the stormy times of the Barons’ Wars onwards which gave
a democratic stamp to the terms we are discussing. In
London, while Simon de Montfort was triumphant, they
advanced an exclusive claim to be the commune of the city,
“ excipientes aldermannos et alios discrètes civitatis,” ¹
and they took advantage of the struggle between Edward II
and the Lords Ordainers to grasp some control of the execu-
tive for the commonalty.² Later still, when they claimed
the sole right of nominating and electing the mayor, the
aidermen objected, almost plaintively, that they too were
citizens and of the community of the city, and the commoners
were restricted to the nomination of two ex-sheriffs, from whom
the mayor and aidermen chose one.³

It is more than questionable, however, despite Stubbs’
opinion,⁴ whether Communitas in the style “ maior, aldermanni,
et (tota) Communitas,” as used in royal letters or in formal
city documents, ever had this narrowed meaning. In the
almost equally common “ maior (et vicecomites) et com-
munitas ” it was certainly employed in its comprehensive
sense and, awkward as it is, the fuller style no more implied
that Communitas did not include the mayor and aidermen
than the modern “ mayor, aidermen, and burgesses ” implies
that they are not burgesses. The apparent ambiguity is the
result of combining the particular and the general in one
brief formula.⁵

Another burghal term which acquired a secondary and
narrower signification was prudhommes (probi homines).
Long used by the royal chancery as equivalent to burgenses,^β
it had become restricted on local lips to the governing body.
When, therefore, in 1312 the burgesses of Bristol refused to re-
ceive a royal mandate to the “ maior, ballivi, et probi homines ”
of the town until Communitas was added,’ it is unnecessary
to suppose that the chancery had been taking sides with the
minority in the local strife.

Reverting to the formula burgenses et Communitas, the

¹ Liber de Antiquis Legibus, pp. 55, 80, 86, 149.

^, Munim Gιldh. London, ɪ 141-4.                    ³ Ibid. p. 20.

⁴ Const Hist ɪi § 185, p. ι68 (2nd ed.).

⁵ As Commumtas, however, was used ɪn ordinary parlance, especially
in the towns themselves, in a narrow as well as a wide sense, it will be well
to translate it by " community ” when it is employed with this wide mean-
ing, and not by “ commonalty ” which became as ambiguous as the Latin
word. Comunete, comounte, co(m)munιte, being more rarely used, almost
escaped this double meaning. See N E.D.

⁶ Below, p. 286 и 5                                  ⁷ Rot Parl ι. 359.

disjunctive interpretation finds no support even in the town
charters of the fifteenth century, in which both terms are
invariably used in their original and wider sense.¹ Inter-
esting confirmation of the equivalence of burgenses (or cives)
and communitas in official language is found in the exception
made for the towns in the acts of resumption of 1464 and 1485.²
For their safety, the actual titles under which they acted and
were addressed are enumerated to the length of nearly a folio
column, seeming to include almost every possible variation
on mayor, bailiffs, aidermen, citizens (burgesses), and com-
munity, but lest the list should not be absolutely complete,
more general provisos were added at the end, one of which is
highly significant for our present point : “ nor (shall the act
extend) to the citizens or Commonaltie of any cite nor to the
burgeises or commonaltie of any borough.” Formulas of
address were sometimes expanded to meet possible legal ob-
jections to the validity of grants enjoyed under varying titles.
Thus a reduction of fee farm was made in 1462 to “ the mayor
and bailiffs, burgesses, men and community of our town of
Northampton, and their heirs and successors, by whatsoever
name they are incorporated, called or known.” ³ Here bur-
gesses, men, and community are clearly equivalents recited ex
abundantia cautelae.

When, therefore, Henry IV in x404, instead of granting
his second charter to the citizens of Norwich simply, as all
previous kings had done, made his grant to “ the citizens and
community,” I do not believe with Mr. Hudson ⁱ that the
king’s chancery clerks were distinguishing between the ruling
class and the body of the citizens or, indeed, thought they
were making any real 'change whatever. They were merely,
somewhat belatedly, adapting an old loose style to the more
modern ideas which required an expression of corporateness.
It is true that in their party conflicts the twenty-four prud-
hommes with the ex-mayors and sheriffs and other “ sufficient
persons,” the gens d'estat of the city, took the view, in 1414,
that they alone were the citizens, and that communitas in
the charter had encouraged the “ commonalty ” to assert
that every person of the lowest reputation had as much
authority and power in the affairs of the city as the most
sufficient ; and accordingly they recommended that it should

¹Cal Charter Rolls, vι. passim.            ^t Rot. Parl. v 515; vɪ. 338.

^, Markham and Cox, Records of Northampton, i. 91.

^, Records of Norwich (1906), i, lxvι.

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