Nottingham (NOT-ing-um)
Nottingham is a large town of around 2,000 people. It is the county town of Nottinghamshire.
Nottingham Castle is the town's major landmark. It stands on a prominent sandstone crag to the southwest of the city. Several caves penetrate the cliffs beneath the castle.
Government
Nottingham has two bailiffs, one for English Borough and the other for French Borough. Each borough has its own customs and bylaws. For example, inheritance customs differ between the two boroughs. The eldest child inherits in French Borough, while in English Borough estates pass to the youngest child.
King Henry II's charter of 1155 makes Nottingham a 'free borough'. Anyone may earn their freedom by living in the town for a year and a day during peacetime, as long as no one makes a claim against them during that time.
The charter also grants Nottingham the right of infangentheof, the right to hang thieves caught red-handed within the town. The gallows stand beside Mansfield Road on a hill north of the town.
Lesser offences result in fines or public humilation. The stocks and pillory are in the great marketplace of French Borough. Violent bloodshed attracts a fine of 18 shillings in French Borough, but only 6s 4d in English Borough.
Defences
An earth bank and ditch controls Nottingham's northern flank. It runs between the wooden walls of the castle's outer bailey and the bank and ditch west of English Borough.
King Henry II spent £1,800 improving Nottingham's defences between 1171 and 1189. Most of the money went on rebuilding the wooden walls of the castle's upper and middle baileys in stone.
Industry & Trade
The wool trade dominates Nottingham's commercial life. Several large Nottinghamshire monasteries have extensive flocks. Nottingham's road and river trade routes help distribute the wool.
The town's Weavers' Guild was one of the first craft guilds in England. King Henry I (1100-1135) granted the guild a monopoly on working dyed wool within 10 leagues (15 miles) of Nottingham. King Henry II confirmed this monopoly in 1155, as did Count John in 1189.
King Henry I's charter also granted Nottingham a weekly market every Saturday. The market begins on Friday evening and ends on Saturday evening. King Henry expected the market to serve all Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. Later charters permit markets in other places.
Henry II's charter further granted Nottingham rights of toll and team. This allows the town to insist merchants show evidence of their rights to sell goods in the market. It also allows the town to charge commission on goods and cattle sold in the market and fine those accused of stealing cattle.
Henry II also allowed the town to charge certain tolls outside Nottingham. The town may charge tolls on goods travelling on the Trent between Thrumpton and Newark. It may also charge tolls on the York-London Road between Retford and Rempston.
Nottingham does not have an annual fair. Henry II granted Lenton Priory a fair from Martinmas (November 11) to November 18. The monks not only charge rents for stalls at the fair, but can charge tolls on goods sold. The fair charter also prevents anyone hindering merchants attending it. This led to disputes over toll rights between town and priory.
When Count John received Nottinghamshire in 1189 he confirmed all the existing rights and added two new ones. First, he exempted the burgesses of Nottingham from all tolls through his lands. By this time he held Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset. Second, he allowed Nottingham to form a merchants' guild, a trade association open to all the town's merchants. This gives the merchants more influence in Nottingham's economy and market.
Infrastructure
Nottingham was an important town before the Norman Conquest due to good road and river links. It lies on the north bank of the River Leen, a mile north of its confluence with the great River Trent.
Nottingham was an important town before the Norman Conquest due to good road and river links. It lies on the main road from London to York a mile from the River Trent, one of the three great rivers of England. Six miles south of the Trent the London-York road crosses the Fosse Way, an old Roman road connecting Lincoln to southwest England.
The London Road crosses the Trent at Hethbeth Bridge. The bridge, originally built in the 10th century, is a vital link between southern England and the North. By the 12th century the wooden bridge was old and in the 1130s a new bridge over the Trent at Newark offered an alternative.
In 1156 King Henry II had Hethbeth Bridge rebuilt with stone piers and a wooden roadway and Nottingham recovered its appeal.
