field of manufacture. A mediæval city made everything that it
wanted--wine, spices, silks, velvets, precious stones, and a few other
things excepted, which were brought to the port from abroad; but the
City could get on very well without those things. Within the walls they
made everything. It is not until one reads the long lists of trades
collected together by Riley that one understands how many things were
wanted, and how trades were subdivided. Clothing in its various branches
gave work to the wympler, who made wimples or neckerchiefs for women;
the retunder, or shearman of cloth; the batour, or worker of cloth; the
caplet-monger; the callere, who made cauls or coifs for the head; the
quilter; the pinner; the chaloner, who made chalons or coverlets; the
bureller, who worked in burel, a coarse cloth; the tailor; the linen
armorer; the chaucer, or shoemaker; the plumer, or feather-worker; the
pelliper, pellercer, or furrier; the white tawyer, who made white
leather; and many others. Arms and armor wanted the bowyer; the kissere,
who made armor for the thighs; the bokelsmyth, who make bucklers; the
bracere, who made armor for arms; the gorgiarius, who made gorgets; the
taborer, who made drums; the heaulmere, who made helmets; the makers of
haketons, pikes, swords, spears, and bolts for crossbows. Trades were
thus already divided; we see one man making one thing and nothing else
all his life. The equyler made porringers, the brochere made spits, the
haltier made halters, the corder made ropes, the sacker made sacks, the
melmallere made hammers, and so on.
The old City grows gradually clearer to the vision when we think of all
these trades carried on within the walls. There were mills to grind the
corn; breweries for making the beer--one remains in the City still; the
linen was spun within the walls, and the cloth made and dressed; the
brass pots, tin pots, iron utensils, and wooden platters and basins
were all made in the City; the armor, with its various pieces, was
hammered out and fashioned in the streets; all kinds of clothes, from
the leathern jerkin of the poorest to the embroidered robes of a
princess, were made here; nothing that was wanted for household use in
the country but was made in London town. Some of those trades were
offensive to their neighbors. Under Edward I., for instance, the melters
of tallow and lard were made to leave Chepe, and to find a more
convenient place at a distance from that fashionable street. The names
of Stinking Lane, Scalding Lane, and Sheer Hog sufficiently indicate the
pleasing effect of the things done in them upon the neighbors. The
modern City of London--the City proper--is a place where they make
nothing, but sell everything. It is now quite a quiet city; the old
rumbling of broad-wheeled wagons over a stone-laid roadway has given way
to the roll of the narrow wheel over the smooth asphalt; the craftsmen
have left the City. But in the days of Whittington there was no noisier
city in the whole world; the roar and the racket of it could be heard
afar off--even at the rising of the Surrey Hills or the slope of
Highgate, or the top of Parliament Hill. Every man in the City was at
work except the lazy men-at-arms of my lord's following in the great
house that was like a barrack. They lay about waiting for the order to
mount and ride off to the border, or the Welsh march, or to fight the
French. But roundabout these barracks the busy craftsmen worked all day
long. From every lane rang out without ceasing the tuneful note of the
hammer and the anvil; the carpenters, not without noise, drove in their
nails, and the coopers hooped their casks; the blacksmith's fire
roared; the harsh grating of the founders set the teeth on edge of those
who passed that way; along the river-bank, from the Tower to Paul's
stairs, those who loaded and those who unloaded, those who carried the
bales to the warehouses, those who hoisted them up, the ships which came
to port and the ships which sailed away, did all with fierce talking,
shouting, quarrelling, and racket. Such work must needs be carried on
with noise. The pack-horses plodded along the streets, coming into the
City and going out. Wagons with broad wheels rumbled and groaned along;
the prentices bawled from the shops; the fighting-men marched along to
sound of trumpet; the church bells and the monastery bells rang out all
day long, and all night too. And at the doors of the houses or the open
windows, where there was no glass, but a hanging shutter, sat or stood
the women, preparing the food, washing, mending, sewing, or spinning,
their children playing in the street before them. There are many towns
of France, especially Southern France, which recall the mediæval city.
Here the women live and do their work in the door-ways; the men work at
the open windows; and all day there is wafted along the streets and up
to the skies the fragrance of soup and onions, roasted meats and baked
confections, with the smell of every trade which the people carry on.
