The Times: 1348-1399
Waves of the black death, named for the black spots on the body,
swept over the nation. The first wave of this plague, in 1348,
decimated the population by about one half in the towns and one
third in the country. People tried to avoid the plague by
flight. The agony and death of so many good people caused some
question their belief in God. Also, it was hard to understand why
priests who fled were less likely to die than priests who stayed
with the dying to give them the last rites. Thus begins a long
period of disorganization, unrest, and social instability.
Customary ways were so upset that authority and tradition were no
longer automatically accepted. Fields lay waste and sheep and
cattle wandered over the countryside. Local courts could not be
held. Some monasteries in need of cash sold annuities to be paid
in the form of food, drink, clothing, and lodging during the
annuitant's life, and sometimes that of his widow also. Guilds
and rich men made contributions to the poor and ships with
provisions were sent to various parts of the country for the
relief of starving people.
Farm workers were so rare that they were able to demand wages at
double or triple the pre-plague rate. Prices did not go up
nearly as much. The villeins had become nomadic, roaming from
place to place, seeking day work for good wages where they could
get it, and resorting to thievery on the highways or beggary
where they could not. The Robin Hood legends were popular among
them.
They spread political songs among each other, such as: "To seek
silver to the King, I my seed sold; wherefore my land lieth
fallow and learneth to sleep. Since they fetched my fair cattle
in my fold; when I think of my old wealth, well nigh I weep.
Thus breedeth many beggars bold; and there wakeneth in the world
dismay and woe, for as good is death anon as so for to toil."
Groups of armed men took lands, manors, goods, and women by
force. The villeins agreed to assist each other in resisting by
force their lords' efforts to return them to servitude. Justices
became afraid to administer the law. Villeins, free peasants,
and craftsmen joined together and learned to use the tactics of
association and strikes against their employers.
The office of Justice of the Peace was created for every county
to deal with rioting and vagrants. Cooperation by officials of
other counties was mandated to deal with fugitives from its
justice.
When there were attempts to enforce the legal servitude of the
villeins, they spread rhymes of their condition and need to
revolt. A secret league, called the "Great Society" linked the
centers of intrigue. A poll tax for a war with France touched
off a riot all over the nation in 1381. This tax included people
not taxed before, such as laborers, the village smith, and the
village tiler. By this time, the black death had reduced the
population from 5 million to 2 1/2 million. It was to rise to 4
million by 1600.
Mobs overran the counties around London. The upper classes fled
to the woods. But the Chief Justice was murdered while fleeing.
Written records of the servitude of villeins were burned in
their halls, which were also looted. Prisoners were released
from jails. The archbishop, who was a notoriously exploitive
landlord, and the Treasurer were beheaded on Tower Hill and their
heads were posted over London Bridge. The villeins demanded that
service to a lord be by agreement instead of by servitude, a
ceiling on rents of 4d. per acre yearly, abolition of a lord's
right for their work on demand (e.g. just before a hail storm so
only his crops were saved), and the right to hunt and fish.
The revolt was suppressed and its leaders punished. Also, the
duty to deal with rioting and vagrants was given to royal
judges, sheriffs, mayors, bailiffs, and constables as well as
the Justices of the Peace. There was a high constable in each
hundred and a petty constable in each parish. Justices of the
peace could swear in neighbors as unpaid special constables when
disorder broke out.
The sheriff was responsible for seeing that men of the lower
classes were organized into groups of ten for police and surety
purposes, and for holding of hundred and shire courts, arresting
suspects, guarding prisoners awaiting trial, carrying out the
penalties adjudged by the courts, and collecting Crown revenue
through his bailiffs. Royal writs were addressed to the sheriff.
Because many sheriffs had taken fines and ransoms for their own
use, a term limit of one year was imposed. Sheriffs, hundreders,
and bailiffs had to have lands in the same shires or bailiwicks
[so they could be held answerable to the King].
Efforts were made to keep laborers at the plough and cart rather
than learn a craft or entering and being educated by the church.
The new colleges at the universities ceased to accept villeins
as students.
Due to the shortage of labor, landlords' returns had decreased
from about 20% to 5%. But some found new methods of using land
that were more profitable than the customary services of
villeins who had holdings of land or the paid labor of
practically free men who paid a money rent for land holdings.
One method was to turn the land to sheep-breeding. Others leased
their demesne land, which transferred the burden of getting
laborers from the landlord to the lessor- tenant. The payment was
called a "farm" and the tenant a "farmer". First, there were
stock-and-land leases, in which both the land and everything
required to cultivate it were let together. After 50 years, when
the farmers had acquired assets, there were pure land leases.
The commutation of labor services into a money payment developed
into a general commutation of all services. Lords in need of
money gladly sold manumissions to their villeins. The lord and
lady of some manors now ate by themselves in a private parlor
with a fireplace of its own and the great hall was deserted.
Some farmers achieved enough wealth to employ others as laborers
on their farms. The laborers lived with their employer in his
barn, sleeping on hay in the loft, or in mud huts outside the
barn. The farmer's family lived at one end of the barn around an
open fire. Their possessions typically were: a chest, a trestle
table, benches, stools, an iron or bronze cauldron and pots,
brooms, wooden platters, wooden bowls, spoons, knives, wooden or
leather jugs, a salt box, straw mattresses, wool blankets, linen
towels, iron tools, rushlightholders, and livestock. Some
farmers could afford to have a wooden four-posted bedstead,
hens, geese, pigs, a couple of cows, a couple of sheep, or two
plow oxen. They ate dark bread and beans and drank water from
springs. Milk and cheese were a luxury for them. Farming still
occupied the vast majority of the population. Town inhabitants
and university students went into the fields to help with the
harvest in the summer.
Town people had more wealth than country people. Most townspeople
slept in nightgowns and nightcaps in beds with mattresses,
blankets, linen sheets, and pillows. Beds were made every
morning. Bathing was by sponging hot water from a basin over the
body, sometimes with herbs in it, rinsing with a splash of warm
water, and drying off with a towel. Tubs just for baths came into
use. There were drapery-rugs hung around beds, hand-held mirrors
of glass, and salt cellars. The first meal of the day was
breakfast, which broke the fast lasting the night. Meals were
often prepared according to recipes from cook books which
involved several preparation procedures using flour, eggs, sugar,
cheese, and grated bread, rather than just simple seasoning.
Menus were put together with foods that tasted well together and
served on plates in several courses. Table manners included not
making sounds when eating, not playing with one's spoon or
knife, not placing one's elbows on the table, keeping one's mouth
clean with a napkin, and not being boisterous. There were
courtesies such as saying "Good Morning" when meeting someone
and not pointing one's finger at another person. King Richard II
invented the handkerchief for sneezing and blowing one's nose.
There were books on etiquette.
New burgesses were recruited locally, usually from within a 20
mile radius of town. Most of the freemen of the larger boroughs,
like Canterbury and London, came from smaller boroughs. An
incoming burgess was required to buy his right to trade either
by way of a seven year apprenticeship or by payment of an entry
fee. To qualify, he needed both a skill and social
respectability.
Towns started acquiring from the King the right to vacant sites
and other waste places, which previously was the lord's right.
