Complaints of Lesser Commune, Oligarchic Rule and Baronial Reform in 13ch Oxford

Complaints of the lesser commune, oligarchic ruleand baronial reform in thirteenth-century Oxford*

Carl I. HammerPittsburgh, PA.

AbstractIn 1253 the ‘lesser commune’ of Oxford directed a petition to Henry III with complaintsagainst the ‘magnates’ there who were misusing their powers over taxation and commerce andotherwise abusing their authority. After examining the persons and the complaints, this articleconcludes that the petition is credible and its complaints consistent with the concerns of thebaronial reform movement. But after 1265 the old oligarchy was able to reassert its localdominance.The article contributes to the ‘pre-history’ of the reform movement and to the roleof towns in it, both of which are still largely unexplored.

English political life from the late twelve-fifties to the late twelve-sixties wasdominated by the rise and fall of the movement associated with Simon de Montfortand other barons who attempted to limit the exercise of Henry III’s royal power,eliminate abuses of local authority and provide readier and more equitable justice toall subjects.1 We know much about the measures taken to secure these ends, beginningwith the famous reforming ‘Provisions’ enacted at Oxford in June 1258.We know lessabout the immediate pre-history of the reform movement and about the abuses thenprevalent in local communities which occasioned such a broad and positive responseto the baronial reformers and their programme. This is particularly true for themany towns which, although comprising only a small part of the population, werenevertheless increasingly significant in economic and political life. Only for London,which played a central role in de Montfort’s rebellion, matching its central economicand political importance in the kingdom, is there an adequate understanding of thepre-conditions, of the critical events and of the persons who pursued the cause ofreform there.2

Here a document from Oxford may provide some exceptional insight. It is a lengthypetition to the king from the earlier twelve-fifties made by a group of townsmen whocharacterize themselves as the ‘lesser commune’ there. It lays out in great detail thevarious ways in which a small group of powerful Oxford burgesses, the ‘magnates’ or

* The author would like to thank John Maddicott for providing detailed comment and helpful suggestionson the draft of this article, and Julian Munby who supplied some welcome initial guidance on a topic in whichhe has a longstanding interest; both facilitated the author’s re-entry into Oxford’s medieval history after manyyears on the continent, as did Alan Crossley of the Oxford Historical Society. All errors are, of course, theauthor’s own.

1 There is a good recent overview in M. Prestwich, Plantagenet England, 1225–1360 (Oxford, 2005), pp. 101–20.2 See the classic account in G.A.Williams, Medieval London: from Commune to Capital (1963), esp. pp. 196–242.

There is a short exposition of the Oxford petition and similar evidence from some other provincial towns inS. Reynolds, An Introduction to the History of English MedievalTowns (Oxford, 1977), pp. 130–6. Unfortunately, thereis little help in James Campbell’s otherwise excellent ‘Power and authority, 600–1300’, in The Cambridge UrbanHistory of Britain, i, ed. D. Palliser (Cambridge, 2000), pp. 51–78, at pp. 69–78.

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Copyright © 2012 Institute of Historical Research DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2281.2012.00595.x Historical Research, vol. 85, no. 229 (August 2012)Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.

‘greater burgesses’, monopolized civic power and used it arbitrarily for their own endsin the areas of taxation, local administration and trade to the detriment of their fellowtownsmen. Thus, it provides a rare and intimate insight into local political and socialconditions which, if widespread, would have made reform so attractive to a broadspectrum of English townspeople. Of course, this petition is an ex parte statement.Wecannot immediately assume that its charges are all correct. However, for Oxford wehave an abundance of contemporary evidence which allows us to evaluate the petitionand to fit the conditions it describes and the persons it identifies into local and nationaldevelopments. Although the new university there created unique circumstances whichmust be taken into consideration, and although the situation in every town will havebeen otherwise unique, a case study of the sort proposed here for Oxford may besuggestive for other places. In any event, it contributes towards the accumulation ofknowledge which, eventually, will allow more confident generalizations about the placeof towns in the baronial reform movement. Thus a close consideration of the lessercommune’s petition may repay the effort.

On 18 March 1253 Robert Walerand was appointed by letters patent to hear anddetermine matters at law between Walter of Milton and the burgesses and sheriff ofOxford.3 On 23 March letters close were dispatched from Westminster to the sheriff torenew the pledges for goods seized from Walter for trespass (‘pro transgressione’) andto hold them until Walerand’s arrival, ‘whom the king will shortly send to Oxford tohear and settle the disputes touching the same Walter and the burgesses of Oxford’.4

In many such cases, this would be all we would ever know about those disputes. Wemight suspect that the matter was of some importance to gain royal attention and,particularly, to command the services of Robert Walerand, one of Henry III’s mostexperienced and trusted royal servants.5 However, in this particular instance we can bequite certain about the origins of the dispute, if not about its conclusion. Preservedamong the chancery records in The National Archives now classified as ‘inquisitionsmiscellaneous’ (C 145) is a lengthy petition to the king from the ‘lesser commune’(‘Minor Communia’) of Oxford seeking redress for numerous injuries suffered fromthe ‘magnates’ of Oxford which are detailed in twenty-seven articles of specificcomplaints.6 At the very end (article 27) we learn that on the Friday after the Feast ofSt. Mathias Apostle (24 February), the bailiffs of Oxford came to the house of Walterde Middleton (Milton), ‘the bearer of this bill of complaint (‘latoris istius libelli’)’,seized his goods by force and deprived him of his liberties to trade in Oxford.

We have no direct information about the outcome of Walerand’s investigation, butthere are several indications that the complaints from the lesser commune arose amongvery unsettled political and social conditions in Oxford. Collection of a tallage underMayor Nicholas Stockwell in 1248/9, which, according to the petition (article 6),

3 Calendar of Patent Rolls 1247–58, p. 228.4 Calendar of Close Rolls 1251–3, p. 459: ‘usque adventum Roberti Waler[and], quem rex in brevi missurus est

apud Oxoniam ad querelas ipsum Walterum et burgenses Oxonie tangentes audiendas et terminandas’.5 See A. Harding, ‘Walerand, Robert (d. 1273)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004)

<http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/28455> [accessed 28 Oct. 2011].6 Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous 1219–1307, no. 238, pp. 79–83, with a careful and extensive English

translation; it is now classified within The National Archives of the U.K.: Public Record Office, C 145 asdocument no. 7 in file 10.The full Latin text with commentary is printed in Snappe’s Formulary, ed. H. E. Salter(Oxford Hist. Soc., lxxx, Oxford, 1924), pp. 270–80; references in this article follow his numbering of the clauses.The author’s English translation of the petition’s text from Salter’s transcription is available at <http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/10893/>.

354 Oligarchic rule and baronial reform in thirteenth-century Oxford

Copyright © 2012 Institute of Historical Research Historical Research, vol. 85, no. 229 (August 2012)

wrongly included widows, was much delayed, and for that and for other arrears thesheriff held the town directly for the king until it was redeemed by the burgesses inearly March 1251.7 Adam Feteplace was admitted mayor by the crown on a highlyunusual date, 28 July 1251, towards the very end of that same administrative year1250/1, possibly replacing Thomas Submuro (the records of mayoral incumbenciesare particularly confused in the early twelve-fifties requiring much conjecture(see Table 1)).8 In early February 1252 the town was once again in the king’s hands,and during these periods of royal intervention in the very early twelve-fifties, thesheriff, Nicholas de Hanred, was presiding in place of the mayor at the portmoot orhustengs court with the bailiffs at various times.9 Later in 1252, on 2 November, aWalter de Middelton was pardoned from outlawry for the death of Robert de Nortleof Torp, evidently Northleigh and Thrupp near Oxford.10 Towards the end of the sameadministrative year 1252/3 a prominent Oxford merchant and university benefactor,William Abel (or Cutler), was murdered; several Oxonians were at various timessuspected of that crime, which was evidently pursued tenaciously by the crown overmany years.11 Such homicides involving prominent burgesses, either as assailants orvictims, seem to have been extremely rare.12 These highly irregular circumstances lendthe petition a certain initial level of credibility, which is strengthened by its subsequentreception into the chancery’s keeping.

The lengthy document from the lesser commune is clearly not the sort normallypreserved by the chancery and now classified as inquisitions miscellaneous, which wereusually initiated by writ.13 A dorsal note in a hand from the reign of Edward II placesit among records from 41 Henry III (1256/7), that is, four years after Walerand’s

7 Cal. Close Rolls 1247–51, pp. 269–72, 296–7.The exemption of Oxford widows was granted by the king on8 Feb. 1234 (Cal. Close Rolls 1231–4, p. 377).

