24 
truth, of the tradition. The King was certainly at York during the 
latter months of the year 1392. About Midsummer in that year, 
the courts of law were removed from "Westminster to York, and 
remained there until after the Christmas following. In June the 
King was at Nottingham, where he held a great council, ^ and 
towards the close of the year he had arrived at his northern 
metropolis, f It is said to have been about this time that the 
royal gifts of a mace and a hat of maintenance were bestowed upon 
the citizens. From the provisions of a charter granted by the same 
monarch, a few years later, it may be inferred that a gilt mace had 
then become a recognised part of the civic regaha. In the year 
1406, one of the Lord Mayor’s officers is denominated servie7is 
majoris ad clavam,’’^ and, from the uniform recurrence of the appoint¬ 
ment of this officer, it is obvious that the gilded mace, as well as 
the sword of state, has been borne before the Lord Mayor of York 
on all occasions of ceremony from the commencement of the 15th 
century down to the present time. 
A remarkable order made by the Corporation, at the inauguration 
of Lord Mayor in the early part of the reign of King Henry YIII., 
shows that something had happened to so insignificant a person as 
the mace-bearer which had excited the commiseration both of the 
King himself and of his great minister. Cardinal Wolsey. On the 
3rd of February, 1517, it was resolved that ‘‘At the King’s pleasure 
and my Lord Cardinal’s, John Burton, mace-bearer, shaR have lus 
office in writing under the common seal for the term of his Rfe, in 
consideration of his harms he had when he was maimed, in 
exercising his office by my Lord Mayor’s commandment.” 
Mr. Drake speaks of two maces, which, at the time he wrote, 
formed part of the civic insignia. “Both (he says) were very 
large, silver gilt, and richly adorned; the biggest of the two was 
carried on Sundays, the lesser at aR other times.” One only of the 
two maces mentioned by the historian is now in the possession of 
the Corporation, and it is not of earlier date than the seventeenth 
century. That which has disappeared since the pubRcation of 
“Eboracum” was, most probably, the original mace presented to 
* The Lord Mayor and Corporation of London were snninioned to appear 
before this great council. They had incurred the displeasure of the King- by 
refusing to lend him money. 
f This appears from a document dated at York the 20th Kovember, 1392, 
hy which the King, at the instance of the Dean and Chapter, gave permission to 
a citizen to appropriate certain property towards maintaining the fabric of the 
Minster. Fabric Kolls of York Minster, Surtees Soc., vol. 35, p. 190, 
