OLD PROVINCIAL FAIRS.
As a survival of one of the earliest institutions of this country, the provincial fair is of special interest. Although it no longer retains the functions for which it was originally founded, yet its existence amongst us points back to a distant period in our history, when it not only served as an important rendezvous for the furtherance of trade, but was a centre whence the legislative enactments of the country were proclaimed. Originally, it would seem the fair was generally held during the period of a saint’s feast within the precincts of the church or abbey, when worshippers and pilgrims assembled from all parts. As the sacred building, too, was frequently in the open country, or near some village too small to provide adequate accommodation for the vast throng assembled on this annual festival, tents were pitched and stalls for provisions set up in the churchyard, to supply the wants of the visitors. This practice soon induced country pedlars and traders to come and offer their wares; and hence in course of time it led to the establishment of the commercial trade-marts known as ‘fairs.’ It was not long, however, before abuses crept up, unseemly diversions and excessive drinking causing no small offence. For instance, in the fourteenth year of Henry III.’s reign, the archdeacon within the diocese of Lincoln made inquiries into the custom of holding fairs in churchyards; the result being that they were shortly afterwards discontinued in this diocese. In the thirteenth year of Edward II.’s reign, a statute was passed prohibiting the keeping of a fair in any churchyard. But this law was in a great measure inoperative, for markets seem to have been held in several Yorkshire churchyards in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; and two hundred years later, the same customs occurred in Germany.
Whatever the exact origin of our provincial fairs may be, they are undoubtedly of great antiquity, although, singular to say, their charters are comparatively of modern date; the first recorded grant in this country apparently being that of William the Conqueror to the Bishop of Winchester for leave to hold an annual ‘free fair at St Giles’s Hill.’ Respecting this old fair, we are told how, on St Giles’s eve, the mayor, bailiffs, and citizens of Winchester gave up to the bishop’s officers the keys of the four city gates; and that, while it lasted, the church appointed its own mayor, bailiff, and coroner. The rules, too, for its regulation seem to have been very stringent; officers being stationed on roads and bridges to take toll upon all merchandise travelling in the direction of Winchester. A tent of justice known as the Pavilion was held in the centre of the fair, in which offences of various kinds were tried by the bishop’s officers. Every precaution, too, was taken that all packages of goods entering the city gates paid toll to the bishop, who likewise received the forfeit of any wares that might be sold out of the fair within a radius of seven miles. ‘Foreign merchants,’ says Mr Morley, ‘came to this fair and paid its tolls. Monasteries had also shops or houses in its drapery, pottery, or spicery streets, used only at fair-time, and held often by lease from the bishop.’ This fair, therefore, apart from its historical value, is interesting in so far as it was in many respects the model upon which succeeding ones in other places were instituted.
Fairs were occasionally granted to towns as a means for enabling them to recover from the effects of war and other disasters; and also as a mark of favour from the Crown. Thus, Edward III. founded a fair in the town of Burnley in Lancashire. An amusing origin is given of ‘Fools’ Fair,’ kept in the Broad Gate at Lincoln on the 14th of September, for the sale of cattle. It is recorded how King William and his queen ‘having visited Lincoln, made the citizens an offer to serve them in any way they liked best. They asked for a fair, though it was harvest, when few people could attend it, and though the town had no trade nor any manufacture.’ Stourbridge fair, once perhaps the largest in the world, was specially granted by King John for the maintenance of a hospital for lepers. Among other origins assigned to fairs, may be mentioned ‘Pack-Monday fair,’ which was in days gone by celebrated at Sherborne, on the first Monday after the 10th October. It was ushered in by the ringing of the great bell at a very early hour, and by the young people perambulating the streets with cows’ horns. Tradition asserts that this fair originated at the completion of the building of the church—at the completion of which the workmen held a fair in the churchyard, blowing cows’ horns in their rejoicings. There can be no doubt, however, that in many cases where the true origin of many of our old fairs has in the course of years been forgotten, another has been invented in its place, and handed down with every mark apparently of plausibility.