The perpetuality of towns was recognized by statutes of 1391,
which compared town-held property to church-held property. The
right of London to pass ordinances was confirmed by charter. Some
towns had a town clerk, who was chief of full-time salaried
officers. There was a guildhall to maintain, a weigh-house,
prison, and other public buildings, municipal water supplies,
wharves, cranes, quays, wash-houses, and public lavatories.
After the experience of the black death, some sanitary measures
were taken. The notorious offenders in matters of public hygiene
in the towns, such as the butchers, the fishmongers, and the
leather tanners were assigned specific localities where their
trades would do least harm. The smiths and potters were excluded
from the more densely populated areas because they were fire
risks. In the town of Salisbury, there was Butcher Row, Ox Row,
Fish Row, Ironmongers' Row, Wheelwrights' Row, Smiths' Row, Pot
Row, Silver Street, Cheese Market, and Wool Market.
Fresh water was brought into towns by pipe or open conduit as a
public facility, in addition to having public wells. In London,
a conduit piped water underground to a lead tank, from which it
was delivered to the public by means of pipes and brass taps in
the stone framework. This was London's chief water supply. Water
carriers carried water in wooden devices on their backs to
houses. The paving and proper drainage of the streets became a
town concern. Building contracts began specifying the provision
of adequate cesspits for the privies at town houses, whether the
toilets were built into the house or as an outhouse. Also, in
the better houses, there grew a practice of carting human and
animal fecal matter at night to dung heaps outside the city
walls. There was one public latrine in each ward and about
twelve dung-carts for the whole city. Country manor houses had
toilets on the ground floor and/or the basement level.
Stairwells between floors had narrow and winding steps.
In London, the Goldsmiths, the Mercers, and the Saddlers became
the first guilds to receive, in 1394-5, charters of
incorporation, which gave them perpetual existence. As such they
could hold land in "mortmain", thus depriving the King of rights
that came to him on the death of a tenant-in-chief. They were
called Livery Companies.
In all towns, the organization of craft associations spread
rapidly downwards through the trades and sought self-government.
Craft guilds were gaining much power relative to the old
merchant guilds in governing the towns. The greater crafts such
as the fishmongers, skinners, and the corders organized and
ultimately were recognized by town authorities as self-governing
craft guilds. The building trade guilds such as the tilers,
carpenters, masons, and joiners, became important. Masons were
still itinerant, going to sites of churches, public buildings,
or commanded by the King to work on castles. The guild was not
necessarily associated with a specific product. For instance, a
saddle and bridle were the result of work of four crafts: joiner
(woodworker), painter, saddler (leather), and lorimer (metal
trappings).
In London in 1392 craft guilds included: baker, fishmonger (cut
up and sold fish), fruiterer, brewer, butcher, bird dealer,
cook, apothecary (sold drugs he had ground up), cutler (made
knives and spoons), barber, tailor, shoemaker, glover (made
gloves), skinner (sold furs), girdler (made girdles of cloth to
wear around one's waist), pouchmaker, armorer, sheathmaker,
weaver, fuller (made cloth full and dense), painter, carpenter,
joiner (woodworker who finished interior woodwork such as doors
and made furniture), tiler, mason (cut stone for buildings),
smith (made metal tools for stonemasons and builders), tallow
chandler (made candles and sometimes soap from the fat and
grease the housewife supplied), wax chandler (made candles),
stirrup maker, spurrier (made spurs), and hosteler (innkeeper).
However, the merchant guilds of the goldsmiths, vintners (sold
wine), mercers (sold cloth), grocers, and drapers (finished and
sold English cloth) were still strong. The goldsmiths, tailors,
skinners, and girdlers bought royal charters, which recognized
their power of self-government as a company and their power to
enforce their standards, perhaps throughout the country. Freemen
in one company could practice the trade of another company.
There were paint mills and saw mills replacing human labor. Women
who spent their days spinning with the new spinning wheel were
called "spinsters".
Many of the guilds bought sites on which they built a chapel,
which was later used as a secular meeting place. The guild
officers commonly included an alderman, stewards, a dean, and a
clerk, who were elected. The guild officers sat as a guild court
to determine discipline for offences such as false weights or
measures or false workmanship or work and decided trade disputes.
The brethren in guild fraternity were classified as masters,
journeymen, or apprentices. They were expected to contribute to
the support of the sick and impoverished in their fellowship.
Their code required social action such as ostracizing a man of
the craft who was living in adultery until he mended his ways.
The rules of the Company of Glovers were:
1. None but a freeman of the city shall make or sell gloves.
2. No glover may be admitted to the freedom of the city unless
with the assent of the wardens of the trade.
3. No one shall entice away the servant of another.
4. If a servant in the trade makes away with his master's
chattels to the value of 12d., the wardens shall make good the
loss; and if the servant refuses to be judged by the wardens, he
shall be taken before the mayor and aldermen.
5. No one may sell his goods by candle-light.
6. Any false work found shall be taken before the mayor and
aldermen by the wardens.
7. All things touching the trade within the city between those
who are not freemen shall be forfeited.
8. Journeymen shall be paid their present rate of wages.
9. Persons who entice away journeymen glovers to make gloves in
their own houses shall be brought before the mayor and aldermen.
10. Any one of the trade who refuses to obey these regulations
shall be brought before the mayor and aldermen.
Cordwainers [workers in soft cordovan leather from Spain,
especially shoes] of good repute petitioned the city of London
in 1375 for ordinances on their trade as follows:
'To the mayor and aldermen of the city of London pray the good
folks of the trade of cordwainers of the same city, that it may
please you to grant unto them the articles that follow, for the
profit of the common people; that so, what is good and right may
be done unto all manner of folks, for saving the honor of the
city and lawfully governing the said trade.
In the first place - that if any one of the trade shall sell to
any person shoes of bazen [sheep-skin tanned in oak or
larch-bark] as being cordwain, or of calf- leather for
ox-leather, in deceit of the common people, and to the scandal of
the trade, he shall pay to the Chamber of the Guildhall, the
first time that he shall be convicted thereof, forty pence; the
second time, 7s. half a mark; and the third time the same, and
further, at the discretion of the mayor and aldermen.
Also - that no one of the trade shall keep house within the
franchise if he be not free [invested with the rights or
privileges] of the city and one knowing his trade, and that no
one shall be admitted to the freedom without the presence of the
wardens of the trade bearing witness to his standing, on the pain
aforesaid.
Also - if any one of the trade shall be found offending touching
the trade, or rebellious against the wardens thereof, such
person shall not make complaint to any one of another trade, by
reason of the discord or dissension that may have arisen between
them; but he shall be ruled by the good folks of his own trade.
And if he shall differ from them as acting against right, then
let the offense be adjudged upon before the mayor and aldermen;
and if he be found rebellious against the ordinance, let him pay
to the Chamber the sum above mentioned.
Also - that no one of the trade shall entice or purloin the
servant of another from the service of his master by paying him
more than is ordained by the trade, on the pain aforesaid.
Also - that no one shall carry out of his house any wares
connected with his trade for sale in market or elsewhere except
only at a certain place situated between Soperesland and the
Conduit; and that at a certain time of the day, that is to say,
between prime [the first hour of the day] and noon. And that no
shoes shall exceed the measure of seven inches, so that the
wares may be surveyed by the good folks of the trade, because of
the deceit upon the common people that might ensue and the
scandal of the trade, on the pain aforesaid.
