SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



managed gild, made a fatal mistake in i6io. As a proof of the growing tendency to seek redress 

 at the hands of the Government, it is of sufficient importance to warrant quotation in full. 1 he 

 bakers had evidently tried and failed to override the authority of the mayor and aldermen by an 

 appeal to the powers in London. 



Petition of Bakers. 



That whereas your humble petitioners The Companye of Bakers of the Cittie of Yorke have 

 since Lammas Last bene so delt withall and are as yet sore impoverished vi^ith severall prices imposed 

 upon us by this honourable court so that for want of a conscionable expositor we were forced to goo 

 to the Cittie of London to showe our griefs if it were possible to Mr. Sergiant Hutton our Recorder 

 or else Mr. Christopher Brooke his deputie or Mr. Alderman Askwith then Burgesses for our cittie of 

 whom we receyved large promises but founde no performancs but called knaves for complaynlnge to 

 the burgesses of my lord mayor (and therefore fare worse for it) although if my lord maior of 

 ignorance as he sometyme pretended and Mr. Halley of purpose as it nowe appeareth (by adding 

 affliction to affliction) have quite fallen awaie both from the equitie of that ancient statute for breade 

 and also from the manier of distributing the saide statute for ther white lofe. And ther ancient 

 custome of the boulted lofe used almost for fortie yeares but upon better consideraton as we supposed 

 at our return we were called to this honorable court wher we were willed to shew our greves 

 which we did that is to sale we entreated to be eased of the byelawe of xviiii/ 



secondlie to be assissed by the printed assisse book 



thirdlie to have the inn holders article amended or annihilated 



fourthlie to have our book of ordinary executed 



fiftlie to have the boulted loafe assessed after the wheaten loafe. 



But the petition met with scant consideration at the hands of the mayor and his brethren, 

 who, considering that Thomas Wilson, who drew up the petition, used words not fitting to be 

 inserted in a petition, ' whereby it appereth plainlie that he scorned this court,' was called upon to 

 answer for his contumelious conduct at the next session.™ 



But the bakers' company continued to hold its own in York for more than two centuries 

 after this episode. In 1779, when an attempt was made in Parliament to abolish apprenticeship, the 

 York bakers were the most active and virulent of its opponents ; the effort was unsuccessful, though 

 interesting expressions of opinions on the subject were copied into the bakers' ordinary at the time. 

 One of these shows clearly that the Apprenticeship Act was not really operative in many places. 

 The correspondent writes : — ' Almost in every town in England where trade flourishes greatly, 

 they never ask whether a man has served his apprenticeship or where his settlement is, by which 

 means you see Leeds, Manchester, Halifax, Birmingham, &c., &c., rise on the ruins of these places.' '^ 



How far women could avail themselves of the gild privileges is not clear ; widows certainly 

 had a right to exercise their husbands' crafts, but whether this policy was dictated by a sense of fair 

 play or a desire to lessen the possibility that the widow and children should become ' chargeable to 

 the city,' the chief bugbear of the local economist, it is impossible to say. The city court passed a 

 comprehensive by-law dealing with the subject in 1529 : — 



Moreover it is fully agreed by the said presense yt if any fraunchest mens wyffs after the dethe of 

 theyr husbands be dispossyd to lylF soole withoute any other husband that then it shalbe lawfuU unto all 

 suche to occupy theyr husbands crafts occupatOns and misterys and for (wV) tayke bothe jornay men and 

 apprentices into theyre servyce, such tyme as other of the same crafts and occupatons usyth to tayke and 

 all suche apprentices to have lyke fredom as other mens apprentics of like occupatons hayth. Any act 

 ordynaunce or agrement hertofore made to the contrary in anything notwithstanding." 



But the gild of surgeons undoubtedly admitted both sexes ; one of their ordinances especially 

 stipulates that 



No man or woman within this cittye practisinge chirurgery or drawyng fourthe of tethe or any 

 other thinge belonging to the said arte unlesse they be under the governance of a Master and proved 

 able to occupy the sayd arte." 



But evidently the surgeons resented the incursion of women, for the council had to interfere to 

 protect Isabel Warwick, 



forasmuch as it apereth that Isabell Warwike hath skill in the scyence of surgery and hath done 

 good therein. It js therefore agreed by these presens that she uppon her good behaviour shall use the 

 same science within this cittie without lett of any of the surgeans of the same." 



II v'\ m''"-' ^i '^^' f? ?''; '^'?; " ^- ^- ^^^- MS- 3+605, foi. 25. 



" York Munic. Rec. xi, fol. 67 d, 20 Oct. 1529. ^ 



" Ordinances of Barbers and Chirurgions, No. 8, 1592. The writer is indebted to Dr. Auden for this 

 rcicp c uc c ■ 



" York Munic. Rec. xxv, fol. iS2a, June 1572. 



453 