Districts
The older, eastern part of Nottingham, known as English Borough, lies north of a steep cliff above the Leen. An ancient ditch protects its eastern side. The northern and western ditches were filled in when French Borough was built and a new town bank and ditch dug.
Guilds and Factions
Nottingham's Weavers' Guild is one of the earliest craft guilds in England. Count John has recently recognised the town's Merchants Guild.
History
The Saxon Snotingas folk settled in Nottingham around 600 CE. There may have been an earlier British settlement; the Saxon scholar Asser refers to it as Tigguocobauc, Cymric for House of Caves.
In 867 CE the Danish Great Heathen Army captured Nottingham and it became one of the Five Burhs of the Danelaw. King Edward the Elder, son of Alfred the Great, recaptured Nottingham from the Danes in 918 CE. He strengthened the town's defences and established a mint there. He also ordered a bridge built over the Trent to improve access to the North of England, which was completed in 920 CE. Nottingham retained its burghal status and became the county town of Nottinghamshire.
By 1066 CE, Nottingham had 173 burgesses and one church, St Mary's. The town paid £18 in yearly taxes.
A year after the Norman Conquest, in 1067 CE, King William I had a castle built on the cliffs southwest of Nottingham. This first castle was a wooden motte surrounded by three baileys. The king granted it to one of his favourites, William Peveril the Elder. William also gained along with 48 merchants' houses in Nottinghamshire and the Barony of the Peak in Derbyshire.
At the time of the Domesday survey (1087 CE) Nottingham had 120 burgesses. Its annual tax value increased to £30.
In the late 11th century a new borough was laid out between the old English Borough and the castle, which became known as the French Borough. St Peter's Church and St Nicholas' Church were founded in the French Borough around 1100 CE. Between 1102 and 1108 CE William Peveril the Elder founded a Cluniac monastery, Lenton Priory, 1.5 miles southwest of Nottingham. He granted it several manors from his estate, and control of Nottingham's three churches.
After Peveril the Elder's death in 1115 CE his lands passed to his son and heir, William Peveril the Younger.
The younger Peveril supported King Stephen against the Empress Mathilda during the Anarchy. In September 1140 CE Angevin forces under Robert, Earl of Gloucester, laid siege to Nottingham Castle but failed to take it. The Angevins looted the town and massacred parishioners who had taken refuge in the churches. One burgess, forced to show Angevin looters his valuables, locked them in his cellar and set fire to his own house. The fire soon spread and much of Nottingham was burnt.
Angevin forces captured Peveril the Younger at the Battle of Lincoln in 1141 CE and forced to him to hand over the castle in return for his freedom. In 1142 he took it back, entering the castle with the help of two Nottingham miller's lads and expelling the Angevin garrison.
The next 10 years were peaceful for Nottingham. Earl Robert, the Angevin military leader, died in 1147 CE. But in January 1153 CE Mathilda's son, Prince Henry, landed in England. The prince, then 20 years old, had few allies in England. He won the support of the powerful Ranulf, Earl of Chester, by promising him Peveril the Younger's lands in return.
With Ranulf's support, Henry's campaign was a minor success. By August he had gained the support of several other barons, and captured the towns of Malmesbury, Warwick, Tutbury and Stamford. Meanwhile, King Stephen's beloved son and heir, Eustace, died suddenly on August 17. Stephen lost heart, and Henry and Ranulf marched on Nottingham to fulfil Henry's promise.
They succeeded in capturing Nottingham town in September, but were unable to capture the castle. Rather than let them keep the town, William Peveril the Younger set fire to it.
Following negotiations the disheartened King Stephen agreed to name Prince Henry his heir. Peveril the Younger and Ranulf of Chester also met; following the meeting three of Ranulf's men died and Ranulf was in great agony. Prince Henry accused Peveril of poisoning their wine. Ranulf died several weeks later on 16 December 1153.