Also - that no one shall expose his wares openly for sale in
market on Sundays at any place, but only within his own dwelling
to serve the common people, on the pain aforesaid.
Also - that if any one sells old shoes, he shall not mix new
shoes among the old in deceit of the common people and to the
scandal of the trade, on the pain aforesaid."
Smithfield was a field outside the city gates at which horses
were sold and raced. In 1372, the horsedealers and drovers
petitioned for a tax on animals sold there to pay for cleaning
the field. The city ordinance reads as follows: "On Wednesday
next after the Feast of St. Margaret the Virgin came reputable
men, the horsedealers and drovers, and delivered unto the mayor
and aldermen a certain petition in these words: 'To the mayor,
recorder, and aldermen show the dealers of Smithfield, that is
to say, the coursers and drovers, that for the amendment of the
said field they have granted and assented among them that for
the term of three years next ensuing after the date of this
petition for every horse sold in the said field there shall be
paid one penny, for every ox and cow one half-penny, for every
eight sheep one penny, and for every swine one penny by the
seller and the same by the purchaser who buys the same for
resale.` Afterwards, on the eleventh day of August in the same
year, Adam Fernham, keeper of the gaol at Newgate, Hugh,
Averelle, bailiff of Smithfield, and William Godhewe, weaver,
were chosen and sworn faithfully to collect and receive the said
pennies in form aforesaid and to clean the field of Smithfield
from time to time during such term of three years when
necessary."
Many London houses were being made from stone and timber and even
brick and timber, instead of just timber and mud. However,
chimneys were still a luxury of the rich. There were windows of
glass and a guild of glaziers was chartered by the King. Many
single-roomed houses added a second-floor room for sleeping,
which was approached by a wooden or stone staircase from the
outside. Goods were displayed on a booth outside the door of the
house or hung in the windows. They were stored at night in the
cellar. Over the booths swung huge signs, which had to be nine
feet above street level to allow a man on horseback to ride
underneath. There were no sidewalks. Street repair work for
wages was supervised by a stone master. The streets sloped down
from the middle so that the filth of the streets would run down
the sides of the road. People sometimes threw the rubbish from
their houses onto the street although they were supposed to cart
it outside the city walls and to clean the frontage of their
houses once a week. Dustmen scavenged through the rubbish on the
streets. Pigs and geese were not allowed to run at large in the
streets, but had to be fed at home. There were other city rules
on building, public order, the use of fountains, precautions
against fire, trading rights in various districts, closing time
of taverns, and when refuse could be thrown into the streets,
e.g. nighttime.
Aldermen were constantly making rounds to test measures and
weights, wine cups, the height of tavern signs, and the mesh of
the fishing nets, which had to be at least two inches wide. They
saw that the taverns were shut when curfew was rung and arrested
anyone on the street after curfew who had a weapon, for no one
with a sword was allowed on the streets unless he was some great
lord or other substantial person of good reputation. Wards
provided citizens to guard the gates in their respective
neighborhood and keep its key.
The city was so dense that nuisance was a common action brought
in court, for instance, vegetable vendors near a church
obstructing passageway on the street or plumbers melting their
solder with a lower than usual shalt of the furnace so smoke was
inhaled by people nearby.
Crime in London was rare. Murder, burglary, highway robbery, and
gross theft were punishable by hanging. Forgery, fraud, was
punishable by the placement in the pillory or stocks or by
imprisonment. Perjury was punished by confession from a high
stool for the first offense, and the pillory for the second.
Slander and telling lies was punished by the pillory and wearing
a whetstone around one's neck.
Prominent Londoners sought to elevate their social position by
having their family marry into rural landholders of position.
Many master freemasons, who carved freestone or finely grained
sandstone and limestone artistically with mallet and chisel,
left the country for better wages after their wages were fixed
by statute. The curvilinear gothic style of architecture was
replaced by the perpendicular style, which was simpler and
cheaper to build. Church steeples now had clocks on them with
dials and hands to supplement the church bell ringing on the
hour.
Towns recognized surgery as a livelihood subject to admission and
oath to serve the social good. Master surgeons were admitted to
practice in 1369 in London in full husting before the mayor and
the aldermen and swore to: faithfully serve the people in
undertaking their cures, take reasonably from them, faithfully
follow their calling, present to the said mayor and aldermen the
defaults of others undertaking, so often as should be necessary;
to be ready, at all times when they should be warned, to attend
the maimed or wounded and others, to give truthful information
to the officers of the city as to such maimed, wounded, or
others whether they be in peril of death or not, and to
faithfully do all other things touching their calling.
Some young girls of good families were boarded at nunneries to be
taught there. Some upper class widows retired there. Only women
were allowed to be present at a birth, at which they spread the
knowledge of midwifery. As usual, many women died giving birth.
Various ways to prevent pregnancy were tried. It was believed
that a baby grew from a seed of the father planted in the woman's
body.
Infant mortality was especially high in boroughs and burgess
family lines usually died out. A three-generation family span
was exceptional in the towns, despite family wealth.
Children's sweets included gingerbread and peppermint drops.
After the plague, gentlemen no longer had their children learn
to speak Norman. The grammar schools taught in English instead
of Norman. Bishops began to preach in English. Twenty years
later, English became the official language of the courts and of
Parliament.
A will in 1389 in which a wealthy citizen arranges for one son to
become a lawyer and the other a merchant: "Will of William de
Tonge, citizen of London: One hundred marks [1,333s.] each to my
two sons. And I will that my said two sons shall live upon the
profits of the money bequeathed to them above until the age of
twenty years. And if my said two sons be well learned in grammar
and adorned with good manners, which shall be known at the end
of twenty years, and the elder son wish to practice common law,
and if it is known that he would spend his time well in that
faculty, I will that over and above the profit of the said one
hundred marks he shall have yearly from my rents for the term of
seven years five marks [67s.]. And if he should waste his time
aforesaid, or if he should marry foolishly and unsuitably, I
will that he receive nothing more of the said five marks.
And if younger son wishes to attend the University of Oxford or
to establish himself well in the mystery of a merchant after the
age of twenty years, and [if] there be knowledge of his
praiseworthy progress in his faculty or his carefulness in
trading ... I will that he shall receive five marks yearly in the
manner described above for his maintenance, over and above the
profit of the said one hundred marks to him bequeathed, for the
space of seven years; and if he behave himself otherwise, I will
that thereupon he be excluded from the said five marks. And in
case the said bequest of 200 marks [2,667s.]to him and his
brother shall be annulled so that he shall have nothing therefrom
... then the said 200 marks shall be spent upon all the yearly
chaplains who can be had to celebrate divine service in the
church of All Hallows for my soul."
England was still an agricultural rather than a manufacturing
country. Imported were cloth, silks, linen, velvets, furs,
glass, wines, candles, millstones, amber, iron, and mercury.
Exported were wool, leather, lead, tin, and alabaster for
sculpturing. But the London Society of the Merchant Adventurers,
which had a monopoly of trade with the Low Countries, now
manufactured cloth good enough for export and began to buy up
raw wool in such quantity that its export declined.
