REGULATIONS CONCERNING STRANGERS (1485).
These regulations are taken from Henry VII.'s charter, which cost the citizens no less than five thousand marks. The main object of the charter was to protect the City from the encroachments of foreigners and strangers, who appear to have been unusually active about this time intheir attempts to gain a footing in the rapidly expanding trade of London. Their efforts met with great hostility on the part of the citizens, and these enactments are indicative of the general attitude of the Londoners towards strangers either from other towns or from across the sea.
Of all time, of which the memory of man is not to the contrary, for the commonweal of the realm and city aforesaid, it hath been used, and by authority of parliament approved and confirmed, that no stranger from the liberty of the city may buy or sell, from any stranger from the liberties of the same city, any merchandise or wares within the liberties of the same city, upon forfeiture of the same. The said mayor and commonalty, and citizens, and their predecessors by all the time aforesaid, have had and received, and have been accustomed to receive, perceive, and have, to the use of the said mayor, commonalty, and citizens, all and all manner of merchandises and wares bought and sold within the liberties of the same city as aforesaid, and forfeitures of the same merchandises and wares, until of late past time they were troubled or molested.
The same lord Henry the seventh, by his letters patent as aforesaid, for pacifying and taking away from henceforth controversies and ambiguities in that behalf, and to fortify and by express words to explain and declare the liberty and custom aforesaid to them the said mayor and commonalty and citizens, and their heirs and successors, and willing the said liberties to be peaceably and quietly had, possessed, and enjoyed to the said mayor and commonalty and citizens, and their successors, with the forfeitures aforesaid, against the said late lord King Henry, his heirs and successors granted, and by his said charter confirmed to the same mayor and commonalty and citizens, and their successors, that no stranger from the liberties of the same city may buy or sell from any other stranger to the liberty of the same city, any merchandises orwares within the liberties of the same city; and if any stranger to the liberty of the same city shall sell or buy any merchandises or wares within the liberty of the same city of any other stranger to the liberty of the same city, that the same mayor, commonalty and citizens, and their successors, may have, hold, and receive all and all manner of such like merchandises and wares, so bought and to be bought, sold or to be sold, within the liberty of the said city, between whatsoever strangers to the liberty of the same city, as forfeited; and all the forfeitures of the same, and also the penalties, fines, and redemptions whatsoever anyways forfeited, lost or to be lost, or to be forfeited or due thereon, to the use and profit of the same mayor and commonalty and citizens, and their heirs and successors, without hindrance of the same late king, his heirs or successors, and without any account or any other thing to be rendered or paid thereof to the late king, his heirs and successors, any statute, act, or ordinance of us or our progenitors made to the contrary notwithstanding; although the same mayor and commonalty, and citizens of the said city, or their predecessors, have before that time used, abused, or not used those customs and liberties: Saving always, that the great men, lords, and nobles, and other English and strangers, of what condition they shall be, may freely buy whatsoever merchandises in gross for their families and proper uses within the liberties of the said city, without any forfeiture, loss, or hindrance whatsoever, so that they do not sell again the said merchandises to any other.
And further, the same late king, of his ample grace, by his said letters patent, amongst other things, did give and grant to the mayor, commonalty, and citizens of the same city of London, and their successors, the office of gauger within the said city, and the disposing, ordering, surveying, and correcting of the same, to have, hold, exercise, and occupy the said office, and other premises, with all fees, profits, and emoluments to the said office in any manner belonging or appertaining, to the same mayor and commonalty, and citizens, by themselves, or by their sufficient deputy or deputies, from the twenty-secondday of August, in the first year of his reign, for ever, without any account to be made thereof, or any other thing rendering or paying to the said lord Henry the seventh, his heirs or successors, as by the said letters patent doth more plainly appear.