Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 9.djvu/123

Rh The following remarks occur to me upon the different parts of this document:—

The governing body were the mayor, two bailiffs, and the twenty-four jurats, commouly called " The Twenty-four; " and this continued to be the basis of the government down to the recent parliamentary change. V/e are not clearly informed who were the general body of electors called "la commune," or the commonalty of the city; and this obscurity has, in almost every period of our municipal system, occasioned controversy respecting the normal constitution of the elective bodies. There seems, however, to be little ground for doubt that, at Winchester, the traditional election by all the freemen, the sworn men of the merchant gild, was the original and regular form of election. The defect of it was, that there was no adequate provision for securing the admission into the franchise of all those who were reasonably entitled to it.

The aldermen did not, strictly speaking, form part of the ordinary govern- ment of the city until they were made so by late charters. Here, as in other cities, as Exeter, &c., they were local officers of wards or districts, whose functions related chietly, but not wholly, to the police and preservation of order, health, and cleanliness within their several limits.* It is remark- able that in the Soke liberty, a suburban manor of the See of Winchester mentioned in the Consuetudinary, each of the several districts or tithings, into which it is divided, has an officer still called, indifferently, the alderman, or the tithingman.

The bailiffs of Winchester were the prepositi or provosts of the city. Hence the "provostry" mentioned in the document designates the functions or office of the bailiffs. They were in the nature of sheriffs, and also pre- sided over the court of pleas jointly with the mayor.^ The original identity of provosts and bailiffs is very apparent in other towns, as at Exeter, Bristol, Salisbury, Yarmouth, Tenby, &c. They are sometimes called also seneschalli, or stewards, as at Exeter and Bristol. In the last city these two officers successively held each of the three names, and finally became the sheriffs.

As sheriffs, the bailiffs of Winchester accounted annually and delivered up their court rolls and rentals, or " terrages," of the city. Under this last name were included the rents called landgable, of which there is a list in the Inquisition already printed in this Journal (No. 28, Grig. Hoc.) There is also a very detailed list of " tarrages," tempore Henry V., among the additional MSS., British Museum, No. 6133. W^hen fines were levied for the benefit of the city under bye-laws, they were paid to the "provostria civitatis." *e The two bailiffs arc also called the two peers — " deus percs," — of the mayor; instances frequently occur in the registers of the city; and the practice is noticed by Mr. Wright in his report on the corporation records.^ But the bailiffs are not the only persons called peers. The Twenty-four,

' The aldermeu are not named in the Cm-., 14 Henry IV., &c. early charters of London, or JNew Saruni, •* Winchester Black Book, Add. MSS., or Bristol. No. G03G, fol. 22, Brit. Mus. - As early as Henry IV., the style was ■* Archaeol. Assoc., 11J45. "coram majore et balHvis." — Vid. Kot.