62O ON THE PRICE OF FOREIGN PRODUCE. 



low rates, as at Forneset in 1294, and at Tikhill in 1312. The 

 price of a pipe at Easthampstede is so low that I have felt 

 obliged to omit it from the annual average. 



Wine is treated as an article of foreign produce ; but on two 

 occasions in the very early part of the period wine said to be 

 of home growth is sold at Ditchingham in Norfolk. Both 

 these are cheap wheat years, and therefore it is probable that 

 the summer was fine and hot. 



Wines bought by the tun were generally purchased for the 

 consumption of great people. The earlier entries refer to the 

 stocks laid in by Isabella de Fortibus and Roger Bigod. Some 

 in the years 1313, 13145 1316 are purchases for certain Welsh 

 castles, part of the estate of the Earls Clare. But in 1308 the 

 Elham bailiff purchases a tun for his lords, the warden and 

 fellows of Merton ; and the provost of GOD'S House in South- 

 ampton buys a pipe in 1325 for the use of the brethren and 

 sisters of that ancient charity. 



But most of the purchases which are recorded in the table 

 (vol. ii. pp. 548-551) are ostensibly made for ecclesiastical 

 purposes. All the wine, for instance, which is entered in 

 the annual roll of New College, sometimes a considerable 

 quantity, is set down among the charges of the chapel. But it 

 is not likely that the whole was used in the celebration 

 of mass. It is more reasonable to conclude, as it was always 

 needed for the services of the Church, that it became 

 customary to reckon the annual purchases under this head 

 of chapel charges, and to use some portion on such gaudies 

 or festivals as were specially distinguished by the grant of 

 doles of wine among the members of the collegiate or monastic 

 foundation. However numerous were the masses said in New 

 College Chapel during the earlier days of its foundation, it 

 could hardly have been the case that more than a gallon every 

 week was required for these offices. 



But though wine, whether bought by the tun or by the 

 gallon, is so remarkably cheap in the earlier part of the period 

 before us, it is occasionally quoted at dear rates. Thus, for 