8 The civic year ran from Michaelmas (29 Sept.).Tables 1 and 2 standardize the names largely according tothe index of H. E. Salter, Survey of Oxford, ed. W. Pantin and W. Mitchell (2 vols., Oxford Hist. Soc., new ser.,xiv, xx, Oxford, 1960–9), ii. The early civic fasti for Oxford are difficult to establish because office-holders arenormally identified only in the witness lists of undated deeds enacted at the local court, which was presided overby the mayor and bailiffs. Thus, we know precisely who was serving with whom in those civic offices in aparticular year, but we do not know precisely when that particular year was! In Table 1 names in sentence caseare based upon (what this author takes to be) Salter’s datings with some adjustments, but where someindependent, absolute date, either incarnational or regnal, is available, all capital letters have been used. Althoughsome dates are still very provisional, it is doubtful that they will affect the conclusions. For Feteplace, see Cal.Pat. Rolls 1247–58, p. 103; the assumption (possibly wrong) in Tables 1 and 2 is that Feteplace then served out thefollowing year, 1251/2, with the indicated bailiffs, one of whom was retained from Submuro’s regime. But thewording of article 9 of the petition, which describes a meeting in spring 1253 during what should have beenhis continued incumbency as mayor in 1252/3, indicates that he no longer held this office, perhaps replaced byThomas Submuro in that same administrative year (as Table 1).

9 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1247–58, p. 128. Hanred was first appointed sheriff on 6 Oct. 1250 (Cal. Pat. Rolls 1247–58,p. 75); for his presidency at the court sessions, see, e.g., The Cartulary of Oseney Abbey, ed. H. E. Salter (3 vols.,Oxford Hist. Soc., lxxxix–xci, Oxford, 1928–9), passim. Hanred’s predecessor, Guy fitz Robert, was evidentlypresiding at the court before Hanred’s appointment in early 1250/1 (A Cartulary of the Hospital of St John theBaptist, ed. H. E. Salter (3 vols., Oxford Hist. Soc., lxvi–lxix, Oxford, 1914–17), ii. 318). Thomas Submuro alsoappears to have presided as mayor for part of 1252/3.

10 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1247–58, p. 163.11 Mediaeval Archives of the University of Oxford, i, ed. H. E. Salter (Oxford Hist. Soc., lxx, Oxford, 1917)

(hereafter M.A.U.O.), p. 303; Cal. Pat. Rolls 1247–58, pp. 332, 340; Cal. Close Rolls 1253–4, pp. 17, 319–20; Cal.Pat. Rolls 1258–66, p. 309; Cal. Pat. Rolls 1266–72, p. 271. For William Cutler alias Abel alias Hoyland, see alsobelow.

12 C. I. Hammer, ‘Patterns of homicide in a medieval university town: 14th century Oxford’, Past & Present,lxxviii (1978), 3–23, at pp. 17–18.

13 See H. C. Maxwell Lyte’s ‘Preface’ to Cal. Inq. Misc. 1219–1307, p. xiii.

Oligarchic rule and baronial reform in thirteenth-century Oxford 355

Historical Research, vol. 85, no. 229 (August 2012) Copyright © 2012 Institute of Historical Research

Table 1. Mayors and bailiffs of Oxford, 1240–75

Year Mayor Bailiff Bailiff

1240/1 PETER fil. TORALD Richard Aurifaber Thomas Cruste1241/2 Peter fil. Torald Laurence Wyth Hugo Fauve1242/3 Peter fil. Torald Will Eu Nicholas Stockwell1243/4 PETER fil. TORALD HUGO FAUVE ADAM CRUSTE1244/5 Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Henxey Henry Perle1245/6 ADAM FETEPLACE NICHOLAS

KINGSTONJOHN COLESHILL

1246/7 LAURENCE WYTH Adam Submuro John Curci1247/8 Laurence Wyth Will Seinter Geoffrey Aurifaber1248/9 NICHOLAS

STOCKWELLHENRY PERLE THOMAS SPICER

1249/50 Thomas Submuro Hugo Cordwainer Alfred Spicer1250/1 Thomas Submuro Geoffrey Aurifaber Thomas Spicer1251/2 ADAM FETEPLACE Geoffrey Henxey Thomas Spicer1252/3a? Adam Feteplace Nicholas Kingston John Curci1252/3b? Thomas Submuro Geoffrey Henxey John Coleshill1253/4 ADAM FETEPLACE ADAM SUBMURO ROBERT

CORDWAINER1254/5 Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Henxey William Spicer Jr.1255/6 Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Henxey Robert Molendar1256/7 Adam Feteplace John Coleshill John Pady1257/8 Nicholas Stockwell John Coleshill Geoffrey Mercer1258/9 WILLIAM SAUSER HENRY PERLE JOHN PADY1259/60 ADAM FETEPLACE GEOFFREY HENXEY JOHN PADY1260/1 Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Aurifaber Richard fil. Nicholas1261/2 Nicholas Kingston William Eu John Pady1262/3 Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Henxey Geoffrey Mercer1263/4 NICHOLAS

KINGSTONGEOFFREY HENXEY WILLIAM SPICER JR.

1264/5 NICHOLASSTOCKWELL

William Eu Geoffrey Mercer

1265/6 ADAM FETEPLACE JOHN COLESHILL ROGER SAUSER1266/7 ADAM FETEPLACE JOHN COLESHILL PHILIP EU1267/8 Adam Feteplace Geoffrey Henxey Geoffrey Aurifaber1268/9 Nicholas Kingston Henry Owen John Eu1269/70 JOHN COLESHILL GEOFFREY

AURIFABERPHILIP EU

1270/1 NICHOLASKINGSTON

JOHN CULVERD ELIAS QUILTER

1271/2 Nicholas Kingston Elias Quilter Henry Owen1272/3 HENRY OWEN ELIAS QUILTER NICHOLAS

AURIFABER1273/4 NICHOLAS

KINGSTONGeoffrey Aurifaber John Eu

1274/5 Henry Owen Elias Quilter Nicholas Aurifaber1275/6 NICHOLAS

KINGSTONGEOFFREY

AURIFABERNICHOLAS

COLESHILL

CAPS. = independently dated incumbency.l.c. = Salter’s dating (adjusted ).All associations between mayors and bailiffs are documented for a particular year.



appointment in 37 Henry III (1252/3).14 There is no indication why this specific yearwas assigned, but presumably the note was added for purposes of refiling.15 Thus, theendorsement does suggest that at a very early date the petition was already associatedwith documents from that year among chancery records.This would indicate that thefortunes of the lesser commune and their spokesman continued for some time tointerest the central government. The petition must have been turned over in the firstinstance to Walerand himself to assist his investigation. But on the evidence of thepetition itself, the contents must have been gathered and drafted, though possibly notpresented to the king, well before Walerand’s involvement in late March 1253. In article26 we learn that on a Tuesday, evidently 18 February 1253, members of the lessercommune had gathered in the church of St. Giles outside the franchise of Oxford inthe Northgate hundred to give their final approval by seal to this bill of complaint, andthat their meeting had been forcibly broken up by the local magnates against whomit was directed before it could be sealed.

Perhaps, the final impetus to present the petition, though unsealed, came from ameeting – evidently in the Gild Hall – described vividly in article 9.There a busy andimportant royal clerk,William of Exemouth, seeking an aid from Oxford in the springof 1253, challenged the assembled burgesses about disturbing reports reaching the royalcourt concerning unjust tallages levied in the town:16

‘You, sirs, I have heard a strange complaint made recently at court to the lord king, that,whenever tallages or amercements or presents are made to the lord king or to the queen or tothe justices, the greater burgesses of Oxford take the whole amount completely from the lessercommune and from the poor, and that the said great burgesses never pay a penny but alwaysremain quit, whence the lord our king was much moved to anger.’ After these words werespoken, almost all who were there present responded crying out with one voice: ‘Sir, thesethings are true, and we are ready so to declare it to the lord king whenever he wishes!’17

Such concerted action would require just the sort of preparatory organizationdescribed in article 26. In fact, although Salter considered the Latin of the petition‘below the usual average’, the document appears to have been drafted with some carefor effect.18 It is certainly not unsophisticated in either form or content. The use ofdirect speech as here in the petition was a rhetorical device regularly deployed in laterpetitions to the crown for dramatic effect.19 The petition cleverly places articles at thebeginning which detail troubles caused by civic officials for members of the royal

14 Cal. Inq. Misc. 1219–1307, p. 83: ‘Inquisiciones et extente de anno regni regis [Henrici] filii regis J.quadragesimo primo xlj’. It is printed in the calendar as the last item entered for that regnal year which ran from28 Oct. 1256 to 27 Oct. 1257.

15 See the discussion of early chancery practice with what were then classed as ‘escheats’ when individual fileswere taken from their bundles for later use (Cal. Inq. Misc. 1219–1307, pp. vii–viii).

16 See S. Mitchell, Studies in Taxation under John and Henry III (New Haven and Oxford, 1914), pp. 256, 341,for the proposed levy, a ‘gracious aid’ which the king sought for his expedition to Gascony and which was tobe paid in by 22 June 1253.

