A HISTORY OF HERTFORDSHIRE 



some functions of the religious fraternity of St. John the Baptist." The 

 inquiry of 1388 found a few gilds in Hertfordshire. At Barkway the 

 fraternity of the Blessed Mary had existed before 1303. As its brethren 

 and sisters agreed to pay ^d. a week for masses in honour of the Virgin, to 

 find lights for her image and to attend one another's funerals, it seems to 

 have been religious in purpose. At Hertford there was a fraternity of 

 St. John the Baptist founded about 1375 by twelve pious men, of whom 

 seven were still alive in 1388. They kept tapers burning before the image 

 of St. John on feast days, but otherwise had no duties or funds. The gild 

 of Holy Trinity at Codicote had an alderman and ' bedell,' so that it may 

 have been fairly large ; but we know no more of its objects. At Waltham 

 Holy Cross the ' two masters of the little company ordained to the honour 

 of God and Our Lady ' declared their purpose to be the maintenance of 

 tapers at holy seasons and the sustentation of a chaplain in the Lady Chapel. 



The wool trade of Hertfordshire was small. Before the year 1396 and 

 the first quarter of 1397 the king's ulnager only accounted for 139^ cloths." 

 In 1398, among the sixteen men of Royston who had thirty-eight cloths, 

 there were three drapers, perhaps the merchants' middlemen." The wool 

 trade must have gone through phases like those of the corn trade — the 

 struggle of merchants for free buying. In the i6th century the justices had 

 to restrain the broggers and engrossers of wool, like the badgers and 

 engrossers of grain.^* But the cloth merchants can never have been a very 

 strong body. In the 15th century, or early in the i6th, the drapers, 

 mercers and haberdashers of St. Albans seem to have formed a company or 

 gild. But we know nothing of this body until after its amalgamation with 

 others, possibly before 1556." It became one of the four companies of the 

 17th century and of the two companies surviving after 1664. 



There is much evidence as to the corn and malt trade, which was 

 probably the most important in the county. Formerly corn and malt had 

 been carried on pack-horses along the great roads of eastern and western 

 Hertfordshire and by the Lea and other rivers. The trade increased all 

 through the i6th century, because of the increasing demand in London. 

 It was extremely difficult to keep the capital supplied, and when this 

 was done the home counties were sometimes starved and provincial prices 

 always raised. The problem of a remedy puzzled the Privy Council. 

 The corn trade had been in the hands of travelling country dealers called 

 ' badgers,' who bought in the country markets and sold to the London 

 brewers and bakers. About the middle of the i6th century some of the 

 badgers had created a very strong position. They had the London brewers 

 m their pockets ; to some they had lent ^^1,400 or £i,Soo worth of grain, 

 so that the debtor dared deal with no one but the creditor. They had also 

 laid hands on the transport ; some had a hundred hired horses carrying to 

 London along the Great North Road daily.^" As they thus controlled 

 supplies both in London and the country, they controlled prices." They 

 bought quantities of corn in advance of delivery, so that the country markets 

 were very small and the supply for London very limited. If they kept 



Is ^n^,-"c- n'T "''''• '" ^'''^- ^"*=- '"^'^- 342, no. 1 1. " Ibid. no. . 2. 



Ca/. S P. Dom 1547-80, p. 555. 79 A. E. Gibbs, Hist. Rec. of St. Jlbans, 14, 17. 



^ Lansdowne MS. 32, fol. 104. 81 jjjjj fg] ,q., 



208 



