INDUSTRIES 



certain quarters of malt for the Queen of Scots ' 

 use, 2os. ' 24 



At the opening of the I Jth century, Notting- 

 ham maltsters found themselves greatly hindered 

 in their trade by the setting up of numerous malt 

 querns in the town, this ' hindrance ' drawing 

 forth a petition to the mayor from certain malt- 

 millers who were tenants to the town for ' your 

 malt mills of a dear reckoning.' One Master 

 Kyme, M. Collenson, James Skott, and Dawson, 

 who where strangers, and no burgesses, had taken 

 the malt mill under the castle, which had been 

 made for the use of the castle only, to the great de- 

 triment of the trade. 88 The traffic in barley was 

 strictly regulated in the interests of the malt trade. 

 Orders were given, 3 June 1608, that all maltsters 

 in Nottingham should forbear buying of 

 barley to malt either by themselves or their 

 servants, and that every maltster should bring into 

 the market a strike or two of malt to furnish the 

 market withal. 26 



The conduct of certain refractory ale-wives 

 drew forth a request to the mayor in 1614 that 

 ' some order should be taken with them all,' ' for 

 we think that never an ale wife doth as her hus- 

 band is bound to do.' 27 In 1619 the number 

 of alehouses in Nottingham provoked a pro- 

 test from several persons whose names have not 

 been recorded. Strangers in the town, it was 

 declared, ' when all trades fail, turn tipplers which 

 will in the end come to something.' 28 John 

 Foster was presented in this year for 'selling 

 his ale continually in sermon-time,' and fined 



3'- 4^- 29 . 



' Foreigners,' that is, persons not free of the 



town, were forbidden to malt without licence. 

 In 1620 William West, an offender against this 

 regulation, on being presented at the sessions, 

 was ' content of his own good will and free offer ' 

 to give ^d. a week to the maintenance of the 

 House of Correction, to be paid to the over- 

 seers, while he continued not a burgess. 30 On 

 15 January 1624, Nicholas Draper was presented 

 for brewing in a little house without windows to 

 the great danger of his neighbours, and fined 

 3*. 4(f. 31 Risks of a conflagration were at all 

 times strictly guarded against in connexion with 

 this industry. Every maltster in Newark was 



" Rec. Bon. Notf. iv, 199. 



15 Ibid. 265. " Ibid. 289. " Ibid. 325. 



18 Ibid. 361. Francis Corve was presented by the 

 Mickletorn jury II July 1614 for brewing, being a 

 stranger, i.e. not a burgess. Ibid. 325. 



19 Ibid. 365. 



30 Stevenson, op. cit. iv, 364. In 1685-6 William 

 Parnham, Thomas Whitlock, and George Beeston, 

 ' foreign maltsters,' were admitted freemen of the 

 corporation on payment of 10 ; ibid, v, 330. In 

 this year also George Linney, maltster, was presented 

 for forestalling the market by buying two cartloads of 

 barley ; ibid. 332. 



" Ibid. 377. 



ordered at the time of drying his malt on the 

 kiln to have two tubs of water standing by the 

 kiln continually. The drying of flax or hemp over 

 the mouth of an oven or kiln was also strictly 

 forbidden, on pain of imprisonment. 33 Richard 

 Browne was presented in 1625 for not keeping 

 the malt mill in repair, ' being the town-mill.' 33 

 A fine of 10s. was inflicted on Humphrey Ays- 

 cough, who broke the assize of ale and beer in 

 this year by selling less than a whole quart of 

 best ale or beer for i^/. 34 Thomas Hollings, the 

 maltster, was paid 22 14.5. 8d. for n qrs. 

 of malt delivered to the king's buttery, after the 

 rate of 4 1 OJ. 4^. by the new measure, where- 

 with he is satisfied. 36 On 20 May 1648 it was 

 suggested that all ale-house keepers who were 

 not yet burgesses should be made so. 38 



In 1695 the bailiffs, aldermen, burgesses, &c., 

 of East Retford, presented a petition to Parliament 

 against the Bill then depending in the House for 

 making the Derwent navigable. The intended 

 scheme would, it was asserted, cause starvation 

 to many families, and destroy the market for 

 malt ; the petitioners, it was pointed out, sub- 

 sisted by sending malt into the neighbouring 

 counties and bringing back in return lead from 

 Derbyshire. 37 



The 'good ale of Nottingham ' did not escape 

 the notice of that observant traveller and piquant 

 diarist, Celia Fiennes, 38 at this date, when it 

 still claimed to be 'the best of all liquors.' 'At 

 Newark,' she says, ' I met with the strongest 

 and best Nottingham ale that looked very pale 

 but exceeding clear.' 



An interesting landmark of the brewing trade 

 of Nottingham was Brewhouse Yard, a separate 

 constablewick, deriving its name from being for 

 a long period the site of the making-offices and 

 brewhouse of the castle. 39 The kiln used here 

 for malting was lost, says Blackner, by 1815, in 



31 Brown, Hist. Newark, ii, 31. 



33 Stevenson, op. cit. v, 1 06. 



"Ibid. 105. ' 3S Ibid. 192. 36 Ibid. 255. 



37 Com. Journ. xi, 434. Maltsters, says Mr. Hol- 

 land, in his Hist, of Worktop, 88, were also lead 

 carriers until the opening of the canals. Blocks of 

 the metal, he tells us, used to be laid along the road- 

 side from Sand Hill to Steetley Bar. 



38 Fiennes, Through Engl. on a Side-saddle, 55, 56. 



39 Stukeley, Gent. Mag. xxii, 38. Various causes have 

 been assigned for the ' softness and pleasant taste ' 

 (I ter Curios. 53) which more than one topographer has 

 remarked as characteristic of the ale of the county. 

 In Blackner's opinion, 'Nottingham ale owes its 

 superior flavour to the coal of the country ' (Hist. 

 Nott. 202) ; in Deering's, ' to the coke or cinder used 

 in drying the malt, which was sold in his time at 

 is. \d. per horse-load' (N ottinghamia, 78) ; the 

 cellars, again, which were hewn out of the rock at 

 Nottingham ' two or three storeys deep, to fourscore 

 steps sometimes ' (Stukeley, op. cit.), were held to 

 exercise a beneficial effect upon the liquor stored 

 therein. 



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