17 Salter, Snappe’s Formulary, p. 275: ‘“Vos, domini, mirum clamorem audivi nuper ad curiam domino regifactum, quod, quotcunque talliagia seu merciamenta seu presencia facta domino regi sive regine aut iusticiariis,maiores burgenses de Oxonia totalia omnino capiunt de minori commnuia et de pauperibus et quod dicti magniburgenses nunquam pacant denarium set semper remanent quieti, unde dominus noster rex multum commotusfuit in iram.” Hiis verbis dictis, responsum dederunt fere omnes [qui ibidem] presentes fuerunt una voceclamantes: “Domine, ista vera sunt, et hoc parati sumus dicere domino regi quandocumque voluerit!”’

18 Salter, Snappe’s Formulary, p. 271.19 W. M. Ormrod, ‘Murmur, clamour and noise: voicing complaint and remedy to the English crown,

c.1300–c.1460’, in Medieval Petitions: Grace and Grievance, ed. W. M. Ormrod, G. Dodd and A. Musson(Woodbridge, 2009), pp. 135–55.



family, Earl Richard of Cornwall and Aymer de Lusignan (articles 2–4), and thenproceeds to charge that not only were the lesser commune being defrauded by thefifteen jurats but that funds rightly due to the crown had been diverted by them fortheir own uses (articles 5?, 6, 7, 8, 11, 22).20 Unfortunately, the virtually unique survivalof this early petition makes it difficult to place it within any contemporary rhetoricaltradition, but its evident skill does call into question Paul Brand’s very recentconclusion that, ‘prior to 1272 the primary mechanism for approaching the king andseeking justice or favour from him was through oral, not written, representations’.21

The charge raised by Sir William was certainly of interest to the crown. The verynext article (10) even appears to allege fraudulent alterations in the tallage rolls,although a note of qualification (which reads like a subsequent gloss) admits: ‘but theydo not know whether (’sed nesciunt utrum’) this was done by Sir William [Exemouth]or by the [greater] burgesses’. During his investigation, Robert Walerand would haveempanelled a jury and gathered precisely this sort of evidence on oath. Indeed, as weshall see below, this was the greatest fear of the lesser commune. It is tempting to seechancery’s preservation of the petition in connection with the activities of anotherambitious royal clerk, John Mansel, in early 1258. Mansel was a member of the king’scouncil, the body to which the lesser commune of Oxford appealed for redress in theirprologue to the petition. In early 1258 he evidently masterminded a royalist purge ofthe London council using presentments from sworn ward juries regarding fraudulenttallages.22 The pretext for this aggressive investigation was a supposed petition recently‘found’ in the wardrobe. Whatever the relevance of the Oxford petition to theseLondon proceedings, they show that official archiving of such documents for possiblefuture use might be thought prudent. In fact, our Oxford document and theundocumented London petition – despite the ends to which it was put – both fit intoa consistent pattern of reforming activities during the twelve-fifties.

In 1253 the king refers to the matters at issue in Oxford as ‘querelae’. This term,‘querela’, has an ordinary meaning of ‘quarrel’ or ‘dispute’ as it probably does here. Butit was also acquiring a technical, legal meaning.This refers to a simplified procedure forbringing actions for summary judgment by presentation of a complaint, a ‘querela’, toa judge sitting in court rather than by royal writ.This innovative method was obviouslyquite important to people like those of the lesser commune who possibly could notafford the expense and trouble of a writ and the attendant legal costs of full trial.Jacob, in his pioneering and still instructive study of the baronial reform movement,first showed how this novel procedure was developed from the mid twelve-fifties,culminating in Hugh Bigod’s ferocious eyres in 1258/9.23

20 The formula used consistently in articles 6, 7, 8, 11 and 22 refers to the loss of the king’s ‘honor’ and‘commodum’, that is, his honour and profit.

21 P. Brand, ‘Understanding early petitions: an analysis of the content of petitions to parliament in the reignof Edward I’, in Ormrod, Dodd and Musson, pp. 99–119, at p. 119.

22 Williams, pp. 198–9, 209–10; for Mansel’s spectacular career, see R. C. Stacey, ‘Mansel, John (d. 1265)’,O.D.N.B. <http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/17989> [accessed 28 Oct. 2011].

23 E. F. Jacob, Studies in the Period of Baronial Reform and Rebellion, 1258–67 (Oxford Stud. in Soc. and LegalHist., viii, Oxford, 1925), passim, but esp. pp. 25–7, 64–70. The best discussion of these eyres and the new roleof querelae in legal procedure is now A. H. Hershey, ‘Success or failure? Hugh Bigod and judicial reform duringthe baronial movement, June 1258–February 1259’, Thirteenth Century England, v (1995), 65–87. Key documentsare introduced, edited and translated with commentary in Documents of the Baronial Movement of Reform andRebellion 1258–67, ed. R. E.Treharne and I. Sanders (Oxford, 1973) (hereafter Documents of the Baronial Movement),where for querelae, see particularly: document no. 5 (‘Provisions of Oxford’, 1258), c. 1, pp. 98–9; documentno. 10 (‘Ordinationes Magnatum’, 1259), pp. 132–3; and document no. 12 (‘Provisions of Westminster’, 1259),c. 18, pp. 152–3.



Jacob notes that our Oxford complaint ‘is the longest petition surviving forour period, [and aside from a ‘querela’ from Scarborough] seems the only other detailedstatement of urban grievances before the rebellion’.24 Indeed, as stated above, the roleof provincial towns in the baronial reform movement is poorly documented andlargely unstudied.25 Even the famous ‘Provisions of Oxford’ from June 1258 promiseonly in very general terms ‘also to reform the state of the city of London, and of allthe other cities of the king, which have gone to poverty and ruin on account oftallages and other oppressions’.26 These are words which would have cheered Walter ofMilton and his associates in the lesser commune of Oxford. But what precisely werethe circumstances of their complaint and what was the nature of the ‘tallages and otheroppressions’ about which they made representation to the king? This Oxford petitionis well known to modern historians, but, aside from the introduction to his edition byH. E. Salter, the leading modern historian of Oxford, it has never been properlycontextualized with regard to both local and national events.27 To do so we shall lookfirst at the local oppressors and then at the local oppressions, before broadening ourperspective to include baronial reform.

There can be little doubt that, as the ‘bill’ itself maintains, Walter was acting asrepresentative for the lesser commune, and he sought redress by writ from the king,which he evidently obtained in the following month. Unfortunately, we know verylittle about the composition of this lesser commune. If the magnates had not brokenup the meeting at St. Giles on 22 February (article 26), we might know their identitiesfrom their seals and possibly their subscriptions.They were clearly not an impoverishedurban proletariat; a written petition alone makes that unlikely and possession ofpersonal seals indicates at least modest social and economic status. And their abortivemeeting in St. Giles church indicates a significant level of organization and politicalsophistication. Walter himself had some property and practised a business in Oxford,although we do not know which (article 27). One member of the lesser commune dida bulk trade in herring (article 21). The two other persons named in article 19 assupporting the lesser commune had urban properties, and still others were involved inproperty suits and had houses in town which they improved (articles 24, 25). Likewise,it appears that at least some of the burgesses assembled in the town hall to hear Williamof Exemouth were in sympathy with the lesser commune’s complaints (article 9).Wemay assume that none of these burgesses aspired to higher local office, although theywere certainly involved in civic duties including assessment and collection of the hatedtallage (article 20). In sum, they seem to have been ordinary traders and craftsmen ofOxford, some of whom were burgesses belonging to the commonalty of the town, butothers, though residents, may have been outside the local franchise (articles 11, 14).

24 Jacob, p. 120. See also the early 14th-century ‘grevauntz dount les menes gents de la communalte’ of Dublinwhich, however, were made to the mayor, bailiffs and commonalty there, not to the crown (Historic and MunicipalDocuments of Ireland A.D. 1172–1320, ed. J. T. Gilbert (Rolls ser., liii, 1870), pp. lxxii–lxxiii, 359–65).

25 See Jacob, pp. 281–90, now superseded for London by Williams.There are only very summary remarks inR. E. Treharne, The Baronial Plan of Reform, 1258–63 (2nd edn., Manchester and New York, 1971), pp. 354–7.Reynolds refers oddly to ‘rebellious tendencies within the towns’ at this time (p. 110).

26 Documents of the Baronial Movement, no. 5 (‘Provisions of Oxford’, 1258), c. 19, pp. 110–11.27 It is cited, e.g., in F. M. Powicke’s enormously influential 1947 political study King Henry III and the Lord

Edward: the Community of the Realm in the 13th Century (2 vols., Oxford, 1947; repr. 1966), p. 446, and in morerecent social and economic studies by R. H. Hilton, English and FrenchTowns in Feudal Society: a Comparative Study(Cambridge, 1992), p. 136 and E. Miller and J. Hatcher, Medieval England:Towns, Commerce and Crafts 1086–1348(1995), pp. 310, 315–16, 359.