Everything was made within the walls of the City. When one thinks upon
the melting of tallow, the boiling of soap, the crushing of bones, the
extracting of glue, the treatment of feathers and cloth and leather, the
making and grinding of knives and all other sharp weapons, the crowding
of the slaughter-houses, the decaying of fruit and vegetables, the
roasting of meat at cooks' shops, the baking of bread, the brewing of
beer, the making of vinegar, and all the thousand and one things which
go to make up the life of a town, the most offensive of which are now
carried on without the town; when one considers, further, the gutter,
which played so great a part in every mediæval city; the gutter stream,
which was almost Sabbatical, because it ceased to run when people ceased
to work; the brook of the middle of the street, flowing with suds, the
water used for domestic and for trade purposes, and with everything that
would float or flow; when, again, one thinks of the rags and bones, the
broken bits and remnants and fragments, the cabbage-stalks and pea-pods
and onion-peelings which were thrown into the street, though against the
law, and of the lay stalls, where filth and refuse of every kind were
thrown to wait the coming of carts, even more uncertain than those of a
modern vestry--when, I say, one thinks of all these things, and of the
small boundaries of the City, and its crowded people, and of its narrow
streets, one understands how there hung over the City day and night,
never quite blown away even by the most terrible storm that ever wept
o'er pale Britannia, a richly confected cloud of thick and heavy smell
which the people had to breathe.
They liked it; without it, the true Londoner languished. The mediæval
smell, the smell of great towns, has left London, but in old towns of
the Continent, as in the old streets of Brussels, it meets and greets us
to the present day. Breathing this air with difficulty, and perhaps with
nausea, you may say, "Such and such was the air in which the citizens
of London delighted when Edward III. was King."
The craftsman in those days had to do good work, or he would hear of it.
He had to obey his company, or he would hear of it; and he had to take,
with outward show of contentment, the wages that were assigned to him,
or he would hear of it. He might be imprisoned, or put in pillory. We
shall see a few cases of his punishment presently. As a final punishment
he might be thrust outside the gates of the City, and told to go away
and to return no more.
Then, one fears, there would be nothing left for the craftsman but to
turn _ribaud_, if he was clever enough to learn the arts of
_ribauderie_; or to sink into the lowest depth and become a _villein_,
bound to the soil.
If it was a city of hard work, it was also a city of play in plenty.
London citizens, old and young, have always delighted beyond measure in
games, shows, sports, and amusements of every kind. There were many
holidays, and Sunday was not a day of gloom.
The calendar of sport begins with the first day of the year, and ends
with the last day.
The year began with New-year's gifts:
These giftes the husband gives his wife and father eke the child,
And master on his men bestows the like with favour milde,
And good beginning of the year they wish and wish again,
According to the ancient guise of heathen people vaine.
These eight days no man doth require his debtes of any man;
Their tables do they furnish forth with all the meat they can.
There were skating and sliding upon the ice in Moorfields, where the
shallow ponds froze easily; or they played at quarter-staff, at
hocking, at single-stick, at foot-ball, and at bucklers. In the evening
they played at cards and "tables" and dice.
Now men and maids do merry make
At stool-ball and at barley-break
On Shrove Tuesday they had cock-fighting, a sport continued with
unabated popularity until within the memory of man--nay, it is rumored
that he who knows where to look for it may still enjoy that humanizing
spectacle. Every Friday in Lent the young men went forth to Smithfield
and held mock fights, but the custom was in time discontinued; at Easter
they had boat tournaments. At this holy season also they had boar
fights, and the baiting of bulls and bears. They had stage plays--the
parish clerk in Chaucer "played Herod on a scaffold high." In the year
1391 the parish clerks had a play at Skinners Well, Smithfield, which
lasted for three days. In 1409 they represented the creation of the
world, and it lasted eight days.
Then there were the pageants, shows, and ridings in the city. Here are
two, out of several described by Stow.
