448 APPENDIX III. CORN LAWS 



C. THE ASSIZE OF BREAD. 1 



The Assize of Bread, like the Assize of Ale, formed part of the system by 

 which, in the interests of consumers, prices of food and drink were regulated. 

 The Assize is defined in one of the most famous of mediaeval statutes the 

 Assisa Panis et Cervisias. But though the name is familiar, the date of the 

 statute is uncertain. Probably passed towards the end of the reign of 

 Henry III. (1266 ?), that part of it which referred to bread, though revised 

 and altered by subsequent legislation, remained in force for London till 1815, 

 and for the rest of the country till 1836. 



It was the duty of Justices of the Peace to " set the Assize," in other words, 

 to adjust the weight, quality, and price of bread to the current prices of 

 wheat, with the addition of an allowance for the labour and skill of the baker. 

 The method, by which this adjustment was effected, was extremely com- 

 plicated. It started with the legal liability of the baker to make 418 Ibs. of 

 bread out of every quarter of wheat. The first step was to ascertain the 

 average price fetched by a quarter of wheat in the public markets of the 

 neighbourhood. The next step was to add to this price the discretionary 

 allowances for the expenses and skill of the baker. These two sums, added 

 together, represented the total sum for which the 418 Ibs. were to be sold. 

 The last step was to calculate the exact weight of bread which each penny 

 would buy, in order that the whole 418 Ibs. might realise the ascertained sum. 

 The table, thus calculated, was called the Assize of Bread : in it were given 

 the weights of the loaves which were to be sold at the customary prices. 

 The Assize was periodically proclaimed, and to sell bread above the price or 

 below the weight set out in the current table was a penal offence. 



The amount of bread to be made from each quarter of wheat remained 

 unaltered down to 1710 (8 Anne, c. 11), when it was reduced, it is said acci- 

 dentally, from 418 Ibs. to 417 Ibs. The allowance of the baker on each 

 quarter of wheat varied more widely. In 1497 it was 2s. But the Church 

 Rate, Education, Sanitary, Police, and Poor Rates, had not then to be taken 

 into consideration. In 1620 these payments entered into the calculation. 

 In that year the white bakers of London petitioned that the allowance should 

 be raised from 6s. to 8s., owing to their necessary expenses for food and 

 clothing, and " the teaching at school " of their children, their " duties to 

 the parson, the scavengers, for the poor, for watching and warding," etc. 

 The items of the allowances at the earlier period are sometimes quaint, e.g. : * 

 " Furnace and wood, - ... 6d. 



The Miller, ... 4d. 



Two journeymen and two apprentices, .... 5d. 



Salt, yeast, candle, and sackbands, ----- 2d. 



Himself, his house, his wife, his dog and his cat, 7d. 



In all - 2s. Od." 



The average price of a quarter of wheat from 1453 to 1497 is said to have 

 been, in modern money, 14s. Id. 8 Taking this figure as an illustration, the 

 method of " setting the Assize " may be thus exemplified. The addition of 

 the discretionary allowance of 2s. to the price (14s. Id.) of the quarter of 

 wheat gives as the total 16s. Id. The justices had to calculate the weight 

 of each penny loaf, so that the whole 418 Ibs. of bread might be sold to realise 



a The Assize of Bread is fully treated in G. Atwood's Review of the Statutes and 

 Ordinances of Assize, 1202-1797 (1801), and in an article by Sidney and Beatrice Webb 

 in The Economic Journal for June, 1904, pp. 196-218. 



8 Quoted by Sidney and Beatrice Webb in "The Assize of Bread "(Economic Journal, 

 June, 1904, p. 197). 



Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, M'Culloch's edition (1850), p. 117. 



