Their rivalry was of long standing; quarrels broke out in 1290 and continued in the sixteenth century: ibid. i. 26 b (1290); ibid. i. 165 a (1304); W. Illingworth, Inquiry into Forestalling, 1800, p. 196 (1292); Select Pleas in the Star Chamber, ii. 68.

Letter Book L, 240. The Ordinance is dated Feb. 1, 1487; six weeks later (ibid. 242) its operation was suspended till Michaelmas, but it was annulled by the parliament meeting Nov. 9, 1487.

• Statutes, ii. 518.

Rot. Parl. ii. 347 a.

Bristol forbade its citizens to sell merchandise at Bath market, and instituted its own market on the same day.

chronicler throws a vivid light upon the disturbed conditions under which mediaeval trade was carried on. The monks of Ely set up a market at Lakenheath, and refused to entertain either a writ from the king or the energetic protests made by the abbot of St. Edmunds. The abbot therefore decided to take matters into his own hands: "he sent word to his bailiffs that they should take the men of St. Edmunds with horse and arms, and destroy the market; all whom they found buying or selling they should bring away in bonds. So at dead of night there went forth almost six hundred men, well armed, making their way to Lakenheath. But when the scouts gave intelligence that they were coming, all who were in the market dispersed hither and thither, and not one was found. . . . They overturned the butchers' shambles and the stalls in the market and carried them away; and they also seized their cattle and then set off towards Icklingham". The bailiffs of the prior followed, but were compelled to come to terms; shortly afterwards the abbot was summoned to the Court of Exchequer to answer for his deed1. An inquest was held, and the jurors returned a verdict that the market at Lakenheath competed with that of Bury St. Edmunds, but "being asked what damage the abbot has sustained the knights replied they do not know, nor can it be known, nor does any one know save God alone " 2.

authorities

We are fortunately not without materials for an attempt Municipal to reconstruct a picture of the life of a mediaeval fair. A superseded. thirteenth-century charter 3, supplemented by other sources,

1 Chronica Jocelini, 99. There was an armed invasion of the market at Abingdon held by the monastery. But here the abbot's retainers met their assailants manfully and drove them away, somewhat to the astonishment of the chronicler: Chronicon monasterii de Abingdon, ii. 227-229.

2 Select Civil Pleas (Seld. Soc. Pub.), i. 54. I have ventured to assume that this inquest refers to Lakenheath, but the Select Pleas gives Lavenham. The fair of Leominster erected by the abbot of Reading was quashed because it harmed the king's fair at Hereford (Plac. Abbrev. 206 b). For other examples, see Rot. Hund. i. 18 a (market set up at Beaconsfield to the prejudice of the king's market at Windsor), etc. The bishop of Ely set up a fair at Ely during "the best time of the fair of St. Ives", and the abbot of Ramsey complained to the king (Rot. Parl. ii. 439 a); seven years before (1320) the abbot had made a similar protest in parliament: Chronicon Abbatiae Rameseiensis, 350.

3 Kitchin, Charter of Edward III.

enables us to depict in some detail the conditions which prevailed while the fair was in progress. At Winchester during the fair of St. Giles the municipal authorities were for the time being entirely superseded, and the bishop set up his own justiciaries who had the keys and custody of the city gates, as well as the cognizance of all pleas touching breaches of law, debts, contracts and even lands and houses in the city. A temporary mayor and bailiffs were instituted to administer the affairs of the town, and a coroner and marshal executed their decrees "without interference or hindrance from any citizen". The jurisdiction of the bishop covered a circuit of seven 'leagues' 1, and here all buying and selling were strictly forbidden except at the fair. Southampton was also included, although it lay outside. the circuit, and made numerous attempts to evade the restriction. In 1254 the burgesses promised that no merchandise brought to the town on account of the fair should be sold in fair-time. An exception was made in favour of victuals, but the citizens were not satisfied and shortly afterwards (1258) carried their suit to a court of law. Though they lost their case friction continued, and renewed agreements were drawn up in 1369 and 1406. On the latter occasion the inhabitants of Southampton at length secured the right to buy and sell in the town during the fair of St. Giles. Not only at Winchester, but elsewhere, the custody of the town was surrendered to the lord of the fair. At Oxford the priory of St. Frideswide received into its hands the keys of the gates and the administration of the city, and at Hereford and Norwich 5 the bailiffs of the Church were also substituted for the governing body while the fair lasted, after which the citizens resumed their authority. At the opening of the fair at York, the bailiffs of the

1 Kitchin, Charter of Edward III., 43. For the term leuca, see Seebohm, Customary Acres, 82, and Murray, Oxford English Dict. It is uncertain whether it means one mile or two.

2 For the privileges claimed by the bishop, see Patent Rolls, 1327-1330, pp. 292-293, and Rot. Parl. i. 379 a. For the dispute with Southampton, see Charter Rolls, i. 445 (1254); Plac. Abbrev. 147 b (1258); Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. App. iii. 66 (1369) and 77 (1406).

Boase, Oxford, 71. 4 Plac. Abbrev. 113 a.

6 Charter Rolls, iii. 74.

tion.

archbishop came upon the city bridge, and there the bailiffs of the city delivered up their staves as the symbol of their authority; during the interregnum the former kept the peace of the city, collected toll and took all other profits, “as the city bailiffs do at other times as well by water as by land "1. The fair was opened by proclamation. The form of pro- Proclamaclamation at Bartholomew fair2 began with an injunction that all "having recourse to this fair keep the peace" of the king, and proceeded: "That no manner of persons make any congregation, conventicles, or affrays by which the same peace may be broken or disturbed. Also that all manner of sellers of wine, ale, or beer, sell by measures ensealed, as by gallon, pottle, quart, and pint. And that no person sell any bread, but if it keep the assize, and that it be good and wholesome for man's body. And that no manner of cook, pie-baker, nor huckster, sell nor put to sale any manner of victual, but it be good and wholesome for man's body. And that no manner of person buy nor sell, but with true weights and measures, sealed according to the statute in that behalf made 3. And that no manner of person or persons take upon him or them within this fair to make any manner of arrest, attachment, summons, or execution, but if it be done by the officers of this city thereunto assigned. And that no person or persons whatever, within the limits and bounds of this fair, presume to break the Lord's Day in selling, showing, or offering to sale, or in buying, or offering to buy, any commodities whatsoever, or in sitting, tippling, or drinking in any tavern, inn, alehouse, tippling-house or cook's house, or in doing any other thing that may tend to the breach thereof. And finally, that what persons soever find themselves grieved, injured, or wronged by any manner of person in this fair, that they come with their plaints, before the stewards in this fair, assigned to hear and determine pleas, and they will minister to all parties justice, according to the laws of this land and

1 Placita de Quo Warranto, 221-223; Drake, Eboracum, 218.

2 Lex Londinensis or the City Law (1680), 247. The contents of the proclamation were doubtless substantially the same in earlier centuries.

3 For the clerk of the market, see J. G. Pease and H. Chitty, The Law of Markets and Fairs (1899), 10-13.