Of triumphant shows made by the citizens of London, ye may read, in
the year 1236, the 20th of Henry III., Andrew Bockwell then being
mayor, how Eleanor, daughter to Reymond, Earl of Provence, riding
through the city towards Westminster, there to be crowned Queen of
England, the city was adorned with silks, and in the night with
lamps, cressets, and other lights without number, besides many
pageants and strange devices there presented; the citizens also rode
to meet the king and queen, clothed in long garments embroidered
about with gold, and silks of divers colours, their horses
gallantly trapped to the number of three hundred and sixty, every
man bearing a cup of gold or silver in his hand, and the king's
trumpeters sounding before them. These citizens did minister wine as
bottlers, which is their service, at their coronation. More, in the
year 1293, for victory obtained by Edward I. against the Scots,
every citizen, according to their several trade, made their several
show, but especially the fish-mongers, which in a solemn procession
passed through the city, having, amongst other pageants and shows,
four sturgeons gilt, carried on four horses; then four salmons of
silver on four horses; and after them six-and-forty armed knights
riding on horses, made like luces of the sea; and then one
representing St. Magnus, because it was upon St. Magnus' day, with a
thousand horsemen, &c.
One other show, in the year 1377, was made by the citizens for
disport of the young prince, Richard, son to the Black Prince, in
the feast of Christmas, in this manner: On the Sunday before
Candlemas, in the night, one hundred and thirty citizens, disguised,
and well horsed, in a mummery, with sound of trumpets, sackbuts,
cornets, shalmes, and other minstrels, and innumerable torch-lights
of wax, rode from Newgate, through Cheap, over the bridge, through
Southwark, and so to Kennington beside Lambhith, where the young
prince remained with his mother and the Duke of Lancaster his uncle,
the earls of Cambridge, Hertford, Warwick, and Suffolk, with divers
other lords. In the first rank did ride forty-eight in the likeness
and habit of esquires, two and two together, clothed in red coats
and gowns of say or sandal, with comely visors on their faces; after
them came riding forty-eight knights in the same livery of colour
and stuff; then followed one richly arrayed like an emperor; and
after him some distance, one stately attired like a pope, whom
followed twenty-four cardinals, and after them eight or ten with
black visors, not amiable, as if they had been legates from some
foreign princes. These maskers, after they had entered Kennington,
alighted from their horses, and entered the hall on foot; which
done, the prince, his mother, and the lords, came out of the chamber
into the hall, whom the said mummers did salute, showing by a pair
of dice upon the table their desire to play with the prince, which
they so handled that the prince did always win when he cast them.
Then the mummers set to the prince three jewels, one after another,
which were a bowl of gold, a cup of gold, and a ring of gold, which
the prince won at three casts. Then they set to the prince's mother,
the duke, the earls, and other lords, to every one a ring of gold,
which they did also win. After which they were feasted, and the
music sounded, the prince and the lords danced on the one part with
the mummers, which did also dance; which jollity being ended, they
were again made to drink, and then departed in order as they came.
Whenever an excuse could be found, the Mayor, Sheriffs, and Aldermen
held a solemn riding in all their bravery. Not even in Ghent or Antwerp
were there such splendid ridings and so many of them. "Search all
chronicles," says an old writer, "all histories and records, in what
language or letter soever, let the inquisitive man waste the deere
treasures of his time and eyesight, he shall conclude his life only in
the certainty that there is no subject received into the place of his
government with the like style and magnificence as is the Lord Mayor of
the city of London." We shall see later on what kind of show would be
held in the time of Queen Elizabeth.
As for pageants, they were so splendid that he was unhappy, indeed, who
could not remember one. But there were few so unfortunate. Whenever the
King paid a visit to the City, on his accession, on his marriage, on the
birth of a prince, the City held a pageant. When you read the account of
the pageant when Henry V. and the City returned thanks for the victory
of Agincourt, remember to cover in imagination the houses with scarlet
cloth, to dress the people with such bravery of attire and such colors
as you can imagine, to let music play at every corner, to let the horses
be apparelled as bravely as their riders, to let the bells be pealing
and clashing, to fill up the narrative with the things which the
historian neglects, and then own that in the matter of pageants we are
poor indeed compared with our forefathers five hundred years ago.