On the other hand, we have very precise knowledge of the magnates’ identitiesfrom the list of the ‘greater burgesses’ (‘maiores burgenses’) appended to the petition(Table 2).28 Very recently it has been asserted that our Oxford petition ‘does notindicate that there really was an urban oligarchy’.29 In this author’s view, thisjudgement would have surprised contemporaries of every political and social stripe,although they would have differed sharply in their estimates of oligarchy.30 Certainly,the lesser commune were in no doubt that the town of Oxford was run by a smallgroup which they consistently call the fifteen jurats. What does this mean? ‘Jurat’

28 In certain years some office-holders are missing from Table 2, since we are only concerned here with thosenamed on the petition’s list. Years in which none of them occurs as an office-holder have been omitted.

29 J. Catto, ‘Citizens, scholars and masters’, in The History of the University of Oxford, i: the Early Oxford Schools,ed. J. Catto (Oxford, 1984), pp. 151–92, at p. 160, evidently following Salter’s dismissive evaluation of Walter andthe document (Salter, Snappe’s Formulary, pp. 270–1).

30 The best survey of English urban oligarchy in this period is E. Miller, ‘English town patricians, c.1200–1350’, in Gerrarchie Economiche e Gerarchie Sociali Secoli XII–XVII, ed. A. Guarducci (Prato, 1990), pp. 217–40,which includes much evidence from Oxford and refers to our petition in a footnote there (p. 220, n. 15).

Table 2. Maiores burgenses of Oxford (c.1253)

ante

1230/1

1233/4

1236/7

1237/8

1238/9

1239/4

01241/2

1242/3

1245/6

1246/7

1247/8

1248/9

1249/5

0

1244/5

1250/1

1251/2

1252/3

1253/4

1254/5

1255/6

1256/7

1257/8

1258/9

1259/6

01260/1

1261/2

1262/3

1263/4

1264/5

1265/6

1266/7

1267/8

1269/7

01273/4

1275/6

mMMmmMmmmMmMMmP

M

MmMb

mmmAP

BbBbbbb

bBbB

B B

bbbbb

MBBbb

bb

b

bb

B

BbP

?M?b?P

bbb

b

m

b b

Bb

BBb

b?

b

Adam Feteplace

Geoffrey Stockwell

Nicholas Stockwell

Thomas Submuro

Geoffrey Aurifaber

Geoffrey Henxey

John Coleshill

John Curci

John Pady II

Adam Submuro

Walter Kingston

Geoffrey Trutun

Thomas Mauger

Roger Arconer

William Spicer

William Eu

Alfred Spicer

John Halegod

Laurence Wyth

Thomas Spicer

William Spicer Jr.

Thomas Elmsley

Henry Perle

Henry Wycombe

Walter Kepeharm

Henry Henge

William Wyth

William Bodin

Richard Mercer

Robert Molendar

James Simeon

Henry Gamage

b B P M m

B? P A b M

M/m = mayor; B/b = bailiff (CAPS. = independently dated/l.c. = Salter’s dating adjusted).P = assigned to keep peace with the university.A = alderman.



was a commonly used term borrowed from French (juré, juratus) to denote a towncouncillor, but whether it, like the associated term ‘commune’ (communia), had arevolutionary connotation in England is disputed.31 Certainly, on various parts of thecontinent it did, and there small bodies of oligarchs, sworn to one another, couldmonopolize town government and oppress other townsmen with unjust exactions andregulations, just as charged in Oxford.32 Fortunately, the lesser commune tell us severalprecise things about the internal organization of these fifteen jurats besides theirnumber. First, in article 7 they allege that the fifteen jurats elected the two bailiffsannually from their own number. Second, article 11 alleges that the jurats attempted toforce all the poor workmen (‘operarii’) of the town to join their merchant gild (‘ingilda sua mercandali/gildam suam mercalem’).Third, they append the list of thirty-twonames of the greater burgesses who should not be included among those summonedto examine these matters. Presumably, the fifteen jurats are among those named on thislist, although they are not explicitly identified there.

It is possible that this appended list of the greater burgesses comprises the dominantmembers of Oxford’s gild merchant, which constituted the earliest basis of localgovernment and farmed the town from the king.33 Normally, such guild organizationswere formed by a mutual oath of the members. But, if we look carefully at thethirty-two names, it is also apparent that they are arranged in a hierarchy with themore important burgesses listed first.This can be seen from those who held the officeof mayor or bailiff in the half century around the petition (see Tables 1 and 2).Theseoffices were clearly monopolized by the first ten persons named on the list, from AdamFeteplace to Adam Submuro.34 Below those ten there are only eight scattered namesof office-holders, many postdating the petition, and only Laurence Wyth appearspreviously to have been a person of some importance in local government. Thus,fifteen is a very credible number for those who effectively ruled Oxford’s civic affairsat this time: an olig-archy, indeed, or the rule of the few (hoi oligoi).

In fact, this number was shortly to be authorized by royal charter. Henry III wasnoted for promoting the university and protecting its members.35 In November 1236he assigned the mayor, bailiffs and twenty-three prominent burgesses to maintain thepeace between the university and the town.36 In May 1248, following the murder ofa servant of the king’s half-brother, Aymer de Lusignan, then studying in Oxford(article 3), the king granted a charter of privileges for the university which aimed toprotect its members from personal harm and economic exploitation.37 There it wasprovided that ‘two aldermen (“aldermanni”) be elected and deputed from amongstthose who then were’ to take responsibility in lieu of the bailiffs for maintaining peaceand enforcing regulations. Seven years later, in June 1255, a new royal privilege raised

31 J. Tait, The Medieval English Borough: Studies on its Origins and Constitutional History (Manchester, 1936),pp. 290–6.

32 C. Petit-Dutaillis, Les Communes Françaises (Paris, 1947; 1970), pp. 27–36, particularly for the town ofChâteauneuf by Tours.

33 See the survey of the early town government by J. Cooper in Victoria History of Oxfordshire, iv. 48–64, atpp. 48–53. This seems to be the sense of article 13.

34 This high degree of concentration is not evident in Edward Miller’s interesting analysis of the list (MedievalEngland, pp. 315–16). Although he does not cite his sources there and his numbers differ somewhat from thosepresented here, his conclusions are generally quite compatible. There Miller characterizes the 15 jurats as ‘thedirectorate of an oligarchy’ (p. 310), but, as we shall see, they are, more likely, the oligarchy itself.

35 For the early development of university privilege, see C. Lawrence, ‘The university in state and church’, inHistory of the University of Oxford, i. 97–150, at pp. 125–46.

36 Cal. Close Rolls 1234–37, p. 513; those occurring in Table 2 are indicated by a ‘P’ under 1236/7.37 Text in M.A.U.O., i. 18–19; Cal. Close Rolls 1247–51, pp. 132, 216–17.



their number to four and added eight of the ‘more discrete and lawful burgesses’ toassist them in their duties.38 All twelve were to swear their fidelity to the king just asthe mayor and two bailiffs did already. Thus, their total number was fifteen, but, ofcourse, this does not mean that aldermen and their assistants (or fifteen jurats) did notexist before 1255.

The aldermen, probably always two in number, were the oldest officers of the gildmerchant, but after the establishment of the mayor’s office early in the thirteenthcentury, they are rarely mentioned in the documents. Possibly this was a consequenceof their status merely as guild officers lacking the official recognition of the mayor andbailiffs who, as royal officers, swore oaths to the king.39 Thus, aldermen are nevermentioned in earlier royal charters or in the petition of the lesser commune.Until these royal charters, the aldermen and their assistants had no explicit royalauthorization for specific civic responsibilities to which they were solemnly charged onoath. Perhaps it was also at this time that Oxford was divided into four topographicalquarters or wards meeting at Carfax, each under an alderman, as we find in thehundred rolls of 1279.40

We should expect that the fifteen jurats and the other members of the gildmerchant were also the wealthiest burgesses in Oxford.And it is likely that the personsnamed in Table 2 were predominately merchants rather than trades- or craftsmen.41

In general, Oxford’s thirteenth-century elite seems to have been a modest reflectionof London’s where, at this time, the principal merchants were occupied with wine,drapery, mercery, spices and goldsmithing, all luxury trades which were heavilydependent on royal purveyance and the other trade generated by the court.42 Indeed,Gwyn Williams, in his seminal study of London, characterized the regime there as a‘patriciate of vintners’.43 Much the same was true of Oxford, with the important royalpalaces in the northern suburbs and at nearby Woodstock which, together with itsconvenient, central location, made it a principal location for royal assemblies from thelater twelfth to the later thirteenth centuries.44 Mayor Adam Feteplace, John Coleshilland Henry Gamage were certainly important vintners, and, as we shall see, Feteplacehad close ties to the court.45 Geoffrey Aurifaber, John Coleshill, William Spicer (le

38 Text in M.A.U.O., i. 19–21; Cal. Pat. Rolls 1247–58, p. 413.39 In Nov. 1237 an unusual deed is witnessed between the mayor and two bailiffs by eight men who may be

aldermen although this is certain only for the last two, Thomas Submuro and Laurence Wyth, as indicated inTable 2 for 1237/8; none of the other six occurs there (The Mediaeval Archives of Christ Church, ed.N. Denholm-Young (Oxford Hist. Soc., xcii, Oxford, 1931), p. 37).

