23133 THE HISTORY OF THE TWELVE GREAT LIVERY COMPANIES OF LONDON; PRINCIPALLY COMPILED FROM THEIR GRANTS AND RECORDS. WITH AN HISTORICAL ESSAY, AND ACCOUNTS OF EACH COMPANY, ITS ORIGIN, CONSTITUTION, GOVERNMENT, DRESS, CUSTOMS, HALLS, AND TRUST ESTATES INCLUDING NOTICES AND ILLUSTRATIONS OF METROPOLITAN TRADE AND COMMERCE, AS ORIGINALLY CONCENTRATED IN THOSE SOCIETIES; AND OF THE LANGUAGE, MANNERS, AND EXPENSES OF ANCIENT TIMES; WITH ATTESTED COPIES AND TRANSLATIONS OF THE COMPANIES' CHARTERS. BY WILLIAM HERBERT, LIBRARIAN TO THЕ CORPORATION OF LONDON. VOL. I. LONDON: • PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR; AND TO BE HAD OF HIM, AT THE LIBRARY, GUILDHALL, MDCCCXXXVII. ADVERTISEMENT. A.V.M. THE present "Commission for Inquiring into Municipal Corporations," must render any work important which can throw additional light on that inquiry. The publication now offered M to the public professes to treat of one great branch of these Corporations, and which is intended to be subjected to the proposed investigation,—namely, the ancient trading Corporations, called Livery Companies; or rather, it purposes to give the History of that portion of them usually denominated the "Twelve Great Livery Companies of London," which will be found, in principle, to include all the rest. To the reader unacquainted with this subject, and it is perhaps the least known of any connected with our localities, it may be observed, that the Livery Companies hold a high rank in City history. Their wealth,-the important trusts reposed in them,-the noble charities they support, and their connexion with the civic constitution of the Metropolis, make them not only of primary consequence to every Liveryman and Freeman, but, when it is considered that they had the earliest share in laying the foundation of British com |