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Authors: Danny Danziger
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in Tuscany and, above all, at Freiberg, near Meissen, in Germany, was of huge importance. In 1180 a new English silver penny was designed, now known to collectors and numismatists as the Short Cross penny. The cross design on one side of the coin simplified life for those who wanted to cut it into two or four pieces in order to have money of lower denomination, halfpennies or farthings (fourths). Thanks to the influx of new silver, especially German silver, numismatists estimate that after 1180 English mints were striking at least six times as many pennies as in the previous decades. By the 1220s, when surviving mint records allow accurate statistics of coin production to be compiled, over 4 million silver pennies were being minted annually at Canterbury and London, and mint production continued to rise during the thirteenth century. Indeed not until the nineteenth century was the weight of silver minted each year in later thirteenth-century England regularly exceeded.
By 1215 London was the second largest town, after Paris, in north-western Europe. The Londoner William FitzStephen prefaced The Life of Thomas Becket which he wrote in the early 1170s with an enthusiastic description of his city:
Among the celebrated and noble cities of the world, the city of London, the throne of the English kingdom, is more widely famed than any other, and sends its wealth and merchandise further afield. It is blessed in the strength of its defences, the honour of citizens, and the chastity of its wives. The inhabitants of other cities are called citizens, but of London they are called barons. They are known everywhere for the elegance of their manners, dress and cuisine.
Here was a great international market, where goods of all kinds could be bought, both basic commodities such as grain which, in times of harvest failure, could be cheaper here than anywhere else in England, and also a great range of luxury goods. Just thinking of these exotic items so inspired William that he turned from prose to verse:
Gold from Arabia, from Sabaea spice
And incense; from the Scythians arms of steel
Well-tempered; oil from the rich groves of palm
That spring from the fat lands of Babylon;
Fine gems from Nile, from China crimson silks;
French wines; and sable, vair and miniver
From the far lands where Russ and Norseman dwell .
It was not just a poetic flight of fancy: all these items could be bought in the London of his day.
So great was the attraction of the city’s market that, by 1215, it had pulled the focal point of national administration into its orbit. Earlier kings of England had looked just as much, if not more, to Winchester, but by the later twelfth century Winchester had been overtaken by Westminster. The palace of Westminster, at its centre the magnificent hall built for William Rufus over a century earlier, became increasingly the heart of government. It was here, even during the prolonged absences of the royal court, that you could find the exchequer and the central law courts. By 1215 the English élite realised they could not do without London and Westminster. Many of them possessed, in addition to their country houses, a residence in London or in one of its two main suburbs, Westminster and Southwark. We have an account, for instance, of how Abbot Walter (1174–1211) of Waltham Abbey took the decision to build a stone house just north of Billingsgate. It was intended to be a place where the canons of Waltham or their servants could stay when they were in London, a warehouse for the goods they bought, and a garage for their carts. London was now England’s capital city.
A few important towns, such as Norwich and Bristol, had developed in the course of the tenth and eleventh centuries, but generally speaking the richest towns were the oldest ones, dating back to Roman times, like York, Winchester, Lincoln, Canterbury, Colchester and, of course, London. According to William FitzStephen, however, London was older even than Rome
By 1215 London was the second largest town, after Paris, in north-western Europe. The Londoner William FitzStephen prefaced The Life of Thomas Becket which he wrote in the early 1170s with an enthusiastic description of his city:
Among the celebrated and noble cities of the world, the city of London, the throne of the English kingdom, is more widely famed than any other, and sends its wealth and merchandise further afield. It is blessed in the strength of its defences, the honour of citizens, and the chastity of its wives. The inhabitants of other cities are called citizens, but of London they are called barons. They are known everywhere for the elegance of their manners, dress and cuisine.
Here was a great international market, where goods of all kinds could be bought, both basic commodities such as grain which, in times of harvest failure, could be cheaper here than anywhere else in England, and also a great range of luxury goods. Just thinking of these exotic items so inspired William that he turned from prose to verse:
Gold from Arabia, from Sabaea spice
And incense; from the Scythians arms of steel
Well-tempered; oil from the rich groves of palm
That spring from the fat lands of Babylon;
Fine gems from Nile, from China crimson silks;
French wines; and sable, vair and miniver
From the far lands where Russ and Norseman dwell .
It was not just a poetic flight of fancy: all these items could be bought in the London of his day.
So great was the attraction of the city’s market that, by 1215, it had pulled the focal point of national administration into its orbit. Earlier kings of England had looked just as much, if not more, to Winchester, but by the later twelfth century Winchester had been overtaken by Westminster. The palace of Westminster, at its centre the magnificent hall built for William Rufus over a century earlier, became increasingly the heart of government. It was here, even during the prolonged absences of the royal court, that you could find the exchequer and the central law courts. By 1215 the English élite realised they could not do without London and Westminster. Many of them possessed, in addition to their country houses, a residence in London or in one of its two main suburbs, Westminster and Southwark. We have an account, for instance, of how Abbot Walter (1174–1211) of Waltham Abbey took the decision to build a stone house just north of Billingsgate. It was intended to be a place where the canons of Waltham or their servants could stay when they were in London, a warehouse for the goods they bought, and a garage for their carts. London was now England’s capital city.
A few important towns, such as Norwich and Bristol, had developed in the course of the tenth and eleventh centuries, but generally speaking the richest towns were the oldest ones, dating back to Roman times, like York, Winchester, Lincoln, Canterbury, Colchester and, of course, London. According to William FitzStephen, however, London was older even than Rome
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