40 This can be seen in the returns for the south-west, north-west and north-east wards in Oxford where thereturns for each ‘aldermanria’ are headed by a different ‘aldermannus’ together with 11 ‘iurati’ (the names for thefourth, the south-east, are missing). The returns for Oxford were reprinted by R. Graham, ‘Description ofOxford from the hundred rolls, A.D. 1279’, Collectanea IV (Oxford Hist. Soc., 4th ser., xlvii, 1905), pp. 1–98, atpp. 3–7, but, unfortunately, rearranged misleadingly by parish.

41 For the following, see the survey of the town’s economy in V.C.H. Oxon, iv. 35–48, at pp. 35–8.42 Williams, esp. pp. 63–75. The same merchant structure as London and Oxford is found in other English

provincial towns (Miller, ‘English town patricians’, pp. 224–5, 239). It is clear that Oxford and its merchants werein relative economic decline in the later middle ages, as argued in a well-known article by R. H. C. Davis, ‘Theford, the river and the city’, Oxoniensia, xxxviii (1973), 258–67. But the precise chronology is elusive and thecauses were clearly varied.The evidence seems to this author to indicate that the town was still in its economicprime in the mid 13th century.

43 Williams, p. 63.44 V.C.H. Oxon, iv. 10–15.45 Calendar of Liberate Rolls 1251–60, p. 50 (31 May 1252); Cal. Close Rolls 1254–6, p. 106 (26 June 1255).



Sauser), John Halegod and Henry Perle were all offering cloth to the king’s purveyorsat the Northampton fair in 1248.46

Surnames in Table 2 include one mercer and four spicers, and there were, no doubt,others where trade was not reflected in their surnames, which were highly fluid in thisperiod.47 Still, surnames are not a certain guide to current occupation, and we must,moreover, beware of assuming occupational exclusiveness from such designations andother evidences of employment. As in London, merchants might deal in commoditiesother than those of their principal trade. Such was the case for John Coleshill in wineand cloth; in 1255 William Spicer was fined the substantial sum of one mark – as wasColeshill – for breach of the wine assize.48 Some of the more affluent may also haveattempted to profit through risky financial dealings, as seems to have been the case forGeoffrey Stockwell in 1244.49 In one important respect, however, Oxford’s elite seemsto have differed sharply from London’s: there is little evidence for the same impressivecontinuity of early urban dynasties. Among the greater burgesses only WalterKepeharm bears the surname of an important early family.50 Oxford was certainly amerchant oligarchy but not a hereditary patriciate.51

Do the articles of complaint presented by the lesser commune correspond generally tothe nature and economic interests of Oxford’s oligarchy? If we try to categorize thetwenty-seven articles by primary concern, we find approximately the followingdistribution: unjust/illegitimate tallage and other taxation (articles 5, 6, 9, 10, 13, 20, 23);abusive/corrupt use of office and status (articles 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 12, 18, 19, 22, 24, 25,26, 27, and the list of those to be excluded from the royal inquisition); and unfair/discriminatory occupational and trade restrictions (articles 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 21). Ofcourse, it would be possible to categorize these matters differently, and the distinctionbetween unjust taxes and corrupt use of office, in particular, is often a very fine one.Nevertheless, certain main points are well established.

Tallage was an arbitrary royal tax levied by the king only on his ancient royaldemesne, to which Oxford, London and most major provincial towns pertained.As such, it retained much-resented connotations of its servile origins, and waslevied frequently under Henry III.52 Thus, issues relating to tallage were particularlysore points both at Oxford and elsewhere. At London this was a primary cause forcomplaint by the commonalty, and their anger was exacerbated by the regular practice

46 Cal. Liberate Rolls 1245–51, p. 319.47 Second names in this period were still normally not true surnames, and it is risky to draw firm

genealogical, occupational or geographical connections solely on their evidence. Patronymics also continued tobe common, and only later in the century did these various forms increasingly become fixed as family names.Documents could vary surnames according to circumstances.Thomas and Adam Submuro also bore patronymicsas ‘filii Walteri’, and one important burgess not on the list but possibly still alive was variously William Abel orCutler or de Hoyland who also dealt in cloth.

48 Cal. Close Rolls 1254–6, p. 106; for local merchants employing weavers, see below.49 Cal. Close Rolls 1242–7, pp. 191 (28 May 1244), 274 (8 Dec. 1244).50 However, he is not included in the impressive Kepeharm descent assembled in V.C.H. Oxon, iv. 4, 67;

Geoffrey Henxey was married to Joan Kepeharm from the last named generation of the family documentedthere.

51 The author is not convinced by Edward Miller’s evidence for Oxford dynasties in ‘English town patricians’,which is too scattered and anecdotal (pp. 221–2), but Miller too recognizes the problematic nature of the term‘patrician’ in an English context (p. 217). However, birth was, of course, an advantage, and some intermarriagecertainly occurred (e.g., see below for Nicholas Kingston).

52 See Mitchell, pp. 340–3, with n. 188 for urban tallages and aids in this period.



of the patricians there to purchase individual exemptions from the king.53 Such royallyauthorized exemptions were not common in Oxford. There is only one recordedinstance known to this author: William [Abel] le Cuteler de Hoyland was grantedthis privilege in 1232 at the petition of Brother Hamo de Faversham, head of theFranciscans in England, because William was the proctor of their Oxford house, andthe privilege was renewed for life in October 1252.54 This singular exemption may havebeen a source of particular contention because, as noted above, William had beenmurdered by late September 1253. But the charge of the lesser commune is of a moregeneral nature: as the court rumours reported by William de Exemouth alleged (article9), the magnates simply exempted themselves arbitrarily so that, by the account of thelesser commune, only three of the greater burgesses contributed to all taxes as did they(prologue to the petition and article 13).55 Articles 10 and 20 show, moreover, that, evenif tallage was not collected inequitably, there was no confidence among the lesserburgesses regarding its assessment by municipal officials.

Salter thought rightly that the very first charge regarding an allegedly fictitious papalprivilege was quite bizarre (article 1), and in his view it may have undermined thecredibility of much else in the petition. But the mayoralty of Geoffrey Stockwellindicated therein coincided with the unprecedented April 1238 attack at Oseney onthe cardinal legate Otto by scholars.56 As a result the legate placed Oxford underinterdict, and the king sealed the town while a massive investigation and roundup ofclerks living with townsmen took place.57 Although the burgesses appear to have beeninnocent parties, they were victims of these draconian measures, and some may havebeen caught up in the proceedings of church courts which are alluded to in article 1,since the suspects were delivered to Oxford’s ordinary, Robert Grossteste, bishop ofLincoln, for punishment. In such circumstances, municipal efforts to seek ecclesiasticalrelief might seem reasonable even if misguided and fruitless – and possiblymisunderstood by the petitioners. The clear instances of corruption are the sort thatone might expect when all public accountability is lacking (for example articles 7 and8), and it still is not unusual for the rich and powerful to treat public property as theirown and arrogantly to expect their inferiors to conform to their wishes (for examplearticles 18 and 25). Intimidation and threats of bodily harm (article 26) were commonin the thirteenth century and probably practised most frequently by the aristocracy.Perhaps the point here of greatest potential interest to the crown was the charge inarticle 24 that royal writs were being quashed. The predominance of vintners amongthe greater burgesses (see above) may be reflected – not without some malicioushumour – in article 22.There it is charged that the greater burgesses purchased threetuns of wine for their own consumption at the expense of the lesser commune andthen quarreled so violently over its distribution that ‘they fought and pulled the hairsfrom their heads’.58

53 Williams, pp. 198–9.54 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1225–32, p. 469; Cal. Close Rolls 1251–3, p. 172; for Abel, see also below.55 Salter (Snappe’s Formulary, p. 272, n. 1) thought that these three contributors would not be among the list

of greater burgesses in Table 2, but that is not certain. It is also notable that in article 23 of the petition, 12 ofthe 15 jurats made a false declaration, leaving three jurats who may have appeared honest to the lesser commune.We shall return to this issue below.

56 Lawrence, ‘University in state and church’, pp. 143–4.57 Lists of the suspects and their landlords, who appear to be mostly modest persons, are printed in Cal. Close

Rolls 1237–42, pp. 134–6.58 Salter, Snappe’s Formulary, p. 278: ‘pugnaverunt et capillos capitis detraxerunt’.



