By Imogen Hudson

There were few towns in Medieval England and those that existed were much smaller than today. Towns grew up in areas where people could easily meet such as rivers or crossroads. Here is my account of a day in the life of a Medieval town family.

Hello, my name is Alice and I live with my husband Adam and children William and Emma in the town of Cheviot Hills. We run a bakery in the town and have an apprentice called Thomas. Our days are very busy and start early, this is what a typical day for us is like am Adam and Thomas get up to light the fires, they don’t have far to go as we live above the shop. Merchants usually had their shop and home in the same building. 4.ooam I’m woken by the Angelus bell ringing. I get up quickly and head for the church, I pass the night watchman finishing his watch by opening the gates of the town for another day.

Religion - As many people in Medieval times couldn’t read or write they believed anything the church told them. The church was very wealthy and influential and controlled the way people behaved. People had to pay 10% of their income to the church in the form of “Tithes”. People were encouraged to believe that disease was a punishment from God, and relied on prayers to heal them. 5.00am As I leave the church the public herdsmen are driving the animals out of the town to pasture. Towns were protected against attack by large fences and gates which were locked at night to keep out undesirables, all animals were kept inside the town, and sometimes in the houses at night as they were valuable possessions.

6.00 am The market traders are setting up their stalls and Adam and Thomas are getting the bread ready to sell. Because many people could not read or write the shop signs were pictures or objects to do with their trade. Towns were noisy places, traders wanted to attract customers and so would shout out their wares. There were also fast food sellers which included hot sheep’s feet and beef ribs!

7.00am I get the children up and empty the night buckets out the window, I do hope it doesn’t land on someone’s head! Towns were very dirty places to live. There was no sewage system so people threw their dirty waste on to the streets which inevitable found its way into the water supply. Rats were everywhere and helped spread the Black Death of People knew little about health and hygiene so disease was common. Life expectancy was short and even shorter for the poor!

8.00am I can hear the foreign merchants calling their trades, they must have set up their stalls already, let’s hope Adam has had a good few hours trade. Foreign traders/merchants had to wait 2 or 3 hours before they could enter the market giving the locals the best of the business. Lords were greedy people they not only demanded money from the town’s traders but they also welcomed outside merchants who paid taxes to sell their wares in the town, these were collected by Sheriffs. This was often open to abuse as most people couldn’t read or write. Many people wanted to see a farer system called a Charter, under this system the rights of the town’s people was clearer, the town collected it’s own taxes removing the need for the corrupt sheriffs.

9.00am The children are crying for their breakfast, I need to re-heat the left- over's from yesterday. Common people ate oatmeal, bread and vegetable stews as they could not afford to eat meat. A staple food was Pottage made in a big pot over the fire, it contained mostly vegetables and was often kept for days on end, being re- heated frequently. Pork was one of the few meats readily available as pigs roamed free and found their own food so were cheap to keep. People drank water, milk and ale. Water was unpleasant, milk did not stay fresh for long so the main drink was ale am I can hear the music of the parade going by, I wonder which Guild it is today? We owe them a lot, I haven’t forgotten all the help they gave us when Adam couldn’t work last Summer.

Merchant Guilds and Craft Guilds both played important roles in Medieval times. Each merchant guild had a patron saint and celebrated a religious festival. They paraded through the town putting on religious plays. Guilds dominated town life, they also looked after the health and welfare of their members and families. Guilds controlled trade in the town. To be expelled from a guild made it impossible to earn a living.

1.00pm I can hear the town crier go by, he's shouting about a flogging in the town square at 2.00pm, the children will love that! The town crier rang a hand bell when he walked through the town proclaiming news. He also told the time and that was a very important role because people didn’t have watches like today. They also had the task of ringing their bell to say prayers in memory of those who had paid for the privilege.

2.00pm On the way to the flogging we stopped so the children could laugh at the people in the stocks. When we got there we saw it was our neighbours who hadn’t pay there taxes, we took pity on them and went on our way. Criminals were put in the stocks or the pillory. These were wooden boards with holes cut for feet, hands or head. Medieval punishments were cruel. Crimes such as theft were punished by hanging.

3.00pm We drop in at the cobblers on our way home just as the market is closing. We hope William will be apprenticed here as soon as we can agree a fee for his placement. Parents paid a fee to place a boy with a master craftsman as an apprentice. Apprenticeships lasted from 2-7 years. The master fed and clothed the boy, gave him a home and taught him. Before an apprentice could be accepted into the guild he had to produce a “masterpiece” of his own.

4.00pm The streets are quiet now, but the rubbish and dirt left by the market is all over the streets, the pigs will feed well today. I need to get the children fed and in bed before the neighbours across the way start shouting and fighting. The streets were unusually narrow and crooked with no proper pavements. The upper stories of the houses sometimes projected so far that people living on opposite sides of the streets could hear each others conversations and practically shake hands from their windows.

8.00pm That’s the town crier round again, ringing the curfew. Another day gone, let’s shut the shutters and pray for a peaceful night’s sleep. Curfews were imposed in towns to keep the peace. The gates to the town would be closed and a night watchman would patrol the streets looking for thieves. As homes were made of wood, ( wooden frame with gaps filled with woven strips of wood called ‘wattle’ and covered, or daubed, with clay) and thatch rooves fire was another danger especially at night when candles were the only source of light.