An Oxford theologian and preacher, John Wyclif, voiced the
popular resentment of the materialism of the church, benefit of
clergy, immorality of priests, and the selling of indulgences
and pardons. He argued against the supremacy of the papal law
over the King's courts and against payments to the papacy. He
opined that the church had no power to excommunicate. The Friars
had become mere beggars and the church was still wealthy. He
proposed that all goods should be held in common by the
righteous and that the church should hold no property but be
entirely spiritual. He believed that people should rely on their
individual consciences. He thought that the Bible should be
available to people who could read English so that the people
could have a direct access to God without priests or the Pope.
Towards this end, he translated it from Latin into English in
1384. His preachers spread his views throughout the country. The
church then possessed about one-third of the land of the nation.
Stories were written about pilgrimage vacations of ordinary
people to religious sites in England. Geoffrey Chaucer's "Tales
of the Canterbury Pilgrims" portrayed characters of every social
class, including the knight with his squire, abbot, prioress,
nun, priest, monk, friar, poor parson of the country, summoner
(who enforced the jurisdiction and levied the dues of the church
courts), pardoner (sold pardons from the Pope), scholar, lawyer,
doctor, merchant, sailor, franklin, yeoman, haberdasher,
tapestry-maker, ploughman, cook, weaver, dyer, upholsterer,
miller, reeve, carpenter.
It told stories about a beautiful and virtuous wife disliked by
her mother-in- law, the difficulty of marriage between people of
different religions, the hatred of a poor person b his brother
and his neighbor, rich merchants who visited other kingdoms, the
importance of a man himself following the rules he sets for
other people's behavior, the spite of a man for a woman who
rejected him, the relative lack of enthusiasm of a wife for sex
as compared to her husband, a mother giving up her own comfort
for that of her child, the revenge killing of a murderer by the
dead man's friends, the joy of seeing a loved one after years of
separation, that life is more sad than happy, that lost money can
be retrieved, but time lost is lost forever.
Other stories in the Canterbury Tales were about two men who did
not remain friends after they fell in love with the same woman,
about a child who preferred to learn from an older child than
from his school-teacher, about a wife who convinced her husband
not to avenge her beating for the sake of peace, about a man who
woke up from bad dreams full of fear, about a man wanting to
marry a beautiful woman but later realizing a plain wife would
not be pursued by other men, about a man who drank so much wine
that he lost his mental and physical powers, about a woman who
married for money instead of love, about a man who said
something in frustration which he didn't mean, about a person
brought up in poverty who endured adversity better than one
brought up in wealth, about a wife who was loving and wise,
about a good marriage being more valuable than money, about a
virgin who committed suicide rather than be raped, about a wife
persuaded to adultery by a man who said he would otherwise kill
himself, about three men who found a pile of gold and murdered
each other to take it all, about an angry man who wanted to
kill, about a malicious man who had joy in seeing other men in
trouble and misfortune, about a man whose face turned red in
shame, about a wife expecting to have half of what her husband
owned.
Will Langland's poem "The Vision of William Concerning Piers
Plowman" portrays a pilgrimage of common people to the shrine of
Truth led by a virtuous laborer. Mystics wrote practical advice
with transcendental teaching, for instance "Scale of Perfection"
attributed to Walter Hilton and "Cloud of Unknowing". Richard
Rolle wrote about spiritual matters, probably the "Prick of
Conscience". Richard de Bury wrote "Philobiblon" about book
lovers. Jean Froissart wrote the "Chronicles" on knights.
Courtly ideals were expressed in "Sir Gawaine and the Grene
Knyght", wherein the adventures of the hero, an Arthur knight,
are allegorical in the struggle against the world, the flesh,
and the devil (1370). "Pearl" eulogized all that is pure and
innocent on the event of the death of a two year old child.
Paper supplemented parchment, so there were more books.
Political songs and poems were written about the evil times of
King Edward II, the military triumphs of King Edward III, and
the complaints of the poor against their oppressors, such as
"Song of the Husbandman". John Gower wrote moralizing poems on
the villein's revolt, the sins of the clergy and lawyers, and the
bad rule of King Richard II. Robin Hood ballads were popular.
The minstrel, who was a honorable person, replaced the
troubadour of older times.
There were many colleges at Oxford and Cambridge due to the
prohibition of gifts to the church. Laymen instead of
ecclesiastics were appointed as Chancellor. The Masters at
Oxford got rid of ecclesiastical supervision by a bishop and
archdeacon by 1368. One could be admitted as a student at age
thirteen.
A Bachelor of Arts degree was granted after four years of study
and an oral exam. Required reading in 1340 for the Bachelor's
Degree was Aristotlean logic and a selection from these works:
"Of Heaven and Earth", "On the Soul", "Of meteors", "Of Birth
and Decay", "Of Feeling and What is Felt", "Of Memory and
Recollection", "Of Sleep and Waking", "Of the Movement of
Animals", "Of Minor Points in Natural History".
A Master of Arts degree could be awarded after three more years
of study and teaching. A Doctorate degrees in theology required
ten more years of study. A Doctorate in civil or canon law
required eight more years. A man with a degree in canon law who
wanted to practice in a certain bishop's court had to first
satisfy this bishop of his competence. The guilds gave rise to
the Inns of Court in London. They used the Register of Writs,
the case law of the Year Books, and disputation to teach their
students.
For a doctorate in medicine from Oxford or Cambridge, five more
years plus two years of practice were required. Surgery was not
taught because it was considered manual labor. Humans were
thought to be influenced by four humors: sanguine, phlegmatic,
choleric, and melancholic. Urinalysis and pulse beat were used
for diagnosis. Epilepsy and apoplexy were understood as spasms
inside the head. It was known what substances served as
laxatives and diuretics. Teeth were extracted, eye cataracts
were removed with a silver needle, and skin from the arm was
grafted onto a mutilated face.
Englishmen who had collected books on philosophy, medicine,
astronomy, and history and literature books from the continent
gave their collections to the universities, which started their
libraries. Marco Polo's discoveries on his journey to China were
known.
The requirements of elementary and higher studies were adjusted
in 1393 and began the public school system. William of Wykeham's
school, St. Mary College of Winchester in Oxford was the
prototype. The curriculum was civil law, canon law, medicine,
astronomy with astronomical instruments that were made, theology,
and the arts. The arts textbooks were still grammar, logic,
Donatus, and Aristotle. Many laymen were literate, for instance
country gentry, merchants, and craftsmen. Laymen instead of
clerics were now appointed to the great offices of state.
Parliament was composed of representatives from 100 boroughs and
37 shires. Merchants were entering Parliament and paid much of
the taxes. Some were created Earls and appointed as ministers to
the King. Edward III did not summon anyone to his council who
did not have the confidence of the magnates [barons, earls,
bishops, and abbots]. Under him, the commons took a leading part
in the granting of taxes and the presentation of petitions.
At the 1376 Parliament, ("the Good Parliament") the Commons,
which formerly had only consented to taxes, took political
action by complaining that the King's councilors had grown rich
by war profiteering at the cost of impoverishing the nation and
the people were too poor to endure any more taxation for the war
and held a hearing on malfeasance of two ministers. The
Parliament found the charges proved and dismissed them from
office. This established the constitutional means for
impeachment and removal of ministers. The commons demanded that
its members be elected by shire citizens rather than appointed
by the sheriff. Actions of this Parliament were undone a few
months later.
