INTRODUCTION OF FLEMISH WEAVERS. 



37 



the twelfth year of his reign, to wrest the crown of 

 France from the house of Valois, procured a grant of 

 half the wool in England, amounting to 20,000 packs, 

 which, taking it as valued by some authors at ^40 a 

 pack, must have realized the sum of ^800,000. 



(42.) Weavers brought from Flanders. — Commerce 

 and industry were at a very low ebb during the time 

 of Edward III., the principal export being wool, 

 which only brought into the kingdom about £450,000. 

 •Edward promoted the woollen manufacture by bring- 

 ing, in 1331, John Kemp, with seventy Walloon fami- 

 lies, weavers, from Flanders, and, owing to the want of 

 native skill in this department, gave every encourage- 

 ment to foreign weavers. (11 Eaward III. cap. 5.)* 

 A further encouragement was given to the home manu- 

 facture, by the enactment of a law (11 Edward III, 

 cap. 2) which prohibited every one from wearing any 

 cloth not of English fabric. Parliament, however, in 

 an evil hour, thwarted these benefits, by prohibiting 

 the exportation of woollen goods, certainly an injurioas 

 step, so long as wool was allowed to be shipped from 

 our ports. 



On the introduction of the Flemish weavers, Kendal 

 became the metropolis of this branch of industry, and 

 was soon equalled in the extent of its manufactories by 

 many other towns, as Norwich, Sudbury, Colchester, 

 and York ; while woollens were spun and wove, though 

 to a less extent, in Devonshire, Worcestershire, Glou- 

 cestershire, Hampshire, Berkshire Sussex, and Wales. 



* Macpherson, in bis Annals of Commerce, agrees with Bloomfield 

 ♦he historiaii of Norfolk, that a colony of Flemish weavers settled so 

 eAiJy as 1327, at Worsted, a village in that county, and bestowed upon 

 li i^e name it bears. 