It is undoubtedly among the occupational and trade restrictions that the immediateinterests of the greater commune are most directly represented. Three such chargesdeserve particular attention here. From the very early twelfth century the gildmerchant of Oxford had a monopoly under royal charter of trade (mercaturam) in thecity and suburbs.59 It is a moot point whether this privilege also included minor localtradesmen and retailers, but it was clearly intended to exclude the members of twoancient craft guilds which had their own royal charters, for which they paid an annualfee to the king: the cordwainers and the weavers.60 Conflicts between the greatmerchants of London, which had no gild merchant, and members of the craft guildswere at the root of civic developments there in the later thirteenth and earlyfourteenth century.61 So it would not be odd if something similar happened inOxford. The effort to force all ‘workmen’ (‘operarios’), even ‘servi’, to join the gild,although it is cast somewhat awkwardly as an attempt to oppress the poor, shouldprobably also be seen as an attempt to enforce the gild’s monopoly of trade.62

Cordwainers and other workers in the leather crafts, some of whom traded inleather on a large scale and were undoubtedly prosperous, may have been a particularobject of merchant machinations. On the other hand, the weavers were clearly indecline as an independent craft during the later thirteenth century. Article 14 isparticularly interesting here because it shows in detail how Oxford’s larger clothmerchants could dominate the craft, as in London, by requiring weaving equipmentwhich was too complex and expensive for modest individual craftsmen to procure forthemselves.63 In a suit brought by the weavers’ guild in 1275 three Oxford merchants,Geoffrey Aurifaber, Nicholas Kingston and Henry Owen, were accused of employingnon-guild weavers by providing them with their ‘utensilia’.64

Unlike London, which had a powerful guild of fishmongers operating under royalcharter, the sale of fish often appears to have been a secondary source of income inOxford, and fishmongers were seldom prominent citizens.65 Sale of fish would be aparticularly attractive sideline for vintners who procured their wine from seaports,in Oxford’s case predominately from Southampton. This is possibly how we shouldunderstand the three articles on the sale of fish. By excluding purchases within aradius of ten leagues (approximately thirty miles) for saltwater fish and five leagues(approximately fifteen miles) for freshwater fish (article 15), they would make itdifficult and expensive for smaller Oxford traders and victuallers to procure fish forresale in Oxford from nearby regional markets such as Abingdon (article 21). Thehigher rentals imposed for market stalls would likewise favour the large merchants of

59 Charter of Henry II (1154–62) printed from an Elizabethan ‘inspeximus’ in Royal Letters Addressed to Oxford,ed. O. Ogle (Oxford, 1892), p. 4.

60 See the accounts of these guilds by A. Crossley in V.C.H. Oxon, iv. 312–27, at pp. 312–13 (cordwainers),316 (weavers).

61 Williams, esp. pp. 167–77.62 Presumably, these ‘servi’ are journeymen pursuing their crafts on their own account, not ‘serfs’.63 See the remarks in Miller, ‘English town patricians’, pp. 223–4. For the analogous situation in London, see

Williams, pp. 173–6, who remarks there that ‘the weavers as a whole were the great absentees of political life’(p. 175); also true of Oxford. Perhaps this provision should also be seen as an effort by the merchants to securethe quality of the Oxford cloth which they were offering at the great English fairs such as those atNorthampton and St. Ives.

64 Select Cases in the Exchequer of Pleas, ed. H. Jenkinson and B. E. R. Formoy (Selden Soc., xlviii, 1932)(hereafter Select Cases), no. 134, pp. 74–5.

65 For London, see Williams, p. 173; for Oxford, see V.C.H. Oxon, iv. 44–6, where the evidence for fishmongersis all quite late and sparse. In the 16th century chandlers often practised fishmongery as a sideline.



the greater commune (article 16). Thus, these requirements for the fish trade wouldbenefit more substantial merchants.

The abuses charged by the lesser commune are largely credible. Many of thesepractices were certainly questionable and even reprehensible, but they were notnecessarily illegal. We would like to know how Justice Walerand disposed of them. Aclue here is provided by a very similar bill of complaint from Oxford forty years later.In late 1293 or early 1294 two Oxford men, Philip Spicer and John Log, evidentlypersons of modest status, brought a suit by writ of trespass before the barons of theexchequer against eight prominent past and present officers of the town.66 One ofthem, the vintner Henry Gamage, was last on the list of Oxford’s greater burgesses in1253, and the charges themselves are remarkably similar to the earlier petition, eventhough this later action was brought by formal writ and tried by jury. Those chargeswere, however, limited to fraudulent taxation and abuse of authority, and there are noallegations of abusive occupational and trade restrictions. Probably this results fromthe narrower legal focus of the later action. The defendants vigorously disputed thecharges, and the matter was referred to the sheriff for trial at Oxford by jury. We donot know the membership of the jury, but we may reasonably suspect that it wasdrawn from substantial persons of local importance. In the event, all of the accusedwere acquitted completely, and their accusers were fined for false accusation. No doubtthis was what the lesser commune anticipated in 1253 when they attempted to excludethe greater burgesses from the requested inquisition.They feared – evidently with goodreason – that the magnates would close ranks against them and collude with royalofficials.67

Despite the many signs of unrest and conflict noted above and Justice Walerand’sinvestigation, there is no direct evidence that the petition had any later effect inOxford, and the greater burgesses’ tight hold on local authority continued largelyunbroken, as is evident in Tables 1 and 2. This is seen most strikingly in AdamFeteplace’s succession of mayoralties: between 1244 and 1268 he appears to have heldthat office in up to fourteen out of twenty-four years. His remarkable tenure wasprobably due in large part to his connections with the court, which he would haveknown well as a vintner. In 1257 the king’s unpopular half-brother,William deValence,secured the lease of the manor of Wantage in Berkshire for Feteplace, who laterestablished the seat of his family at nearby North Denchworth.68 But, as we shall see,his high-profile royal connection was not without risk. We know that partisans ofreform must have been numerous there because Oxford was fined 500 marks (ofwhich 300 were subsequently remitted by Lord Edward) because ‘they were said tohave adhered to the enemies of the king and himself ’.69

Still, is there any evidence to link the petition and associated circumstances indirectlyto the subsequent baronial reform movement and revolt? We might approach thisproblem first by asking who was not on the lesser commune’s ‘enemies list’ and who

66 T. Madox, Firma Burgi: or, an Historical Essay Concerning the Cities,Towns and Buroughs of England, taken fromRecords (1726), pp. 94–5, n. z (this author’s English translation is available at <http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/10893/>); such cases are discussed in Select Cases, pp. cii–cviii. For Log, see Salter, Survey of Oxford, i. 214(S.E.99); Spicer, as a ‘merchant of Oxford’, earlier had some dealings in wool (Cal.Pat.Rolls 1266–72, p.691 (1272)).Neither plaintiff was prominent in Oxford government, but they had the means to bring an expensive suit.

67 See the examples in Hilton, p. 137.68 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1247–58, p. 581. For the country properties of Feteplace and other Oxford magnates, see

Miller, ‘English town patricians’, pp. 231–2.69 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1258–66, p. 576 (3 Apr. 1266).



were the three greater burgesses who exceptionally paid tallage, not necessarily thesame people. Thomas Spicer, whose name is absent from the list, seems to have beenbailiff in two years immediately before the petition, but he does not occur later andmay have been dead or removed from Oxford by 1253.70 Salter thought that thevintner, Peter Torald, Oxford’s leading mayor before the emergence of Adam Feteplace,was also one of those intended, but it is likely that he last held that office in 1243/4and he was not witnessing local deeds after the late twelve-forties, so it is not certainthat he was even still alive in 1253.71 Two other omissions from the lesser commune’slist may, however, be significant. Hugo le Cordwainer was bailiff in 1249/50 andRobert Bonvalet, also a cordwainer, held that office in 1253/4.These are the only twocordwainers that this author has been able to identify as active in Oxford governmentduring this entire period. They both must have been men of substance to bear theexpense and risk of the bailiff’s office. Despite this, there is no strong evidence forthe kind of craft ‘revolution’ which Williams has described in London. Simon deMontfort’s prominent local partisans in Oxford must have come from factions withinthe merchant oligarchy opposed to one another for whatever reasons, personal andpublic, and to Adam Feteplace’s local domination.

