Early Trading Conditions 21 



pleasure fairs, with gingerbread stalls, shows and roundabouts 

 for their chief attractions mere reminiscences of old in- 

 stitutions which, in bygone days, were of supreme commercial 

 importance. 



They were, also, greatly influenced by religious festivals, 

 whether in ancient Greece or in Europe. In Britain itself the 

 commemoration of saints' days by the monasteries, the 

 dedication festivals of churches or cathedrals, and the visita- 

 tion of shrines by pilgrims brought together crowds of people 

 whose assembling offered good opportunities for the opening 

 up with them of a trade in commodities which they, in turn, 

 might otherwise have some difficulty in procuring. It was, 

 indeed, to the advantage of the Church to offer or to encourage 

 the offering of such facilities, not only because there would 

 thus be a greater inducement to people to come to the festivals 

 or to visit the shrines, but also because when the fair was held 

 on land belonging to the Church or connected with religious 

 buildings there might be a substantial revenue gained from 

 the tolls and charges paid by the traders. At one time the 

 fairs were even held in churchyards ; but this practice was 

 prohibited in the I3th year of Edward I., and thenceforward 

 they were held on open spaces, where stalls and tents could 

 be erected for the accommodation of the goods on sale and of 

 the persons who had brought them, various amusements being 

 added, or encouraged, by way of affording further attractions. 

 The land occupied might be that of the lord of the manor, 

 but the fairs still continued to be held chiefly on Saints' days 

 or on the occasion of Church festivals, the actual dates being 

 generally so fixed as to allow of the foreign or other traders 

 attending them to arrange a circuit. The time of year pre- 

 ferred for the holding of fairs was either the autumn, when 

 people whose wants were not wholly met by pedlar or chapman 

 would be providing against the stoppage of all traffic along 

 the roads during the winter ; or the spring, when they would 

 want to replenish their depleted stocks. The localities mostly 

 favoured were towns either on navigable rivers, giving access 

 to a good stretch of country, or at the entrance to valleys 

 whose inhabitants would be especially isolated during the 

 winter months by their impassable roads and mountain tracks. 



In course of time the fairs became, as shown by Giles Jacob, 

 in his " Law Dictionary " (4th edition, 1809), " a matter of 



