CHAPTER VII.
Early English Bread.
When the culture of grain in Britain really commenced we cannot possibly tell, but we know that the Phœnicians traded with this island in very early times for tin. All that we really know is from the fragments of writing left by Pytheas, who may, in one sense, be said to have been the discoverer of Britain. About 340 B.C. the Greek colony which the Greeks had planted at Massilia (Marseilles) wished to extend their trade, and, whether at their expense or his own, Pytheas, a learned man, a geographer and astronomer, set sail for parts unknown in the Western Ocean.
Diodorus Siculus, who lived just before the Christian era, must have taken his account of the Britons from Pytheas. In Book V., c. 2, he says: ‘They dwell in mean cottages, covered for the most part with reeds and sticks. In reaping their corn, they cut the ears from off the stalk, and house them in repositories under ground; thence they take and pluck out the grains of as many of the oldest of them as may serve them for the day, and, after they have bruised the corn, make it into bread,’
It is said, also, that about this time the Britons exported corn to Gaul and also up the Rhine. On Cæsar’s arrival he found them an agricultural people, with abundance of wheat and barley; and during the time of the Roman occupation they made great advances in agriculture. After their departure a hide of land was 180 acres if it was cultivated on the Roman three-field system, or 160 if on the English plan of two-field course. In the former, one portion was sown with winter wheat, a second with spring wheat, whilst the third lay fallow. The English way was to divide the hide, and in each half to sow alternately spring and winter wheat, and the chief crops raised were rye, oats, barley, wheat, beans and peas. In social rank, the yeoman, or geneat (tenant farmer), ranked next after the thegn and the priest, whilst even the baker was an important member of a thegn’s household—the bread being made in round flat cakes from wholemeal (for there is no mention of bolting it), ground in a hand-mill or quern. Such were doubtless the storied cakes which Alfred watched for the neatherd’s wife.
The peasants’ bread was principally made of rye, oats, and beans, the wheat being used by the ‘gentry’ only—ordinary bread being made of barley; and, connected with the latter, are derived our names of Lord and Lady, the first from Llaford, originator of bread, or bread-ward, the latter from Llæfdige, bread-maid, or bread-maker. So, too, we owe our wedding cake to the great loaf made by the bride to show her inauguration into housewifery, which was partaken of by the wedding guests.
The peasant baked his bread on iron plates or in rude ovens, and ground his coarse meal in hand-mills; but in later times water was made the principal motive power for grinding corn, and about 5000 mills are mentioned in Domesday Book; but they are not particularised as to what power they were worked by.
As a trade, the bakers of London rank from a very early date. They formed a brotherhood, or guild, in the reign of Henry II., about 1155. Stow says of them: ‘The Company of White Bakers are of great antiquity, as appeareth by their Records, and divers other things of antiquity, extant in their Common Hall. They were a Company of this City in the first year of Edward II., and had a new Charter granted unto them in the first year of Henry VII., the which Charter was confirmed unto them by Henry VIII., Edward VI., Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth, and King James I. Their Arms were anciently borne; the crest and supporters were granted to them by Robert Cook, Clarencieux, the Letters Patent bearing date November 8 (32 Eliz.), 1590. The Cloud on the Chief thro’ which the Hand holding the Scales Cometh, hath a Glory, omitted in the edition printed 1633; and on each side of the Hand are two Anchors, here also omitted; as by the Visitation Book, Anno 1634, appears.’
Stow describes the Company of the Brown Bakers as ‘A Society of long standing and continuance, prevailed to have their Incorporating granted the ninth day of June, in the 19th year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord King James I.’
The Arms of both White and Brown Bakers are copied from Harl. MSS. 1464, 57e. (73), A.D. 1634—the Arms of these and other Companies being copied from the Herald’s Visitation of that year, by Rd. Price, Armes-Painter.