King Richard II exiled Henry of Lancaster, forbade his
inheritance, and took his property. This made all propertied men
anxious. The "Merciless Parliament" of 1388 swept out King
Richard II's friends. Parliament threw Richard II into prison
and elected Lancaster to be King Henry IV. This action
established clearly that royal decrees were subordinate to
parliamentary statutes. The House of Commons became very
powerful.
So the roles of Parliament and the King's council are starting to
differentiate into legislative and executive, respectively. The
legislative function is law- making and the executive is
regulation-making that refines and effectuates the laws of
Parliament. But the legislative, executive and judicial
authorities have not as yet become so completely separated that
they cannot on occasion work together.
There was a standard form of direct taxation voted by Parliament,
which was normally 1/10 of the value of all moveables in towns
and royal domains and 1/15 in the country.
>From 1150 to 1400, resistance was an ordinary remedy for
political disagreements. If a popular leader raised his standard
in a popular cause, an irregular army could be assembled in a
day. (There was no regular army, since England was protected by
the sea from invasion.) So misgovernment by a King would be
quickly restrained. Society recovered quickly from conflict and
civil war because the national wealth consisted chiefly in
flocks and herds and in the simple buildings inhabited by the
people. In a week after armed resistance, the agricultural
worker was driving his team. There was little furniture, stock of
shops, manufactured goods, or machinery that could be destroyed.
The feudal army was summoned for the last time in the 100 year
war with France, which began in 1337. In it the English longbow
was used to pierce French knights' armor. Guns and cannon with
gunpowder were introduced in 1338. They became common by 1372
and foresaw the end to the competition between the strength of
arrows to pierce and the heaviness of armor to resist.
Featherbeds and blooded horses were favorite spoils of war
brought back to England. In th 1300s and 1400s, the King relied
on mercenaries hired directly or by contract with his great
nobles for foreign wars.
Many lords got men to fight with them by livery and maintenance
employment agreements such as this one of 1374: "Bordeaux,
February 15. This indenture, made between our lord King John [of
Gaunt, of Castile, etc.] of the one part and Symkyn Molyneux,
esquire, of the other part, witnesses that the said Symkyn is
retained and will remain with our said lord for peace and for
war for the term of his life, as follows: that is to say, the
said Symkyn shall be bound to serve our said lord as well in time
of peace as of war in whatsoever parts it shall please our said
lord, well and fitly arrayed. And he shall be boarded as well in
time of peace as of war. And he shall take for his fees by the
year, as well in time of peace as of war, 133s. ten marks
[133s.4d] sterling from the issues of the Duchy of Lancaster by
the hands of the receiver there who now is or shall be in time to
come, at the terms of Easter and Michaelmas by even portions
yearly for the whole of his life. And, moreover, our lord has
granted to him by the year in time of war five marks [67s.]
sterling by the hands of the treasurer of war for the time being.
And his year of war shall begin the day when he shall move from
his inn towards our said lord by letters which shall be sent to
him thereof, and thenceforward he shall take wages coming and
returning by reasonable daily [payments] and he shall have
fitting freightage for him, his men, horses, and other harness
within reason, and in respect of his war horses taken and lost
in the service of our said lord, and also in respect to
prisoners and other profits of war taken or gained by him or any
of his men, the said our lord will do to him as to other squires
of his rank."
Forecastles and stern castles on ships were lower and broader.
Underneath them were cabins. The English ship was still
single-masted with a single square sail. A navy was formed with
over 200 ships selected by the English admirals acting for the
King at the ports. Men were seized and pressed into service and
criminals were pardoned from crimes to become sailors in the
fleet, which was led by the King's ship. They used the superior
longbow against the French sailor's crossbow. In 1372, the Tower
of London had four mounted fortress cannon and Dover had six.
The war's disruption of shipping caused trade to decline. But the
better policing of the narrow seas made piracy almost disappear.
In 1363, Calais, a continental town held by the English, became
the staple town for lead, tin, cloth, and wool and was placed
under a group of London capitalists: the Merchants of the
Staple. All exports of these had to pass through Calais, where
customs tax was collected. Merchants who took cloth abroad to
various places to sell, personally or by agents, were called
merchant adventurers to distinguish them from the Merchant of
the Staple.
Waterpower was replacing foot power in driving the mills where
cloth was cleaned and fulled [thickened].
A boundary dispute between two barons resulted in the first true
survey map. Nine cow pastures were divided by a boundary marked
by a shield on a pole which the commission of true and sworn men
had set up.
Bethlehem Hospital was used from 1377 to house the mentally ill.
The Law
After the Black Death of 1348 these statutes were enacted:
High treason was defined by statute in 1352 as levying war
against the King, aiding the King's enemies, compassing or
imagining the death of the King, Queen, or their eldest son and
heir, or violating the Queen or the eldest unmarried daughter or
the wife of the King's eldest son and heir, making or knowingly
using counterfeits of the King's great or privy seal or coinage,
or slaying the Chancellor, Treasurer, or any justice in the
exercise of their duty. The penalty was forfeit of life and
lands. During the reign of King Richard II, who was later
disposed, high treason was extended to include making a riot and
rumor, compassing or purposing to depose the King, revoking
one's homage or liege to the King, and attempting to repeal a
statute. But these extensions were repealed after he was
deposed.
Petit treason was defined by statute and included a servant
slaying his master, a wife her husband, or a man his lord, to
whom was owed faith and obedience.
No one shall tell false news or lies about prelates, dukes,
earls, barons, and other nobles and great men or the Chancellor,
Treasurer, a Justice, Clerk of the Privy Seal, Steward of the
King's house whereby debates and discords might arise between
these lords or between the lords and the commons. Cases shall be
tried by the King's Council, which included the Chancellor,
Treasurer, and chief justices.
Preachers drawing crowds by ingenious sermons and inciting them
to riot shall be arrested by sheriffs and tried by the
ecclesiastical court.
Any stranger passing at night of whom any have suspicion shall be
arrested and taken to the Sheriff.
No man shall ride with a spear, upon pain of forfeiting it.
No servant of agriculture or laborer shall carry any sword or
dagger, or forfeit it, except in time of war in defense of the
nation. He may carry bow and arrow [for practice] on Sundays and
holy days, when he should not play games such as tennis.
football, or dice.
No one may enter another's land and tenements by strong hand nor
with a mob, upon pain of imprisonment and ransom at the King's
will.
Charters, releases, obligations, [quit-claim deeds] and other
deeds burnt or destroyed in uprisings shall be reissued without
fee, after trial by the King and his council. Manumissions,
obligations, releases and other bonds and feoffments in land
made by force, coercion or duress during mob uprisings are void.
Men who rape and women consenting after a rape shall lose their
inheritance and dower and joint feoffments. The husbands, or
father or next of kin of such women may sue the rapist by
inquisition, but not by battle. The penalty is loss of life and
member.
The Statute of Laborers of 1351 required all workers, from
tailors to ploughmen, to work only at pre-plague wage rates and
forced the vagrant peasant to work for anyone who claimed him or
her. It also encouraged longer terms of employment as in the
past rather than for a day at a time. Statutory price controls on
food limited profits to reasonable ones according to the
distance of the supply. Later, wages were determined in each
county by Justices of the Peace according to the dearth of
victuals while allowing a victualler a reasonable profit and a
penalty was specified as paying the value of the excess wages
given or received for the first offense, double this for the
second offense, and treble this or forty days imprisonment for
the third offense.
