Paul's
churchyard, where majority decision was a tradition. By 1032, it
had lost much of its power to the husting [household assembly in
Danish] court. The folkmoot then had responsibility for order and
was the sole authority for proclaiming outlaws. It met three times
a year at St. Paul's churchyard and there acclaimed the sheriff
and justiciar, or if the king had chosen his officer, heard who
was chosen and listened to his charge. It also yearly arranged the
watch and dealt with risks of fire. It was divided into wards,
each governed by an alderman who presided over the ward-mote, and
represented his ward at the folk-mote. Each guild became a ward.
The chief alderman was the portreeve. London paid one-eighth of
all the taxes of England.
Later in the towns, merchant guilds grew out of charity
associations whose members were bound by oath to each other and
got together for a guild feast every month. Some traders of these
merchant guilds became so prosperous that they became landholders.
Many market places were dominated by a merchant guild, which had a
monopoly of the local trade. In the great mercantile towns all the
land and houses would be held by merchants and their dependents,
all freeholders were connected with a trade, and everyone who had
a claim on public office or magistry would be a member of the
guild. The merchant guild could admit into their guild country
villeins, who became freemen if unclaimed by their lords for a
year and a day.
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