SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



1327 were included alum (used for dyeing), wool at \d. per wey, woad \d, per 

 assize, cloth id. per bound trussel and \d. per whole drap, teazles at id. per 

 ijOOO. 1 St. Kenelm's Fair (July 28) was the great occasion for the purchase 

 of cloth and other articles at Winchcombe. In 1254 the abbot of Abingdon 

 provided himself with cloth there,* and weavers and fullers are mentioned.* 

 Winchcombe merchants, however, probably dealt more in the raw article. 

 In 1276 they got into trouble by exporting wool, which a protective law of 

 1258 forbade, and some of them bribed the bailiff of the town to the extent 

 of is. a sack, to wink at the rule.* 



But wool-stapling had not yet reached its height. It was Edward IV's 

 protection that did most to develop the English cloth trade, and so to 

 provide a lucrative home market, and it is in the fifteenth century 

 accordingly that men began to c discover ' the Cotswolds, to whose pastures, 

 as Drayton wrote two centuries later, even 



Sarum's vale gives place ; tho' famous for her flocks, 

 Yet hardly doth she tythe our Cotswold's wealthy locks. ' 



Cotswold, that * great king of shepherds,' had, as we have seen, always been 

 famous for its sheep. Domesday Book notes ' the sheep's wool ' at Cirencester 

 as being the queen's due. In the thirteenth century it is said that 6,000 sheep 

 were kept at Beverstone, and that the city of Gloucester owed 30,000 sacks 

 of Cotswold wool every year to the crown.* In the fourteenth century we 

 get a detailed account of sheep-farming in the ministers' accounts of 

 Brimpsfield and Winstone. Here we learn the prices of sheep and fleeces, 

 and the wages of shepherds and shearers, together with the cost of all their 

 manifold requisites. Some 400 sheep seem to have been kept a number 

 betokening that the growth of wool was made a regular matter of business, 

 for on most manors sheep were only kept in small numbers on the waste 

 or the stubble. Here they were carefully enclosed in a fold, the steward 

 paying 2s. for twenty-four hurdles made of the lord's wood. Sheep were 

 shorn at five a penny, the men receiving free food and drink while at work. 

 One permanent shearer was engaged, besides the shepherd, whose joint 

 wages amounted to i8j. per annum. At lambing time the shepherd was 

 allowed a boy to help him (at a wage of i s. 6d.} and received a pound of candles 

 (worth zd.}. The loss of lambs seems, however, to have been considerable. 

 Out of a hundred and twenty, thirty-one died one year before weaning, and 

 only seventy-seven finally survived. Once too we get a glimpse of the 

 darkest of all the evils that beset the shepherd's charge. 'Twelve sheep, 

 injured by night by dogs unknown, sold for i is. id? As a matter of fact, 

 such a sale involved no very great pecuniary loss, as is. %d. was quite an 

 ordinary price for a sheep. Fleeces were sold at 6}</. each, lambskins at j\d. 

 Fresh wool fetched 9 1 3*. ^d. the sack ; refuse or broken wool about 

 3</. per Ib. ' Red stuff for marking the sheep ' cost 8</. ; lard was bought 

 at \od. per gallon for mixing with tar to grease the sheep. 7 



1 From the high price of teazles, which are used in the finishing process of cloth-making, they were 

 probably still imported from abroad at this date. Later in the reign Gloucestershire is said to have led the 

 way in the cultivation of teazles, and was long famous for the fineness of its growth. See Anne Pratt's Flowering 

 Planti, Gratia, and Ferns of Gl. Britain, ii, 1 19. ' Chron. Monait. dt JbingJont, ii, 300-16. 



* LanJboc. Introd. pp. zzvii-zzz, 43, 195. ' Hund. R. i, 74, 167, 174, 178. 



* Polyolbion, \ 889 reprint, p. 232. ' Prize Essay on ' Cotswold Sheep ' in The CotmoU Flock Book, vol. i. 

 ' Mins. Accts. Ric. II. belle. 850, No. ^^. 



155 