A fugitive laborer will be outlawed, and when found, shall be
burnt in the forehead with the letter "F" for falsity.
Children who labored at the plough and cart or other agriculture
shall continue in that labor and may not go into a craft.
A statute of 1363 designed to stop hoarding various types of
merchandise until a type became scarce so to sell it at high
prices, required merchants to deal in only one type of
merchandise. It also required craftsmen to work in only one
craft as before (except women who traditionally did several
types of handiwork). This was repealed a year later.
Where scarcity has made the price of poultry high, it shall be
lowered to 8d. for a young capon, 7d. for an old capon or a
goose, 9d. for a hen, and 10d. for a pullet.
The fares for passage on boats on fresh waters and from Dover to
the continent shall remain at their old rate.
Any merchant selling at a fair after it has ended will forfeit to
the King twice the value of that sold.
Anyone finding and proving cloth contrary to the assize of cloth
shall have one- third of it for his labor.
No shoemaker nor cordwainer shall tan their leather and no tanner
shall make shoes, in order that tanning not be false or poorly
done.
The staple was reinstituted by statute of 1353 after an
experiment without it, in which profits of a staple went to
staples outside the nation. The rationale for the staple was to
facilitate inspection of quality and the levy of customs. Wool,
woolfells, leather, and lead sold for export had to go through
the staple town. The penalty was forfeiture of lands, tenements,
goods, and chattel. (The staple statute remained basically
unchanged for the next 200 years.) The mayor and constables of
the staple were elected annually by the native and foreign
merchants of the place. The mayor gave validity to contracts for
a set fee, by seal of his office. He and the constables had
jurisdiction over all persons and things touching the staple,
which was regulated by the Law Merchant in all matters of
contract, covenant, debt, and felonies against foreign merchants.
A Hue and Cry was required to be raised and followed for anyone
taking a cart of merchandise or slaying a merchant, denizen
[resident alien] or alien, or the town would answer for the
robbery and damage done.
All denizen [foreigner permitted to reside in the realm with
certain rights and privileges] and alien merchants may buy and
sell goods and merchandise, in gross, in any part of the
country, despite town charters or franchises, to anyone except
an enemy of the King. They may also sell small wares: victuals,
fur, silk, cover chiefs, silver wire, and gold wire in retail,
but not cloth or wine. They must sell their goods within three
months of arrival. Any alien bringing goods to the nation to
sell must buy goods of the nation to the value of at least
one-half that of his merchandise sold. These merchants must
engage in no collusion to lower the price of merchandise
bought, take merchandise bought to the staple, and promise to
hold no staple beyond the sea for the same merchandise. An
amendment disallowed denizens from taking wools, leather,
woolfells, or lead for export, but only strangers.
Towns failing to bring disturbers of this right to justice shall
forfeit their franchise to the King and pay double damages to
the merchant. The disturber shall be imprisoned for a year.
Cloth may not be tacked nor folded for sale to merchants unless
they are opened to the buyers for inspection, for instance for
concealed inferior wool. Workers, weavers, and fullers shall put
their seals to every cloth. And anyone could bring his own
wools, woolfells, leather, and lead to the staple to sell without
being compelled to sell them in the country. Special streets or
warehouses were appointed with warehouse rent fixed by the mayor
and constables with four of the principal inhabitants. Customs
duties were regulated and machinery provided for their
collection. No one was to forestall or regrate, that is, buy at
one price and sell at a higher price in the same locale.
Forestallers were those who bought raw material on its way to
market. Regrators were those who tried to create a "corner" in
the article in the market itself.
Anyone may ship or carry grain out of the nation, except to
enemies, after paying duties. But the council may restrain this
passage when necessary for the good of the nation. Any merchant,
privy or stranger, who was robbed of goods on the sea or lost
his ship by tempest or other misfortune on the sea banks, his
goods coming to shore could not be declared Wreck, but were to be
delivered to the merchant after he proves ownership in court by
his marks on the goods or by good and lawful merchants.
All stakes and obstacles set up in rivers impeding the passage of
boats shall be removed.
Imported cloth shall be inspected by the King's officials for
non-standard measurements or defects [despite town franchises].
No one shall leave the nation except at designated ports, on pain
of one year's imprisonment.
English merchants may carry their merchandise in foreign ships if
there are no English ships available.
Social distinctions by attire were mandated by statute of 1363. A
servant, his wife, son, or daughter, shall only wear cloth worth
no more than 27s. and shall not have more than one dish of meat
or fish a day. Carters, ploughmen, drivers of the plough,
oxherds, cowherds, shepherds, and all other people owning less
than 40s. of goods and chattels shall only wear blanket and
russet worth no more than 12d. and girdles of linen according to
their estate. Craftsmen and free peasants shall only wear cloth
worth no more than 40s. Esquires and gentlemen below the rank of
knight with no land nor rent over 2,000s. a year shall only wear
cloth worth no more than 60s., no gold, silver, stone, fur, or
the color purple. Esquires with land up to 2,667s. per year may
wear 67s. cloth, cloth of silk and silver, miniver [grey] fur
and stones, except head stones. Merchants, citizens, burgesses,
artificers, and people of handicraft having goods and chattels
worth 10,000s. shall wear cloth the same value as that worn by
esquires and gentlemen with land or rent within 2,000s. per
year. The same merchants and burgesses with goods and chattels
worth 13,333s. and esquires and gentlemen with land or rent
within 400s. per year may not wear gold cloth, miniver fur,
ermine [white] fur, or embroidered stones. A knight with land or
rents within 2,667s. yearly are limited to cloth of 80s., but
his wife may wear a stone on her head. Knights and ladies with
land or rents within 8,000s. to 20,000s. yearly may not wear fur
of ermine or of letuse, but may wear gold, and such ladies may
wear pearls as well as stones on their heads. The penalty is
forfeiture of such apparel. This statute is necessary because of
"outrageous and excessive apparel of diverse persons against
their estate and degree, to the great destruction and
impoverishment of all the land".
If anyone finds a hawk [used to hunt birds, ducks, and pheasant]
that a lord has lost, he must take it to the sheriff for keeping
for the lord to claim. If there is no claim after four months,
the finder may have it only if he is a gentleman. If one steals
a hawk from a lord or conceals from him the fact that it has been
found, he shall pay the price of the hawk and be imprisoned for
two years.
No laborer or any other man who does not have lands and tenements
of the value of 40s. per year shall keep a greyhound [or other
hound or dog] to hunt, nor shall they use nets or cords or other
devices to take [deer, rabbits, conies, nor other gentlemen's
game], upon pain of one year imprisonment.
No man shall eat more than two courses of meat or fish in his
house or elsewhere, except at festivals, when three are allowed
[because great men ate costly meats to excess and the lesser
people were thereby impoverished].
No one may export silver, whether bullion or coinage, or wine
except foreign merchants may carry back the portion of their
money not used to buy English commodities. The penalty for
bringing false or counterfeit money into the nation is loss of
life and member. An assigned searcher [inspector] for coinage of
the nation on the sea passing out of the nation or bad money in
the nation shall have one third of it. No foreign money may be
used in the nation.
