CHAPTER XIV.
CONCLUSION.
While the presentation of the preceding details has been essential to the plan of this work, I desire, by way of appropriate conclusion, to estimate the influence of the fair upon the development of commerce in England, and, in some degree, also in Europe. I find a most comprehensive review of this character from the masterly pen of Prof. James E. Thorold Rogers, M.A., in his great work, the “History of Agriculture and Prices in England” (1866, vol. i. pp. 142-4).
After pointing out that the port of Lynn, with the rivers Ouse, and Cam, were the means by which water-carriage was made available for goods—an important point; indeed it may be regarded as certain that in the middle ages and later, no great fair could be held far removed from water communication—he proceeds:
The concourse must have been a singular medley. Besides the people who poured forth from the great towns—from London, Norwich, Colchester, Oxford, places in the beginning of the fourteenth century of great comparative importance, and who gave their names, or, in case certain branches of commerce had been planted in particular London streets, the names of such streets, to the rows of booths in the three-weeks’ fair of Stourbridge—there were, beyond doubt, the representatives of many nations collected together to this great mart of medieval commerce. The Jew, expelled from England, had given place to the Lombard exchanger. The Venetian and Genoese merchant came with his precious stock of Eastern produce, his Italian silks and velvets, his store of delicate glass. The Flemish weaver was present with his linens of Liege and Ghent. The Spaniard came with his stock of iron, the Norwegian with his tar and pitch. The Gascon vine-grower was ready to trade in the produce of his vineyard; and, more rarely, the richer growths of Spain, and, still more rarely, the vintages of Greece were also supplied. The Hanse towns sent furs and amber, and probably were the channel by which the precious stones of the East were supplied through the markets of Moscow and Novgorod. And perhaps by some of those unknown courses, the history of which is lost, save by the relics which have occasionally been discovered, the porcelain of the farthest East might have been seen in some of the booths.
Blakeney, and Colchester, and Lynn, and perhaps Norwich, were filled with foreign vessels, and busy with the transit of various produce; and Eastern England grew rich under this confluence of trade. How keen must have been the interest with which the franklin and bailiff, the one trading on his own account, the other entrusted with his master’s produce, witnessed the scene, talked of the wonderful world about them, and discussed the politics of Europe!
To this great fair came, on the other hand, the woolpacks, which then formed the riches of England and were the envy of outer nations. The Cornish tin-mine sent its produce, stamped with the sign of the rich earl who bought the throne of the German Empire, or of the warlike prince who had won his spurs at Crecy, and captured the French king at Poitiers. Thither came also salt from the springs of Worcestershire, as well as that which had been gathered under the summer sun from the salterns of the eastern coast. Here, too, might be found lead from the mines in Derbyshire, and iron, either raw or manufactured, from the Sussex forges. And besides these, there were great stores of those kinds of agricultural produce which, even under the imperfect cultivation of the time, were gathered in greater security, and therefore in greater plenty, than in any other part of the world, except Flanders.
To regulate the currency, to secure the country against the loss of specie, and more harmlessly to prevent the importation of spurious or debased coin, the officers of the king’s exchange examined into the mercantile transactions of the foreign traders. To form a ready remedy against fraud, the mayor sat at his court “of the dusty feet;” a mixed multitude were engaged in sale or purchase; the nobles securing such articles of luxury as were offered them, or which law and custom assigned to their rank—their rich robes of peace, their armour from Milan, their war horses from Spain. The franklin came for materials for his farm, and furniture for his house; sometimes even to buy rams in order to improve the breed of his flock. The bailiffs of college and monastery were busy in the purchase of clothing. And on holidays and Sundays, some canon, deputed from the neighbouring priory, said mass and preached in the booth assigned for religious worship.
This is certainly a not over-coloured picture of the past of this once mighty fair. Mr. Cunningham, in his most excellent work, “The Growth of English Industry and Commerce” (1882, Cambridge University Press, p. 164), says:—“By far the greater part of the commerce of this country was carried on at such fairs; and Sturbridge Fair was one of the most important in the whole kingdom, rivalling it was said the great fair of Nijni Novgorod, as a gathering of world-wide fame.” And he adds by way of note:—“In the eighteenth century it continued to be a most important mart for all sorts of manufactured goods, as well as for horses, wool, and hops.”