We need also to recognize the important role of the university in these events.The royal privileges granted in 1248 and 1255 (see above) show that this still relativelynew corporation was already having a profound influence on the constitutionaldevelopment of the town as the crown tried to protect its members from theexigencies of urban life.Throughout the history of ‘town and gown’, the relationshipbetween two such radically different corporations was not always friendly andharmonious, although the degree of cordiality or hostility must have variedconsiderably depending upon the social group involved.72 The university’s presence inthe petition is faint, but in article 3 the masters of the university are mentioned withapproval for urging Aymer de Lusignan to seek remedy for the lesser commune whenthey had been mulcted to compensate for the fatal assault on his baker; at the end ofthe petition the participation of university clerks in the proposed inquisition isinvited.73 Walter of Milton and his associates must have seen them as potential alliesagainst the greater commune who controlled the economic and legal machinery whichthe university was seeking to reform. Still, we are very poorly informed about dailyinteractions between townsmen and scholars unless they resulted in violence.74 Onesuch spectacular incident occurred early in 1264 as the final dramatic events of Simonde Montfort’s baronial rebellion began to unroll.

Oxford was at their very centre. It is likely, as Salter suggested, that the absence ofthe important vintner, Nicholas Kingston, from the petition is in some way significant.Kingston had already served as bailiff during Feteplace’s second successive mayoralty in

70 There are no indications that he is identical with Thomas Mauger, son of Mauger the vintner, but thatpossibility cannot be excluded.

71 He was to be paid £12 for wine in 1251/2 but his name in the entry is defective and the debt might beolder (Cal. Liberate Rolls 1251–60, p. 50). He is not mentioned in the lesser commune’s petition, which couldeither witness to his benevolence or to his absence.

72 There is a survey in C. I. Hammer, ‘Oxford town and Oxford university’, in History of the University ofOxford, iii, ed. J. K. McConica (Oxford, 1986), pp. 69–116.

73 See the comment in H. W. Ridgeway, ‘The ecclesiastical career of Aymer de Lusignan, bishop elect ofWinchester, 1250–60’, in The Cloister and the World: Essays in Medieval History in Honour of Barbara Harvey, ed.J. Blair and B. Golding (Oxford, 1996), pp. 148–77, at p. 176.

74 E.g., early in his local career in May 1232,Adam Feteplace was imprisoned by the sheriff along with severalothers for ‘beating and wounding clerks, Oxford scholars’ (Cal. Close Rolls 1231–4, p. 63, cf. pp. 43, 47, 49, 55, 57).



1245/6 and again in the contested period around 1252 when the sheriff was sitting inthe hustengs court.75 But only ten years later, during the baronial reform in 1261/2, didhe again hold civic office, when he first served as mayor. From 1270/1 onwards he wasOxford’s dominant mayoral figure and was intermarried with several prominentOxford families.76 Unfortunately, we know nothing about his political views, but hissecond, tumultuous mayoralty in 1263/4 may provide some indirect clues.

In late February 1264 Lord Edward, newly returned from France, was hurrying tothe west with a large retinue of mercenaries.77 When he reached Oxford, the gateswere barred against him.78 However, some scholars took umbrage at this prudentsecurity measure, which hindered their extra-mural sports, and they destroyedSmithgate and gave its remnants a mock funeral.79 They were arrested by MayorKingston and the bailiffs, William Spicer Jr. and Geoffrey Henxey, all named inthe vivid and well-informed contemporary description by Robert of Gloucester(ll. 11,204–6). These officers refused to turn the offenders over to the chancellor, andtheir defiance elicited another, larger and more destructive scholarly riot. Summonedby the bell of St. Mary the Virgin, the scholars evidently fired ‘the portereves [bailiffs’]house’ and set about pillaging the south-eastern part of the town from the spicery tothe vintnery where the hated officers conducted their businesses (ll. 11,223–9).80

King Henry, promptly informed of the tumult by two Oxford Dominicans, wroteto the university and the town from Rochester on 28 February, admonishing bothparties to a final settlement.81 Then, on 12 March, anticipating the great royalist counciland muster summoned to Oxford for 30 March, the king ordered the university todisperse, no doubt to avoid the risk of further spontaneous violence.82 In June thisorder was rescinded, and the university may have resumed formally in the autumn forMichaelmas term, but many scholars must have remained away.We shall see that manyof them were probably attending the schools of Northampton, a baronial strongholdwhich the king had taken after leaving Oxford in early April. In September the townmust again have been in turmoil because on 8 September – with the king now, afterLewes (14 May), a baronial prisoner – a letter was sent under his name to Kingston,Spicer and Henxey from Canterbury warning of ‘certain persons from your town who,with men of the same as well as others outside the town daily make illicit assembliesand confederations for the upset of your town and your interests (‘partes’)’; theseoutside agitators even included a multitude of foreign Jews from whom turbulence wasto be feared.83

75 Salter, Cartulary of the Hospital of St John the Baptist, i. 69.76 See Salter, Survey of Oxford, i. 6–7 (N.E. 5: Somenour’s Inn), 106 (N.E. 144: second shop); and Survey of

Oxford, ii. 189 (N. 22: Mareyshall).We, of course, do not know the dates of these marriage alliances with JohnColeshill, William Eu and Henry Perle respectively.

77 The master political narrative for the following is still Powicke, pp. 456–502, 784–7; see now also Lawrence,‘University in state and church’, pp. 128–31.

78 As Powicke suggested (p. 785), this was probably not a show of opposition; on his return to Oxford Edwarddid not punish the town as he had Gloucester (p. 458).

79 The Metrical Chronicle of Robert of Gloucester, ed. W. A.Wright (2 vols., Rolls ser., lxxxvi, 1887) (hereafterMetrical Chronicle), ii. 741–8, at ll. 11,201–3, p. 742: ‘and suþþe [then] þoru beumond [Beaumont]. to hare welleit [the Gate] bere. and “subvenite sancti”. vaste gonne singe. as me deþ wan a ded man. me wole to putte bringe.’

80 The other topographical evidence for these merchant locations is thin (see J. Cooper in V.C.H. Oxon, iv.22–35, at p. 27).

81 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1258–66, p. 383.82 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1258–66, pp. 307, 320; M.A.U.O., i. 24–6; this interpretation of Henry’s motives differs from

Powicke (p. 784), and Lawrence (C. Lawrence, ‘The university of Oxford and the chronicle of the Barons’ Wars’,Eng. Hist. Rev., xcv (1980), 99–113, at p. 109), who emphasize the king’s concern for the scholars’ safety.

83 Cal. Close Rolls 1261–4, pp. 363–4.



This letter, with its antisemitic jibe, reflects the immediate concerns of Simon deMontfort and the baronial party.84 During Kingston’s incumbency Oxford was clearlyconsidered a secure enough place for the royalists to hold their major assembly there.This does not mean that Kingston was unsympathetic to reform, but his first concernmust have been the safety of his town and his own economic interests. No doubt hisresolve was strengthened by his senior bailiff, Geoffrey Henxey, who was associated asbailiff with Feteplace fully seven times.This cautious and calculated civic neutrality wasabout to change radically.

One of the very ‘greatest’ burgesses identified by the lesser commune in 1253 wasNicholas Stockwell, third on their list, who was mayor in 1248/9 during the five-yearhiatus in Feteplace’s early progress, and he again served as mayor in 1257/8 after afour-year run by Feteplace. We do not know his business, but he was clearly wellsituated from an early period in his civic career. In 1245 he received the lease of theformer house of the Jew, David, which was now owned by the house of Jewishconverts in London.85 This connection, like his surname and that of his father,Richard, may point to a London origin for the family.86 At first sight, he may seem anunlikely reformer because the lesser commune complained in their petition about twoinstances of abuses during his earlier term as mayor (articles 2 and 6). But politicalopportunism knows no consistent ideology.

On 22 October 1264 letters patent were sent from Westminster certifyingStockwell’s oath to the king after due election by the ‘bailiffs, good men and wholecommonalty of Oxford’, and charging the bailiffs and good men to ‘be intendent’ tohim as they had been to other mayors.87 Stockwell’s election may have been byrevolutionary means.We know little of the actual procedures for electing early mayors,but we may suppose that the electorate was restricted, as was that for the bailiffsaccording to the lesser commune. All early royal notices of the privilege to electmayors and the confirmations of elections in royal letters are addressed solely to the‘probi homines’ or ‘good men’ of Oxford as electors, which indicates a very restrictedelectorate.88 But the first inclusion at this critical point in 1264 of a larger body ofelectors, the ‘commonalty’ or ‘communitas’ of the freemen, would be quite consistentwith the reformers’ objectives and, very likely, a political necessity to bypass astill-recalcitrant and largely royalist oligarchy.

Perhaps the innovation stuck, since the commonalty was also invoked in the royalconfirmation of Feteplace’s election in 1266.89 A novel electoral procedure mightaccount as well for the explicit endorsement of Stockwell’s authority and, like theearlier royal letter of September, it may also reflect a certain unease among the baronialparty regarding the stability of their support in Oxford.90 But in the event, animportant baronial assembly was rescheduled from Northampton to Oxford on 25

84 At this time, ‘Things anathema to Henry were said in the king’s name and done under his seal’ (Powicke,p. 486). Jews were clearly targets of the baronial party, as we shall see shortly for Oxford, but whether this wasa distinguishing ideological feature is unclear to this author, particularly in light of later events under theiropponent, Lord Edward.