Each goldsmith shall have an identifying mark, which shall be
placed on his vessel or work only after inspection by the King's
surveyor.
No one shall give anything to a beggar who is capable of working.
Vagrants begging in London were banned by this 1359 ordinance:
"Forasmuch as many men and women, and others, of divers
counties, who might work, to the help of the common people, have
betaken themselves from out of their own country to the city of
London and do go about begging there so as to have their own ease
and repose, not wishing to labor or work for their sustenance, to
the great damage of the common people; and also do waste divers
alms which would otherwise be given to many poor folks, such as
lepers, blind, halt, and persons oppressed with old age and
divers other maladies, to the destruction of the support of the
same - we do command on behalf of our lord the King, whom may God
preserve and bless, that all those who go about begging in the
said city and who are able to labor and work for the profit of
the common people shall quit the said city between now and
Monday next ensuing. And if any such shall be found begging
after the day aforesaid, the same shall be taken and put in the
stocks on Cornhill for half a day the first time, and the second
time he shall remain in the stocks one whole day, and the third
time he shall be taken and shall remain in prison for forty days
and shall then forswear the said city forever. And every
constable and the beadle of every ward of the said city shall be
empowered to arrest such manner of folks and to put them in the
stocks in manner aforesaid."
The hundred year cry to "let the King live on his own" found
fruition in a 1352 statute requiring consent of the Parliament
before any commission of array for militia could be taken and a
1362 statute requiring purchases of goods and means of
conveyance for the King and his household to be made only by
agreement with the seller and with payment to him before the
King traveled on, instead of at the low prices determined
unilaterally by the King's purveyer.
Every man who has wood within the forest may take houseboot and
heyboot in his wood without being arrested so long as it take
such within the view of the foresters.
English was made the official language of the courts, replacing
French and Latin, and schools in 1362 and of Parliament,
replacing Anglo-Norman, in 1363.
No fecal matter, dung, garbage, or entrails of animals killed
shall be put into ditches or rivers or other waters, so that
maladies and diseases will not be caused by corrupted and
infected air. The penalty is 400s. to the King after trial by
the Chancellor.
Gifts or alienation of land to guilds, fraternities, or towns are
forbidden. Instead, it escheats to its lord, or in his default,
to the King.
No man will be charged to go out of his shire to do military
service except in case of an enemy invasion of the nation. Men
who chose to go into the King's service outside the nation shall
be paid wages by the King until their return.
Admiralty law came into being when ancient naval manners and
customs were written down as the "Black Book of the Admiralty".
This included the organization of the fleet under the Admiral,
sea-maneuver rules such as not laying anchor until the Admiral's
ship had, engagement rules, and the distribution of captured
goods: one-fourth to the vessel owner, one-fourth to the King if
the seamen were paid by the King's wages, and the rest divided
among the crew and Admiral. Stealing a boat or an anchor holding
a boat was punishable by hanging. Stealing an oar or an anchor
was punishable by forty days imprisonment for the first offense,
six months imprisonment for the second, and hanging for the
third. Desertion was punishable by loss of double the amount of
wages earned and imprisonment for one year. Cases were tried by
jury in the Admiral's court.
Wines, vinegar, oil and honey imported shall be gauged by the
King's appointees.
A man may not hire another man to fight in his place in a
quarrel, except one living in his household or his esquire.
Judicial Procedure
The office of Justice of the Peace was developed and filled by
knights, esquires and gentlemen who were closely associated with
the magnates. There was no salary nor any requirement of
knowledge of the law. They were to pursue, restrain, arrest,
imprison, try, and duly punish felons, trespassers, and rioters
according to the law. They were expected to arrest vagrants who
would not work and imprison them until sureties for good
behavior was found for them. They also were empowered to
inspect weights and measures and enforce the new law against
hiring another to fight one's quarrel. Trespass included forcible
offenses of breaking of a fence enclosing private property,
assault and battery, false imprisonment, and taking away goods
and chattels.
Private suits for murder or personal injury were falling into
disuse and being replaced by the action of trespass.
Pardons may be given only for slaying another in one's own
defense or by misfortune [accident], and not for slaying by
lying in wait, assault, or malice aforethought.
Justices of Assize, sheriffs, and Justices of the Peace and
mayors shall have power to inquire of all vagabonds and compel
them to find surety of their good bearing or be imprisoned.
Treason was tried in Parliament, by bill of "attainder". It was
often used for political purposes. Most attaints were reversed
as a term of peace made between factions.
A reversioner shall be received in court to defend his right when
a tenant for a term of life, tenant in dower, or by the Law of
England, or in Tail after Possibility of Issue extinct are sued
in court for the land, so as to prevent collusion by the
demandants.
A person in debt may not avoid his creditors by giving his
tenements or chattels to his friends in collusion to have the
profits at their will.
Where there was a garnishment given touching a plea of land, a
writ of deceit is also maintainable.
Actions of debt will be heard only in the county where the
contract was made. The action of debt includes enforcement of
contracts executed or under seal, e.g. rent due on a lease, hire
of an archer, contract of sale or repair of an item. Thus there
is a growing connection between the actions of debt and
contract.
Executors have an action for trespass to their testators' goods
and chattels in like manner as did the testator when alive.
If a man dies intestate, his goods shall be administered by his
next and most lawful friends appointed. Such administrators
shall have the same powers and duties as executors and be
accountable as are executors to the ecclesiastical court.
Children born to English parents in parts beyond the sea may
inherit from their ancestors in the same manner as those born in
the nation.
A person grieved by a false oath in a town court proceeding may
appeal to the King's Bench or Common Pleas, regardless of any
town franchise.
The Court of the King's Bench worked independently of the King.
It became confined to the established common law. The King
proclaimed that petitions for remedies that the common law
didn't cover be addressed to the Chancellor, who was not bound
by established law, but could do equity. With the backing of the
council, he made decisions implementing the policy of the Statute
of Laborers. Most of these concerned occupational competency,
for instance negligent activity of carriers, builders,
shepherds, doctors, clothworkers, smiths, innkeepers, and
jailers. For instance, the common law action of detinue could
force return of cloth bailed for fulling or sheep bailed for
pasturing, but could not address damages due to faulty work. The
Chancellor addressed issues of loss of wool, dead lambs, and
damaged sheep, as well as dead sheep. He imposed a legal duty on
innkeepers to prevent injury or damage to a patron or his goods
from third parties. A dog bite or other damage by a dog known by
its owner to be vicious was made a more serious offense than
general damage by any dog. A person starting a fire was given a
duty to prevent the fire from damaging property of others. These
new forms of action came to be known as assumpsit, which
provided damages for breach of an oral agreement and a written
agreement without a seal, or trespass on the case, which did not
require the element of force of the trespass offense.
Decisions of the common law courts are appealable to Parliament,
which can change the common law by statute.
No attorney may practice law and also be a justice of assize.
Champerty [an outsider supporting or maintaining litigation in
which there is an agreement for him to share in the award] is
forbidden because court officials have maintained and defended
a party which has resulted in another party being cheated out of
his land.
