[371] This is stated to have been very rare. (Ibid. p. 114.)
[372] Ibid. 118, 163. The appellation of the Guild Merchant “was more frequently applied to the aggregate of the crafts” than to the governing body of the borough. (Ibid. i. 114.) In Carlisle had the term “been used at all, it would probably have been applied to the eight guilds aggregately, rather than to the Corporation.” (Ibid. ii. 40.) In proving that the later Guild Merchant was “an aggregate of the crafts,” Dr. Gross carries us at a single step into a much later period (pp. 118-123), where the name tells us little apart from the history of the borough. The case of Coventry seems a doubtful instance.
[373] Gross, i. 161, 163. Lynn is given as an illustration of this change, but the evidence is not adduced.
[374] Ibid. i. 118. No instance is given of this.
[375] Dr. Gross argues that any struggle which did take place was not between the Guild Merchant and the crafts, but between “the governing council (the “magnates,” “potentiores,” etc.) on the one side and the burgesses at large (“communitas,” “populus,” “minores”) on the other.” (Gross i. 110, 285.) The “magnates” of Norwich (Hudson’s Mun. Org. p. 24-5), or “les riches” of the city records, ruled in a city where there was no Guild Merchant. The “potentiores” of Lynn seem from the printed records to have been the Guild Merchant. In the town records “communitas” cannot be understood as synonymous with “populus,” still less with “minores.”
[376] Gross, i. 109. “Not a single unmistakable example of such a conflict has ever been deduced.” On this point Seligman (Mediæval Guilds, 57-8) speaks very dogmatically on most inconclusive evidence, so far as this is given in his notes. The analogy on p. 58 of craft guilds including smaller unions is not shewn, nor their common occurrence proved.
[377] In London, Norwich, and the Cinque Ports, there was no Guild Merchant at any time. In Lynn, Andover, Southampton, and Bristol it was all-powerful. In Nottingham no influence of its action can be traced; the guild mentioned in John’s charter (Nott. Rec. i. 9) is only once mentioned afterwards, in 1365. (Ibid. i. 189.)
[378] Gross, i. 107.
[379] See Lynn, Gross, ii. 157. Southampton, ibid. 216-226. Andover, ibid. 4, 8, 294, 344. Derby, ibid. 51-3. Newcastle, ibid. 184-5; other instances, i. 69. For Reading see vol. i. 302. For the variety in relations of the Guild to the town see Gross, i. 73.
[380] As at Oxford and Lincoln, Lib. Cus. 671. Gross, ii. 146. It is very probable, however, that these were confirmations of older institutions.