There was a vacant ground opposite the great west door of St. Paul’s where this interesting ceremony took place. The folkmoots were held in the churchyard at the east end of the cathedral.
In 1275 (3 Edw. I.) Robert Fitz-Walter obtained licence from the Crown to convey Baynard Castle and the Tower of Montfichet to the Archbishop of Canterbury for the purpose of the foundation of the House and Church of the Friars Preachers or Blackfriars.[269] In the following year Edward I. confirmed the grant of two lanes adjacent to ‘Castle Baynard and the Tower of Montfytchet for the purpose of enlarging the aforesaid place on condition that the said archbishop should provide the citizens with a more convenient way as he had now done.’[270] In 1277-1278 an alteration was made in the wall of the friary.[271]
When Sir Robert Fitz-Walter conveyed Baynard Castle to the Archbishop he specially reserved all his rights and privileges in the following terms: ‘Provided that by reason of this grant nothing should be extinguished to him and his heirs which did belong to his barony, but that whatsoever relating thereto as wel in rents, landing of vessells and other liberties and priviledges in the City of London or elsewhere without diminution, which to him the said Robert or to that barony had antiently appertained, should be thenceforth reserved.’[272]
We know very little of this Tower of Montfichet, but it must have been closely connected with Baynard Castle. There is a reference to it and its owner in the Chronique de la guerre entre les Anglois et les Ecossois en 1173 et 1174 par Jordan Fantosme (Howlett’s Chronicles of Stephen, Henry II. and Richard I., iii. 339. Rolls Series):
“Gilbert de Munfichet has fortified his castle,
And says that the Clares are leagued with him.”
As Mr. Round points out to me this reference to the Clares must relate to the proprietors of Baynard’s Castle, who, as previously noted, were of the same family as the Clares. Walter Fitz-Robert is also referred to in this metrical chronicle.
The Barons Fitz-Walter possessed many privileges in time of peace, which are set out by Dugdale, among which was the right of punishing by drowning at Woodwharf persons guilty of treason, but it was as constable of Barnard Castle that they enjoyed these privileges as well as the office of bannerer to the City of London. A beautiful seal inscribed ‘Sigillum Roberti Filii Walteri’ was found at Stamford, Lincolnshire, in the reign of Charles II., and is the subject of a paper by John Charles Brooke of the Heralds’ College in Archæologia (vol. v. pp. 211-215): ‘In this seal we see [Fitz-Walter’s] horse elegantly engraved and covered with trappings of his arms, so exquisitely represented, that they evidently appear to be of a much finer texture than those commonly used, the muscles of the animal being seen under them, and as much as engraving can represent drapery, appear to be silk, as described by Glover; and what is remarkable his arms are carved on the rest behind his saddle, which is a rare instance, and evidently alludes to that which the Mayor was to present to him.’
On the seal are represented the arms of Fitz-Walter’s second wife Eleanor, daughter of Robert de Ferrers, Earl of Ferrers and Derby. She was married in 1298 and died in 1304, therefore the date of the seal is fixed within six years. Mr. Brooke refers to another seal of Baron Fitz-Walter which he used, 28 Edw. I. (Anno 1300), and in which the dragon occurring in the former seal beneath the horse is used as a supporter. Robert Fitz-Walter died in 1325, and in 1328 the wardship of his son John was granted by the Mayor and aldermen to his widow Johanna.[273]