[APPENDIX III]
FOREIGN MERCHANTS

“For many centuries the enterprising foreigner who ventured to visit this country for the purposes of traffic had to struggle against numerous discouragements and grievous restrictions, originating partly in the avarice of the English sovereigns and the insolence and rapacity of their officers, and, to a still greater extent, in the jealousy entertained towards them by the English population, the freemen of the cities and towns more specially. So early, however, as the time of Ethelred II. (about A.D. 1000) some brief regulations were framed, if not for their encouragement at least for their protection.

The existing text of this document, which empowers the merchants of certain foreign countries to trade at the Hythe, even then known as ‘Billingesgate,’ is evidently in an imperfect and mutilated state; so much so, in fact, that, brief as it is, some portions of it are all but wholly unintelligible. In the list, however, of the traders thus favoured, we are enabled to discover the names of the men of France and Normandy, the people of Rouen, the merchants of Flanders, the inhabitants of Liège and of Lier (in Brabant), and the ‘Emperor’s men,’ at an early period known as the ‘Easterlings,’ and in the latter half of the thirteenth century, if not before, under the aggregate appellation of the ‘Merchants of the Hanse of Almaine.’

The curious document, called Regulations for the Lorraine Merchants, is probably based upon the code of Ethelred to some extent, to which indeed it bears a strong resemblance in one or two of its provisions; so far, that is to say, as the unsatisfactory state of the manuscripts containing Ethelred’s tariff allows of its provisions being understood. Though of less remote antiquity, the code of regulations given in the Liber Custumarum is of greatly superior interest to its predecessor: it belongs probably to the first half of the thirteenth century, if, indeed, not an earlier date, and no other copy of it, so far as the Editor has been enabled to ascertain, is known to exist. Under what peculiar circumstances these regulations were drawn up in favour of the Lorrainers, it is probably impossible to say; a people who, though subjects of, or in a state of vassalage under, the Emperors of Almaine, or Germany, do not appear at this period to have come under the more general appellation of ‘Emperor’s men.’

From this document we are enabled to gather that in the earlier days of the Plantagenets, if not at a still more remote period, a wine-fleet, its freight probably the produce of the banks of the Moselle, was in the habit of visiting this country each year. The moment this fleet of adventurous ‘hulks and keels’ had escaped the perils of the German Ocean, and had reached the New Wear, in the Thames, the eastern limit of the City’s jurisdiction, it was their duty, in conformity with fiscal and civic regulations, to arrange themselves in due order and raise their ensign; the crews being at liberty, if so inclined, to sing their kiriele, or song of praise and thanksgiving, ‘according to the old law,’ until London Bridge was reached. Arrived here, and the drawbridge duly raised, they were for a certain time to lie moored off the Wharf (Rive); which not improbably was Queen-Hythe, the most important, in these times, of all the hythes or landing-places, to the west of London Bridge. Here they were to remain at their moorings two ebb, and a flood; during which period the merchants were to sell no part of their cargo, it being the duty of one of the Sheriffs and the King’s Chamberlain to board each vessel in the meantime, and to select for the royal use such precious stones, massive plate of gold or silver (called ‘Work of Solomon’), tapestry of Constantinople, or other valuable articles, as they might think proper; the price thereof being duly assessed by lawful merchants of London, and credit given until a fortnight’s end.

The two ebbs and a flood expired, and the officials having duly made their purchases or declined to do so, the wine-ship was allowed to lie alongside the wharf, the tuns of wine being disposed of under certain regulations, apparently meant as a precaution against picking and choosing, to such merchants as might present themselves as customers, those of London having the priority, and those of Winchester coming next. The first night after his arrival in the City, no Lorrainer was allowed to go ‘to market or to fair’ for any purposes of traffic, beyond four specified points, which seem to have been Stratford-le-Bow, Stamford Hill, Knightsbridge, and Blackheath. The reason for this singular restriction may possibly have been a desire that the foreigner should have at least the opportunity forced upon him of spending his newly-earned money in the City or its vicinity; and it was in a like spirit, probably, that a premium was offered to such of the Lorrainers as forbore to land at all, or to pass the limits of the wharf, or Thames Street, at most, in the shape of a reduction of the duties on their wines.

If, however, on the other hand, the Lorrainer thought proper to carry his wares and luggage beyond those limits, and to ‘take hostel’ within the City, it was the duty of the Sheriff to visit him at his lodging and exact scavage on his goods; the merchant being bound to wait three days for the Sheriff’s attendance, and during that interval not allowed even to unpack his goods. Unless prevented by contrary winds, sickness, or debt, the Lorrainer, in common with most other foreigners in these times, was bound to leave London by the end of forty days; and during his stay there were certain articles, woolfels, lambskins, fresh leather, and unwrought wool, in the number, which he was absolutely forbidden to purchase, under pain of forfeiture to the Sheriff. Three live pigs was all he was allowed to buy for his own consumption, at sea, probably; and if he dared to violate so important a regulation, upon outcry being raised thereon, he was to be brought up for judgment in the Court of Hustings forthwith. By a regulation of probably the same date, the ‘men of the Emperor of Almaine’ were allowed the privilege of lodging within the walls of the City wherever they might please, an option that was left to few other foreign merchants in these days. The inhabitants, however, of Tiesle (Thiel in Gelderland) and Brune (or Bruune, probably Bruurren, in Gelderland) were excepted; what offence had given cause for their exclusion it is perhaps impossible now to say. The men of Antwerp, too, were not allowed to go beyond London Bridge, in case they should object to be ruled by London law; a piece of contumacy of which they had no doubt been guilty at a recent period, and which may possibly have been carried to a still more unpardonable extent by the traders from Tiesle and Brune. Retailing was in general wholly forbidden to foreign merchants, but the ‘Emperor’s men’ were privileged to sell so small a quantity as a quarter of cummin-seed, and a dozen, or even half-dozen, cloths of fustian.

The natives of Denmark seem, in these times, to have been peculiarly favoured, in consequence, probably, of their more intimate connection with this country at a still earlier period. They enjoyed the privilege of sojourning in London all the year through; in addition to which they had a right to all the benefits of ‘the law of the City of London’ —in other words, the right of resorting to fair or to market in any place throughout England. The Norwegians, on the other hand, were upon an equal footing with the Danes as to the right of sojourning in London all the year, but did not enjoy ‘the law of the City,’ being prohibited from leaving it for the purposes of traffic.