Perhaps one of the most curious features of our provincial fairs is to be found in the odd customs associated with them, these possessing an additional interest, as they help to illustrate the social life of our forefathers. Thus, from time immemorial, it has been customary at several of our large fairs—such as those kept up at Portsmouth, Southampton, Chester, and Macclesfield—to announce their opening by hoisting a glove of unusual size in some conspicuous place. This, it has been suggested, is the earliest form of royal charter, denoting the king’s glove—the custom being thus explained in the Speculum Saxonicum: ‘No one is allowed to set up a market or a mint without the consent of the ordinary and judge of that place; the king ought also to send a glove, as a sign of his consent to the same.’ The charter for Lammas fair at Exeter was formerly perpetuated by a huge glove, stuffed and carried through the city on a long pole, which was eventually placed on the top of the Guildhall, where, so long as it remained, it indicated that the fair was still open. A variation of this usage prevailed at Liverpool, where, ten days before and after each fair-day, a hand was exhibited in front of the town-hall—a sign which denoted that ‘no person coming to or going from the town on business connected with the fair can be arrested for debt within its liberty.’ Englefield, in his Walk through Southampton (1805), describing the fair held on Trinity Monday at Southampton, says it was dissolved by the glove being taken down, ‘which was at one time performed by the young men of the town, who fired at it till it was destroyed, or they were tired of the sport.’ Without enumerating further instances of this practice, there can be no doubt that, as Mr Leadam has shown in the Antiquary (1880), the glove is the original ‘sign-manual.’
One of the quaint features of Charlton fair, formerly held on St Luke’s Day, was the elaborate display of horns; the booths not only being decorated with them, but most of the articles offered for sale having representations of this emblem. For a long time, antiquaries were much divided as to what connection there could be between horns and Charlton fair, and many conjectures were started without any satisfactory result. At last, however, light was thrown on this much-disputed question by an antiquary, who pointed out that a horned ox is the old medieval symbol of St Luke, the patron of the fair. In support of this explanation, it was further added, that although most of the painted glass in Charlton church was destroyed in the troublous times of the reign of Charles I., yet fragments remained of St Luke’s ox ‘with wings on his back, and goodly horns on his head.’ As an additional illustration on this point, we may quote the following extract from Aubrey’s Remains of Gentilisme and Judaisme: ‘At Stoke-Verdon, in the parish of Broad Chalke, Wilts, was a chapel dedicated to St Luke, who is the patron saint of the horn-beasts and those that have to do with them; wherefore the keepers and foresters of the New Forest come hither at St Luke’s tide with their offerings to St Luke, that they might be fortunate in their game, the deer, and other cattle.’ Many of those, also, who visited Charlton fair wore a pair of horns on their heads, and the men were attired in women’s clothes; a mode of masquerading thus described by a writer of the last century: ‘I remember being there upon Horn fair-day; I was dressed in my landlady’s best gown, and other women’s attire.’ Referring to St Luke’s Day, Drake tells us in his Eboracum that a fair was annually kept up at York for all sorts of small-wares, and was popularly known as ‘Dish-fair,’ from the large quantity of wooden dishes exposed for sale. It was also characterised by an old custom of ‘bearing a wooden ladle in a sling on two stangs about it, carried by four sturdy labourers; this being, no doubt, in ridicule of the meanness of the wares brought to the fair.’ At Paignton fair, Exeter, it was customary, says a correspondent of Notes and Queries, to draw through the town a plum-pudding of immense size, and afterwards to distribute it to the crowd. The ingredients which on one occasion composed this pudding were as follows: four hundred pounds of flour, one hundred and seventy pounds of beef-suet, one hundred and forty pounds of raisins, and two hundred and forty eggs. It was kept constantly boiling in a brewer’s copper from the Saturday morning to the Tuesday following, when it was placed on a car profusely decorated and drawn along the streets by eight oxen.
Again, among the numerous other customs which were attached to many of our fairs may be mentioned that popularly designated as ‘Walking the Fair.’ Thus, at Wolverhampton, on the eve of the great fair which took place on the 9th of July, a procession of men in antique armour paraded the town, preceded by the local authorities. According to tradition, this ceremony took its rise when Wolverhampton was a great emporium for wool and resorted to by merchants from all parts of England. These processions, however, were in all probability the remains of the Corpus Christi pageantry, which was frequently celebrated at the yearly fairs. At Avingham fair, held about twelve miles from Newcastle, an amusing ceremony was celebrated called ‘Riding the Fair.’ Early in the morning a procession moved from the principal alehouse in the village, headed by two pipers, known as the ‘Duke of Northumberland’s pipers,’ who, fancifully dressed up for the occasion, were mounted on horses gaily caparisoned, and specially borrowed for the day. These pipers, followed by the Duke of Northumberland’s agent, bailiff, and a numerous escort, rode through the fair; and after proclaiming it opened, they ‘walked the boundary of all that was, or had been, common or waste land.’ Riding the boundaries is still annually practised in many provincial parishes.