On the king's return after the glorious field of Agincourt, the
Mayor of London and the Aldermen, apparelled in orient grained
scarlet, and four hundred commoners clad in beautiful murrey, well
mounted and trimly horsed, with rich collars and great chains, met
the King at Blackheath; and the clergy of London in solemn
procession with rich crosses, sumptuous copes, and massy censers,
received him at St. Thomas of Waterings. The King, like a grave and
sober personage, and as one who remembered from Whom all victories
are sent, seemed little to regard the vain pomp and shows, insomuch
that he would not suffer his helmet to be carried with him, whereby
the blows and dints upon it might have been seen by the people, nor
would he suffer any ditties to be made and sung by minstrels of his
glorious victory, because he would the praise and thanks should be
altogether given to God.
At the entrance of London Bridge, on the top of the tower, stood a
gigantic figure, bearing in his right hand an axe, and in his left
the keys of the city hanging to a staff, as if he had been the
porter. By his side stood a female of scarcely less stature,
intended for his wife. Around them were a band of trumpets and other
wind instruments. The towers were adorned with banners of the royal
arms, and in the front of them was inscribed CIVITAS REGIS JUSTICIE
(the City of the King of Righteousness).
At the drawbridge on each side was erected a lofty column, like a
little tower, built of wood, and covered with linen; one painted
like white marble, and the other like green jasper. They were
surmounted by figures of the King's beasts,--an antelope, having a
shield of the royal arms suspended from his neck, and a sceptre in
his right foot; and a lion, bearing in his right claw the royal
standard unfurled.
At the foot of the bridge next the city was raised a tower, formed
and painted like the columns before mentioned; and, in the middle of
which, under a splendid pavilion, stood a most beautiful image of
St. George, armed, excepting his head, which was adorned with a
laurel crown, studded with jems and precious stones. Behind him was
a crimson tapestry, with his arms (a red cross) glittering on a
multitude of shields. On his right hung his triumphal helmet, and on
his left a shield of his arms of suitable size. In his right hand he
held the hilt of the sword with which he was girt, and in his left a
scroll, which, extending along the turrets, contained these words,
SOLI DEO HONOR ET GLORIA. In a contiguous house were innumerable
boys representing the angelic host, arrayed in white, with
glittering wings, and their hair set with sprigs of laurel; who, on
the King's approach, sang, accompanied by organs, an anthem,
supposed to be that beginning "Our King went forth to Normandy;" and
whose burthen is, "Deo gratias, Anglia, redde pro
victoria,"--printed in Percy's Reliques.
The tower of the Conduit on Cornhill was decked with a tent of
crimson cloth, and ornamented with the King's arms, and those of
Saints George, Edward, and Edmund. Under the pavilion was a company
of hoary prophets, in golden coats and mantles, and their heads
covered with gold and crimson; who, when the King passed, sent forth
a great quantity of sparrows and other small birds, as a sacrifice
agreeable to God, some of which alighted on the King's breast, some
rested on his shoulders, and some fluttered round about him. And the
prophets then sang the psalm, Cantate Domino canticum novum, &c.
The tower of the Conduit at the entrance of Cheap was hung with
green, and ornamented with scutcheons. Here sat twelve venerable old
men, having the names of the twelve Apostles written on their
foreheads, together with the twelve Kings, Martyrs, and Confessors,
of the succession of England, who also gave their chaunt at the
King's approach, and sent forth upon him round leaves of silver
mixed with wafers, and wine out of the pipes of the conduit,
imitating Melchisedeck's reception of Abraham, when he returned from
his victory over the Four Kings.
The Cross of Cheap was not visible, being concealed by a beautiful
castle, constructed of timber, and covered with linen painted to
resemble squared blocks of white marble and green and crimson
jasper. The arms of St. George adorned the summit, those of the King
and the Emperor were raised on halberds, and the lower turrets had
the arms of the royal family and the great peers of the realm. On a
stage in front came forth a chorus of virgins with timbrel and
dance, as to another David coming from the slaughter of Goliath;
their song of congratulation was, "Welcome, Henry the Fifte, King of
Englond and of Fraunce." Throughout the building there was also a
multitude of boys, representing the heavenly host, who showered down
on the King's head small coins resembling gold, and boughs of
laurel, and sang, accompanied by organs, the Te Deum laudamus.
