Chapter 6 Medieval British Society, 1066–1485 - Lyceum Books

124 Part II Norman Britain
granted by royal charter. Itinerant traders brought luxury goods and other unusual
items, often imported, to these fairs, which were held only once or twice a year, and
families might travel some distance to purchase commodities that were not ordinarily
available. Sometimes fairs were held some distance outside towns because
of the possibility of disturbances at them. At Cambridge, for example, the famous
Stourbridge Fair took place at Barnwell, a village several miles away from the town
center. Special courts, called courts of pie powder (the phrase is derived from the
French pieds poudrés or “dusty feet”), were sometimes held to deal speedily, on the
spot, with disputes that arose at these fairs.
Foreign goods were sold at fairs, as well as at settled locations in the larger cities
like London and York. Luxurious textiles, including silks, velvets, and cloth of gold,
were the most valuable imports, but French wines did not lag far behind. (Water was
not thought to be a healthful drink in the Middle Ages; the poor drank beer or ale
and the rich drank wine.) Furs from the Baltic were prized, as were metalwork from
Germany and the spices, rare fruits, sugar, and rice that came from more distant
lands, often aboard Italian galleys. The British exported wool, grain, fi sh, and dairy
products to help pay for these imports.
The Wool Trade
Throughout the Middle Ages England’s most important export was wool. Even
poor peasants might own a few sheep, but most wool came from the substantial
estates held by the gentry and aristocracy. Church lands, especially those owned by
monasteries, also provided pasture for large fl ocks. St. Peter’s abbey in Gloucester,
for instance, owned more than 10,000 sheep in 1300, while the total number in England
is thought to have been between fi fteen and eighteen million. By the end of the
thirteenth century, England was exporting more than thirty thousand sacks of wool a
year—nearly 6,000 tons. Wool produced in England was made up into fi nished cloth
on the Continent, primarily in Flanders, and large quantities of cloth were imported
by the residents of the British Isles. Luxury fabrics, of higher quality than those produced
in England, were especially popular with members of the aristocracy.
The wool trade was handled largely by foreign merchants. Italians, some of
them papal tax collectors, dominated during the earlier Middle Ages. In later centuries
German traders from the Hanseatic League were also important. They secured
special privileges in England, including the right to have their own guildhall in
London as well as exemption from some customs duties. During the fourteenth
century, English merchants controlled more of the wool trade themselves; they
gained royal charters that allowed them to set up monopolistic centers on the Continent,
called staples, as centers of their activity. The staple at Calais was especially
important. Trading here was regulated by a small group of Englishmen known as
merchants of the staple.
The wool trade declined during the second half of the fourteenth century, in
part because of a great increase in the quantity of cloth being made within England.
Indeed, England began to export fi nished cloth as well as raw wool. Trade with the