Whereas it is contained in the Magna Carta that none shall be
imprisoned nor put out of his freehold, nor of his franchises
nor free custom, unless it be by the law of the land; it is
established that from henceforth none shall be taken by petition
or suggestion made to the King unless by indictment of good and
lawful people of the same neighborhood where such deeds be done,
in due manner, or by process made by writ original at the common
law; nor that none be out of his franchise, nor of his
freeholds, unless he be duly brought into answer and forejudges
of the same by the course of law. (forerunner of indictment grand
juries and trial juries for criminal cases)
There were so many cases that were similar to, but not in
technical conformity with, the requirements of the common law
for a remedy by the reign of Edward III, that litigants were
flowing into the Chancery, which had the power to give swift and
equitable relief.
The King will fine instead of seize the land of his tenants who
sell or alienate their land, such fine to be determined by the
Chancellor by due process.
The King's coroner and a murderer who had taken sanctuary in a
church often agreed to the penalty of confession and perpetual
banishment from the nation as follows: "Memorandum that on July
6, [1347], Henry de Roseye abjured the realm of England before
John Bernard, the King's coroner, at the church of Tendale in
the County of Kent in form following: 'Hear this, O lord the
coroner, that I, Henry de Roseye, have stolen an ox and a cow of
the widow of John Welsshe of Retherfeld; and I have stolen
eighteen beasts from divers men in the said county. And I
acknowledge that I have feloniously killed Roger le Swan in the
town of Strete in the hundred of Strete in the rape of Lewes and
that I am a felon of the lord King of England. And because I
have committed many ill deeds and thefts in his land, I abjure
the land of the Lord Edward King of England, and [I
acknowledge] that I ought to hasten to the port of Hastings,
which thou hast given me, and that I ought not to depart from
the way, and if I do so I am willing to be taken as a thief and
felon of the lord King, and that at Hastings I will diligently
seek passage, and that I will not wait there save for the flood
and one ebb if I can have passage; and if I cannot have passage
within that period, I will go up to the knees into the sea every
day, endeavoring to cross; and unless I can do so within forty
days, I will return at once to the church, as a thief and a
felon of the lord King, so help me God."
Property damage by a tenant of a London building was assessed in
a 1374 case: "John Parker, butcher, was summoned to answer
Clement Spray in a plea of trespass, wherein the latter
complained that the said John, who had hired a tavern at the
corner of St. Martin-le-Grand from him for fifteen months, had
committed waste and damage therein, although by the custom of the
city no tenant for a term of years was entitled to destroy any
portion of the buildings or fixtures let to him. He alleged that
the defendant had taken down the doorpost of the tavern and also
of the shop, the boarded door of a partition of the tavern, a
seat in the tavern, a plastered partition wall, the stone
flooring in the chamber, the hearth of the kitchen, and the
mantelpiece above it, a partition in the kitchen, two doors and
other partitions, of a total value of 21s. four pounds, 1s.
8d., and to his damage, 400s. 20 pounds. The defendant denied
the trespass and put himself on the country. Afterwards a jury
... found the defendant guilty of the aforesaid trespass to the
plaintiff's damage, 40d. Judgment was given for that amount and
a fine of 1s. to the King, which the defendant paid immediately
in court."
The innkeeper's duty to safeguard the person and property of his
lodgers was applied in this case:
"John Trentedeus of Southwark was summoned to answer William
Latymer touching a plea why, whereas according to the law and
custom of the realm of England, innkeepers who keep a common inn
are bound to keep safely by day and by night without reduction
or loss men who are passing through the parts where such inns
are and lodging their goods within those inns, so that, by
default of the innkeepers or their servants, no damage should in
any way happen to such their guests ...
On Monday after the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary
in the fourth year of the now King by default of the said John,
certain malefactors took and carried away two small portable
chests with 533s. and also with charters and writings, to wit
two writings obligatory, in the one of which is contained that a
certain Robert Bour is bound to the said William in 2,000s. and
in the other that a certain John Pusele is bound to the same
William in 800s. 40 pounds ... and with other muniments
[writings defending claims or rights] of the same William, to
wit his return of all the writs of the lord King for the counties
of Somerset and Dorset, whereof the same William was then
sheriff, for the morrow of the Purification of the Blessed Mary
the Virgin in the year aforesaid, as well before the same lord
the King in his Chancery and in his Bench as before the justices
of the King's Common Bench and his barons of his Exchequer,
returnable at Westminster on the said morrow, and likewise the
rolls of the court of Cranestock for all the courts held there
from the first year of the reign of the said lord the King until
the said Monday, contained in the same chests being lodged
within the inn of the same John at Southwark
And the said John ... says that on the said Monday about the
second hour after noon the said William entered his inn to be
lodged there, and at once when he entered, the same John
assigned to the said William a certain chamber being in that
inn, fitting for his rank, with a door and a lock affixed to the
same door with sufficient nails, so that he should lie there and
put and keep his things there, and delivered to the said William
the key to the door of the said chamber, which chamber the said
William accepted...
William says that ... when the said John had delivered to him the
said chamber and key as above, the same William, being occupied
about divers businesses to be done in the city of London, went
out from the said inn into the city to expedite the said
businesses and handed over the key of the door to a certain
servant of the said William to take care of in meantime,
ordering the servant to remain in the inn meanwhile and to take
care of his horses there; and afterwards, when night was
falling, the same William being in the city and the key still in
the keeping of the said servant, the wife of the said John
called unto her into her hall the said servant who had the key,
giving him food and drink with a merry countenance and asking
him divers questions and occupying him thus for a long time,
until the staple of the lock of the door aforesaid was thrust on
one side out of its right place and the door of the chamber was
thereby opened and his goods, being in the inn of the said John,
were taken and carried off by the said malefactors ... The said
John says ...[that his wife did not call the servant into the
hall, but that] when the said servant came into the said hall and
asked his wife for bread and ale and other necessaries to be
brought to the said chamber of his master, his wife immediately
and without delay delivered to the same servant the things for
which he asked ... protesting that no goods of the same William
in the said inn were carried away by the said John his servant or
any strange malefactors other than the persons of the household
of the said William."
On the Coram Rege Roll of 1395 is a case on the issue of whether
a court-crier can be seized by officers of a staple:
"Edmund Hikelyng, 'criour', sues William Baddele and wife Maud,
John Olney, and William Knyghtbrugge for assault and
imprisonment at Westminster, attacking him with a stick and
imprisoning him for one hour on Wednesday before St. Martin, 19
Richard II.
Baddele says Mark Faire of Winchester was prosecuting a bill of
debt for 18s. against Edmund and John More before William
Brampton, mayor of the staple of Westminster, and Thomas Alby
and William Askham, constables of the said staple, and on that
day the Mayor and the constables issued a writ of capias against
Edmund and John to answer Mark and be before the Mayor and the
constables at the next court. This writ was delivered to Baddele
as sergeant of the staple, and by virtue of it he took and
imprisoned Edmund in the staple. Maud and the others say they
aided Baddele by virtue of the said writ.
Edmund does not acknowledge Baddele to be sergeant of the staple
or Mark a merchant of the staple or that he was taken in the
staple. He is minister of the King's Court of his Bench and is
crier under Thomas Thorne, the chief crier, his master. Every
servant of the court is under special protection while doing his
duty or on his way to do it. On the day in question, he was at
Westminster carrying his master's staff of office before Hugh
Huls, one of the King's justices, and William took him in the
presence of the said justice and imprisoned him.
The case is adjourned for consideration from Hilary to Easter."