Following Stephen's death in October 1154, Henry became king. Shortly after his coronation on 22 December 1154 he accused Peveril of treason and stripped him of his lands. Rather than give them to Ranulf's heir, he kept them as royal lands. Peveril took the tonsure and retired to live the rest of his life as a monk at Lenton Priory.
King Henry I. Henry visited Nottingham several times. He stayed at the castle in 1155 and 1165 CE, and held his Christmas court there in 1177 and 1180 CE.
Nottingham was burnt a third time in 1174 during the Young King's War when rebel Earl William Ferrers of Derby sacked the town. Earl William, Peveril the Younger's grandson, believed he should have inherited the Peveril estate.
In 1180 St Peter's Church, heavily damaged in the various sieges, was rebuilt.
In 1185 an earthquake severe enough to damage stone buildings struck Nottingham. Several houses were destroyed and others damaged.
Before his death in 1189 King Henry II promised Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire to his youngest son, Count John. King Richard honoured and added to his father's promise before he left on crusade, and the town is now part of Count John's extensive lands.
Points of interest
- Nottingham Castle
- The Marketplace
- The Pilgrim (inn)
- St Mary's Church
- St Peter's Church
- St Nicholas' Church
- Hethbeth Bridge
- Caves
- St Mary de la Roche (hermitage)
Tourism
The Tudor antiquary John Leland visited Nottingham in 1537, and gives a detailed description. We must remember that 350 years passed between our core period in the 1190s and Leland's day, but he observed things that are no longer visible and his descrption therefore remains valuable.
Nottingham is booth a large toun and welle buildid for tymber and plaster, and standith stately on a clyminge hille.
The market place and streate both for the building on the side of it, for the very great widenes off the streat, and the clene paving of it, is the most fairest withowt exception of al Inglande.
(The Itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535-1543, volume 1, p94, edited by Lucy Toulmin Smith, 1907)
Much as I love Leland's writing, I'll translate the full description into modern English. You can find the the original description on Archive,org. I recommend you read it - it is delightful.
Nottingham is both a large town and well built of timber and plaster, and stands stately on a climbing hill.
The market place and streets, for the buildings on the side of it, for the very great wideness of the street, and for the clean paving of it, is the fairest without exception in all England.
There are three parish churches [St Mary, St Peter and St Nicholas], but the church of St Mary is excellent, new and uniform in work, and so many fair windows in it that no craftsman can imagine setting more there. Southward to the waterside there are great cliffs and crags of stones that are large and good to build with, and many houses set on top of them, and at the bottom there are great caves where many stones have been dug out for the buildings in the town, and these caves are partly used for swelling houses and partly for cellars and store houses.
There were three houses of friars, as I remember, of which two stood to the west of the town, not far from the castle.
The town was well walled with stone and had many gates; much of the wall is now down, and the gates, saving two or three.
There is no suburb over the stone bridge of arches over the Leen on the south side of the town.
And though the town and the ground it stands on, and that around it, is high in the north, all the ground on the south, outside the town, is plain low meadow.
[There follows a description of Nottingham Castle, which you can find in that article.]
The little river of Leen and the great stream of the Trent come near together in the meadow on the south side of the town, and when any land waters come down much of the vale and meadows there are flooded.
The great stream of the Trent and the great bridge over it with [XXX] arches of stone is not past two flight-shots from the bridge of the Leen hard on the south side of Nottingham. The Leen river goes through the meadows beneath Nottingham into the Trent.
Geography
Caves riddle the sandstone cliffs below English Borough and Nottingham Castle. Some are natural, others excavated as cellars or store-rooms.
Marshes along the River Leen hinder access to the city from the south, as do riverside meadows during winter floods. Between the Trent and the Leen the London Road follows a winding route over firmer ground to smaller bridges over the channels of the River Leen. It enters the town through Hollowgate, a short, steep road up the cliffs into English Borough.
Maps
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Nottingham
Very early work in progress - Nottingham town plan.
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