85 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1232–47, p. 453; Salter, Survey of Oxford, i. 226–7 (S.E. 131: Lower Gild Hall).86 This author is not, however, aware of any connection with his namesake and predecessor on the list,

Geoffrey Stockwell.87 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1258–66, p. 354.88 Cal. Close Rolls 1227–31, p. 500 (1231); Cal. Close Rolls 1234–7, p. 297 (1236); Cal. Pat. Rolls 1232–47, p. 198

(1237); Cal. Close Rolls 1237–42, p. 229 (1240).89 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1266–72, p. 10.90 Similar solicitude accompanied the royally mandated election of Peter Torald as mayor in 1240 (Cal. Close

Rolls 1237–42, pp. 341, 343).



November and de Montfort brought the king along for an abortive meeting with theMarchers there. In January 1265 Stockwell would likely have attended de Montfort’sinnovative parliament, which was the first to summon a substantial number of townrepresentatives.91 There, an important piece of Oxford business was evidentlyconcluded, for on 1 February a letter close was sent under the king’s name dissolvingthe newly established university at Northampton to the benefit of ‘municipiumnostrum Oxonie’.92 The dispersal of the university in the previous year must have beenparticularly devastating for the small traders and craftsmen who rented quarters andlodged scholars and supplied their daily needs.This singular baronial benefit to newly‘reformed’ Oxford must also have been a political benefit for the town’s chiefrepresentative, Nicholas Stockwell.

Thus, it is not surprising that when Simon de Montfort’s rapacious son, Simon Jr.,reached Oxford on his dilatory way to Kenilworth in July 1265 he was received there intriumph. Robert of Gloucester tells us that he spent three days at Oxford, and ‘Vairorefolc ne mighte be pan wip him was pere’.93 At Oxford he attempted a pogrom and, nodoubt, extortion against the local Jews as he had at Winchester, but it failedfor lack of any Jews, who had clearly taken their cue from the awful depredationsat Winchester. But Simon Jr. found another sheep to fleece. He forced the mostprominent and affluent local royalist,Adam Feteplace, to enfeoff Master Guy, his father’stailor and supporter, with rent in Oxford worth ten marks.94 The humiliation of settlinga tailor’s bill surely heightened the sting of the financial penalty. Small wonder that afterthe baronial disaster at Evesham on 4 August, Stockwell’s political fortunes were quicklyreversed.Adam Feteplace was rehabilitated by the crown and held the mayoralty for thenext three years until his retirement to the Berkshire countryside.95 Stockwell evidentlycontinued for a short time in Oxford, as did his son, Richard, who had been a bailiff toFeteplace’s regime in the year of the special eyre 1259/60; they continued to controllocal property but both disappeared from the civic fasti.96

The earl’s tailor, Master Guy or Guido, provides a final element in this story.As Guido the Armerer he married an important local woman and established himselfas a major property-holder in Oxford.97 He was evidently also a member of thecraft-dominated ‘communa mediocris populi’ of London and was identified by royalistsas a leading rebel there in 1263.98 We know that his Oxford widow, Agnes, was close

91 M. McKisack, The Parliamentary Representation of the English Boroughs during the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1932),pp. 1–3. Summoning some burgesses to parliament was not without precedent, but de Montfort seems to havemade a particularly broad effort to mobilize the parliamentary support of his partisans in provincial towns inaddition to London and the Cinque Ports (J. R. Maddicott, The Origins of the English Parliament, 924–1327(Oxford, 2010), pp. 257–61).

92 Cal. Close Rolls 1264–8, pp. 92–3; see Lawrence, ‘University of Oxford’, pp. 110–12, and his ‘University instate and church’, pp. 129–30, where the role of the former university chancellor, Bishop Thomas Cantilupe, inthis (for Oxford ) favourable act is emphasized.

93 Metrical Chronicle, ii. 760–1, at l. 11,639.94 Cal. Inq. Misc. 1219–1307, no. 294, pp. 101–2; Salter, Snappe’s Formulary, pp. 284–5. Guido evidently resisted

restoring the rent (Cal. Close Rolls 1264–8, pp. 190–1).95 As a ‘burgess of Oxford’ Feteplace was granted simple royal protection already on 22 Aug. 1265 (Cal. Pat.

Rolls 1258–66, p. 422).96 E.g., both witnessed a deed for St. Frideswide’s on 30 July 1266 (Mediaeval Archives of Christ Church, p. 29),

but this author has not been able to trace them further with any confidence.97 For Guido’s properties, see the index to Salter, Survey of Oxford, ii, sub ‘Armerer’ and ‘Scissor’, with

genealogical chart there on p. 167.98 Williams, p. 339, and see pp. 228–9 for commentary. Neither Oxford nor London is included in the

extensive and detailed royal ‘Inquisitiones de Rebellibus’ made directly after Evesham in 1265 (Cal. Inq. Misc.1219–1307, nos. 609–940, pp. 186–288; for Oxfordshire, nos. 852–5, pp. 260–2).



to the local Franciscans because she donated property to them.99 Laurence Wyth, the‘greater burgess’, whose civic career was over by the date of the petition (see above),may also have been a benefactor of the Oxford Franciscans in the first year (1246/7)that he held the mayoralty during the early five-year hiatus in Feteplace’sincumbency.100 William Abel, the cutler murdered in 1253, had been the Franciscans’proctor (see above).101

This very tenuous Franciscan connection is particularly interesting because OxfordFranciscans and scholars associated with them were the ideological ‘brains trust’ of thereform movement.102 We may wonder about the effect of their sermons preached tothe local congregations who attended the large new Franciscan church in St. Ebbe’sparish. Perhaps in studied contrast, during Lent in March 1264 before the great royalistassembly at Oxford, the king had stayed for three weeks with the Dominicans welloutside the town to the south. According to Robert of Gloucester, Henry was visiblyinfluenced by their wise counsel, and they urged him to stage a spectacular piece ofpolitical theatre, evidently to win the support of the town. The king, surrounded byDominicans who ‘massen and orisons vaste vor him bede’ (l. 11,321), entered the towngates and made a royal peace with Oxford’s civic patroness, St. Frideswide.103

The many elements in Oxford’s society all played their various roles during thetumultuous incumbencies of Kingston and Stockwell. The battle at Evesham clearlyput an end to any possible social revolution in Oxford. The lesser commune hadapparently caused some temporary political upset but failed to incite any detectablepermanent reform. Still, some of their concerns were carried forward in a modifiedform by the baronial reformers, who, although they also failed – disastrously – in theend, did influence later developments. After the final departure of Adam Feteplace in1268 a new political generation joined Kingston in town government, just as hisgeneration had displaced that of Peter Torald in the mid twelve-forties.This new groupincluded Henry Owen, twice bailiff with Mayor Kingston in 1267/8 and 1271/2, andmayor for the first time in the following year, 1272/3. Owen was the party mostprominently accused in the failed suit by Philip Spicer and John Log in the earlytwelve-nineties, where his alleged ‘trespasses’ were quite similar to those complainedabout by the lesser commune (see above). Now, however, both plaintiffs and defendantsinvoked the approval of the ‘commonalty’ as a protective mantra.Thus, during the laterthirteenth century the terms of political discourse had moved on. But, if we look atthe underlying reality rather than the appearance, we may conclude that it was a verylong time indeed before municipal government in Oxford opened significantly andthen only to an urban community at the end of the medieval period which was muchless important than that of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.104 In the meantime, themore things changed, the more they stayed the same in the home of lost causes.

99 A. G. Little, The Grey Friars in Oxford (Oxford Hist. Soc., xx, Oxford, 1892), p. 14; see Salter, Survey ofOxford, ii. 19–20.

100 Cal. Pat. Rolls 1232–47, p. 494 (27 Nov. 1246); Little, p. 299. It is difficult to say whether this transaction wasentirely voluntary; this author cannot identify it in Salter’s Survey of Oxford.

101 Mag. Guido’s Oxford reincarnation as an ‘armeror’ would be quite comprehensible if there were someconnection to William Abel, e.g. marriage, since cutlery and weapon making were closely allied metal crafts, butnothing is known about Abel’s family, and this author is unable to establish any connection.

102 J. R. Maddicott, Simon de Montfort (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 250–5, 274–5.103 Metrical Chronicle, ii. 746–7; Henry’s chief Dominican mentor, ‘frer Ion’ (l. 11,317) must be John de

Darlington.104 See C. I. Hammer, ‘Anatomy of an oligarchy: the Oxford town council in the 15th and 16th centuries’,

Jour. British Stud., xviii (1978), 1–27.



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Complaints of Lesser Commune, Oligarchic Rule and Baronial Reform in 13ch Oxford

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