252 MERCHANT GILD, FEE FARM, COMMUNE
right and that the “ skivins ” of the oath were only the
aidermen in the new communal setting,1 though later attempts
may have been made to substitute a body differently con-
stituted. Oxford’s contemporary assumption of a communal
seal was perhaps an immediate repercussion of the movement
in her mother city.
The circumstances in which the commune of London was
granted were tumultuous and, though Richard of Devizes is
not supported by other accounts in asserting that the magnates
were forced to swear to preserve it,2 it bore at least a super-
ficial resemblance to the more violent kind of continental
communa jurata, it was a Conjuratio which, he says, neither
Henry II nor Richard would have permitted for a million
marks of silver. Neither Richard on his return nor John as
king ever created a sworn commune by charter in England,
though John at least founded them freely in his continental
dominions. Nevertheless, the essential principle of the
commune, the obligation on oath to preserve the town and
its liberties and for that end to obey and assist its officers
was silently recognized and incorporated in borough practice.
There is an unmistakable likeness to the London oath in that
which the burgesses of Ipswich swore on July, I2OO, to be
obedient, intendant, advisory and assistant to their officers
and portmen to preserve and maintain the town and its
honour and liberties everywhere against everyone, except
against the lord king and the royal power.3
At Ipswich there was much reorganization, but that was
because they had had so little up to then, not even a merchant
gild-4
The Ipswich evidence that the new form of commune,
though introducing local loyalties which might easily, in
spite of protestations to the contrary, become a danger to
the royal power, and which therefore were never formally
authorized by charter, was recognized by the Crown finds
1 Below, p. 266.
2 According to tlɪe Gesta Henrici et Ricardi (“ Benedictus Abbas ,
ii. 214, they only swore to do so quandiu regi placuerit.
3 Gross, Gild Merchant, ii. 118.
4 From 1194 the men of Ipswich held the farm of the borough, doubtless
“ during pleasure,” at an increment of £5, but it was three years before
they paid anything [P.R. 6 Ric. I, p. 47 ; 9 Ric. I, p. 226). In 1197 and
1198 they paid off arrears (ibid, and 10 Ric. I, p. 95), but were again in debt
for nearly a year’s farm at Michaelmas 1199 (ibid. 1 John, p. 263). They
had not yet paid the 60 marks they had offered " to have their liberties ”
as far back as 1191 (ibid. 3 Ric. I, p. 42).
MILITARY COMMUNES OF 1205
25З
confirmation in an unexpected quarter. The ordinance of
1205 for the defence of the realm against a feared French
invasion and for the preservation of the peace, which Gervase
of Canterbury embodied verbatim in his Gesta Regumy1 has
been noticed by historians as a reorganization of the fyrd,2
but its importance for the enlarged meaning of communa
and as the first general reference to the office of mayor, has
escaped them.
In introducing his transcript of the ordinance Gervase
says that it ordered the formation of a communa throughout
the realm, and that all men over twelve years of age should
swear to keep it faithfully. The ordinance does not actually
speak of a national commune, but of local communes of
shires, hundreds, cities, boroughs and groups of minor vills,
though, as these covered the whole country, they might be
regarded as constituting one national commune, a reorganiza-
tion of the communa Hberorum hominum of the Assize of Arms.3
The chief novelty was that the command of the various units
was to be entrusted to new officers called constables, with or
without the co-operation of existing local officials. Several
chief constables {capitales Constabularii) replaced the sheriff
in the county for this military and police duty, with sub-
ordinate constables, normally one for each of its hundreds,
cities, boroughs and groups of townships, the hundrediy
burgi and visneta of the Assize of Arms. These subordinates
and the communes they commanded were to obey the orders
of the chief constables. All men over twelve were to swear
to observe this “ ad honorem Dei et fidelitatem domini regis.”
Interesting as it is as a link that has been overlooked be-
tween the Assize of Arms and the establishment of constables
for the preservation of the peace in the next two reigns,* the
1 WznzAs, ed. Stubbs (Rolls Ser.), ii. 97.
2 Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 592, § 162 ; Davis, England under the Normans
and Angevins, pp. 351-2 ; Norgate, John Lackland, p. 104.
3 Stubbs, Select Charters, ed. Davis, pp. 183-4.
4 The ordinance was an emergency measure to meet a danger which,
so far as foreign invasion was feared, did not arrive and it may be doubted
whether constables were generally appointed, though, for the preservation
of the peace, they re-appear in the hundreds in 1242 (Morris, The English
Sheriff to 1300, p. 228), and more widely in the writ of 1252 [Select Charters,
p. 364), and in the Statute of Westminster of 1285. The mayor, or the
reeves or bailiffs where there was no mayor, acted in cities and boroughs in
1252, while constables were appointed elsewhere. Though the scheme of
1205 was apparently abortive, it was embodied by London writers in addi-
tions to early Norman law books with especial emphasis on the part to
be played by fratres Coniurati and particularly in cities and boroughs
(Liebermann, Ges. i. 490, 655, ii. 375, iii. 282).
S