We must not omit to mention the ‘Procession of Lady Godiva’—one of the grandest of these shows, and which has been the distinguishing feature of Coventry Show Fair, for many years one of the chief marts in the kingdom. This celebrated fair has generally commenced upon Friday in Trinity-week, the charter for it having been granted, it is said, by Henry III. in the year 1218, at the instigation of Randle, Earl of Chester. It is noteworthy, however, that the tradition of Lady Godiva is not confined to Coventry fair, a similar one having been handed down in the neighbourhood of St Briavel’s, Gloucestershire. Thus Rudder, in his History of this county (1779), tells us how, formerly, after divine service on Whitsunday, pieces of bread and cheese were distributed to the congregation at church. To defray the expenses, every householder in the parish paid a penny to the churchwardens, and this was said to be for the liberty of cutting and taking wood in Hudnalls. Tradition affirms that ‘this privilege was obtained of some Earl of Hereford, then lord of the Forest of Dean, at the instance of his lady, upon the same hard terms that Lady Godiva obtained the privileges for the citizens of Coventry.’
Again, at the Whitsuntide fair held at Hinckley in Leicestershire, one of the principal attractions was the procession of the millers, who, having assembled from all the neighbouring villages, marched in grand array with the ‘king of the millers’ at their head. From the various accounts recorded of this ceremony, it appears that the dresses were generally most elaborate; and one writer, in 1787, describing these shows, says: ‘The framework knitters, wool-combers, butchers, carpenters, &c., had each their plays, and rode in companies bearing allusions to their different trades.’ Then there was the well-known practice of ‘Crying the Fair.’ Thus, in connection with Stourbridge fair we read how in the year 1548 a proclamation was issued by the university of Cambridge in ‘crying the fair,’ in which it was directed, among other clauses, that ‘no brewer sell into the fayer a barrell of ale above two shillings; no longe ale, no red ale, no ropye ale, but good and holsome for man’s body, under the penaltie of forfeyture.’
Ravenglass fair, celebrated annually at Muncaster in Cumberland, was the scene of a peculiar ceremony, which is thus described in Lyson’s Magna Britannia: ‘The lord’s steward was attended by the sergeant of the borough of Egremont with the insignia called the bow of Egremont, the foresters with their bows and horns, and all the tenantry of the forest of Copeland, whose special service was to attend to the lord and his representatives at Ravenglass fair, and remain there during its continuance.’ In order, also, to attract visitors, various modes of diversion were contrived; these generally succeeding in bringing together large concourses of people from outlying districts. Thus, occasionally, a mock-mayor was appointed, whose duty it was to try any unfortunate person who on some trumped-up charge might be brought before him. It has been suggested that these mock-trials may have originated in the courts which were granted at fairs ‘to take notice of all manner of causes and disorders committed upon the place, called pie-powder, because justice was done to any injured person before the dust of the fair was off his feet.’ A notable instance of this custom was kept up at Bodmin Riding in Cornwall, on St Thomas à Becket’s Day. A mock-court having been summoned, presided over by a Lord of Misrule, any unpopular individual so unlucky as to be captured was dragged to answer a charge of felony; the imputed crime being such as his appearance might suggest—a negligence in his attire or a breach of manners. With ludicrous gravity, we are told in the Parochial History of Cornwall, ‘a mock-trial was then commenced, and judgment was gravely pronounced, when the culprit was hurried off to receive his punishment. In this, his apparel was generally a greater sufferer than his person, as it commonly terminated in his being thrown into the water or the mire’—‘Take him before the Mayor of Halgaver;’ ‘Present him in Halgaver Court,’ being old Cornish proverbs.
A similar institution has existed from time immemorial at the little town of Penryn in Cornwall, at the annual festival of Nutting, when the ‘Mayor of Mylor’ is chosen. According to popular opinion, says Mr Hunt, in his Romances of the West of England, ‘there is a clause in the borough charter compelling the legitimate mayor to surrender his power to the “Mayor of Mylor” on the day in question, and to lend the town-sergeant’s paraphernalia to the gentlemen of the shears.’ At the yearly fair, too, held in the village of Tarleton, a mock-mayor was until a very few years ago elected, this ceremony forming part of the after-dinner proceedings. ‘Three persons,’ says a correspondent of Notes and Queries, ‘were nominated, and it was the rule that each candidate on receiving a vote should drink a glass of wine—a “bumper” to the health of the voter—so that the one elected was not very steady on his feet when all the company had polled and the newly elected mayor had to be installed.’
Lastly, referring to the days on which fairs were formerly held, it appears from The Book of Fairs that they were kept up on Good-Friday at St Austell, Cornwall; Droitwich, Worcestershire; Grinton, Yorkshire; High-Budleigh, Devonshire; and at Wimborne, Dorsetshire. A correspondent of Notes and Queries says that he saw a ‘brisk fair going on in the little village of Perran’s Porth, Cornwall, not far from the curious oratory of St Piran, on Good-Friday in 1878.’ In some places, too, Sunday seems to have been selected; for in Benson’s Vindication of the Methodists we find the following paragraph, with special reference to Lincolnshire: ‘Wakes, feasts, and dancing begin in many parishes on the Lord’s Day, on which also some fairs and annual markets are held.’