Yarmouth,england
Yarmouth,englandMedieval Yarmouth, England
Yarmouth was a town consisting of two major sections, Great and Little Yarmouth. The founder of Yarmouth is believed to be a man named Cedric, who was a Saxon leader, but people still doubt this to this very day. One of the main reasons for the foundation of Yarmouth is the Herring, a fish that was very healthy to eat, and especially important to the lower classes because it was cheap and readily available. Fishing was a very important part of their society. The seal of the town of Yarmouth has everything to do with fishing, including a Herring boat and a picture of St. Nicholas. Yarmouth consists of several rivers, which was important for its economy. All of the rivers flow into a big estuary, which then flowed into the ocean. Two main features of Yarmouth, were its port and marketplace.
Another major function of this town is silting, which developed from a huge sandbank formed over a long period of time. The sandbank became strong enough to become a place for the salting and smoking of Herring, and a great dock for boats. This attracted many fisherman from all over the continent, including the Clique Port fishermen. After awhile silting became very useless and migration began to occur towards the south part of the town.
In the royal domain, Yarmouth was known as a borough, in which they had to pay "every third penny" of revenues to the Earl. Yarmouth was a very small town compared to others in the region. According to the Doomsday survey, it had at least seventy burgesses by ten sixty six. Yarmouth was known as a frontier town due to its lack of role of administration in the area. In addition, the king never set up anything financially significant in Yarmouth.
There was one church in Yarmouth, St. Nicholas's Church, which was dedicated to St. Benedict. It was founded by the Bishop of Norwich. The Church became a major attraction to townspeople. Another marketplace was built shortly after the church. Due to the migration and construction, the town wall was expanded around the Church. Another significant building, St. Mary's Hospital was soon built, and covered up a large portion of the East Side of the town.
For centuries , government was a huge problem for Yarmouth, resulting in many changes of power. The town started out with a Reeve, which was an official appointed by the King. Shortly thereafter, the king granted the town their first self-administration. A royal charter was granted, which included conditions such as: "free borough",and "the right to choose your executive officer of your local government".
The town was divided into four main sections, therefore, four bailiffs were appointed who were elected annually. Despite these changes, government became conflicted, resulting in violence, and formation of a town council to assist the bailiffs. In response to the conflict, officers responsible for the borough treasury, also know as the "pyx", were created. Balance of power...
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