The tower of the Conduit at the west end of Cheap was surrounded
with pavilions, in each of which was a virgin, who from cups in
their hands blew forth golden leaves on the King. The tower was
covered with a canopy made to resemble the sky and clouds, the four
posts of which were supported by angels, and the summit crowned with
an archangel of brilliant gold. Beneath the canopy, on a throne, was
a majestic image representing the sun, which glittered above all
things, and round it were angels singing and playing all kinds of
musical instruments.
This was the last of the pageantry, and, after the King had paid his
devotions at St. Paul's, he departed to his palace at Westminster.
Of ecclesiastical functions and processions I say little. The people
belonging to the Church, as well as the churches themselves, were in
every street and in every function. At funerals there followed the
Brotherhood of Sixty, the singing clerks, and the old priests of the
Papey chanting the psalms for the dead. And see, here is a company of a
hundred and twenty. They are not Londoners, they are Dutchmen; and they
have come across the sea--such are the amenities of mediæval piety--to
flagellate themselves for the sins of this city. Will the English follow
their example and go to flog themselves at Amsterdam? For there are sins
to be expiated even in Holland. They are stripped to the waist; every
man is armed with a whip, and is belaboring the man in front. It is a
moving spectacle. London cannot choose but repent. The tears should be
running down the cheeks of toper, tosspot, and "rorere." Alas! we hear
of no tears. The Dutchmen have to go home again, and may, if they
please, flagellate themselves for their own good, for London is
impenitent.
Then there is the great day of the company--its saint's day--the day of
visible greatness for the trade. On this day is the whole livery
assembled; there must be none absent, great or small: all are met in the
hall, every man in a new gown of the trade color. First to church; the
boys and singing clerks lead the way, chanting as they go. Then march
the Lord Mayor's sergeants, the servants of the company, and the company
itself, with its wardens and the officers. Mass despatched, they return
home in the same order to the hall, where they find a banquet spread for
them, such a banquet as illustrates the wealth and dignity of the trade;
the music is in the gallery, the floor is spread with rushes newly laid,
clean, and warm; the air is fragrant with the burning of that scented
Indian wood called sanders; at the high table sit the master or warden,
the guests--even the King will sometimes dine with a city company--and
the court. Below, at the tables, arranged in long lines, are the freemen
of the company, and not the men alone, but with every man sits his wife,
or, if he be a bachelor, he is permitted to bring a maiden with him if
he chooses. Think not that a city company of the olden time would call
together the men to feast alone while the women stayed at home. Not at
all. The wardens knew very well that there is no such certain guard, and
preservative of honesty and order, which are the first requisites for
the prosperity of trade, as the worship of man for maiden and of maid
for man.
When dinner is over, they will elect the officers for the year, and
doubtless hear a word of admonition on the excellence of the work and
the jealousy with which the standard of good work should be guarded.
Then the loving-cup goes round, and the mummers come in to perform plays
and interludes, dressed up in such fantastic guise as makes the women
scream and the men laugh and applaud.
On the day before Ascension Day there was beating of the bounds, a
custom still observed, but with grievous shrinkage of the ceremonies.
Perhaps the greatest festival of the year was May Day, which fell in the
middle of our month of May. It must be a hard year indeed when the east
winds are not over and done with by the middle of May. Spring was upon
them. Only think what was meant by spring to a people whose winters were
spent, as must have been the case with most of them, in small houses,
dark and cold, huddled round the fire without candles, going to bed
early, rising before daylight, eating no fresh meat, fruit, or
vegetables, waiting impatiently for the time to return when they would
live again in the open, shutters down and doors thrown wide.
All the young people on the eve of May Day went out into the fields to
gather boughs and white-thorn flowers. In Chaucer's "Court of Love,"
"Forth goeth all the court, both most and least, to fetch the flowers
fresh." Later on, Herrick writes:
Come, my Corinna, come, and coming, mark
How each field turns a street, each street a park
Made green and trimmed with trees; see how
Devotion gives each house a bough
Or branch; each porch, each door, on this
An ark, a tabernacle is
Made up of white thorn neatly interwoven.