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Backed by the combined forces of all the gildsmen, it was able to assert itself against the lord who claimed manorial rights over the town, and to insist that a runaway serf who had lived in the town for a year and a day should not be dragged back to perform his servile labor on the manor, but should be recognized as a freeman.
"And when a gildsman dies, all those who are of the gild and are in the city shall attend the service for the dead, and gildsmen shall bear the body and bring it to the place of burial." The gild merchant also sometimes fulfilled various religious, philanthropic, and charitable duties, not only to its members, but to the public generally, and to the poor.
It was not only at the periodical business meetings, or on the feast days, or in the preparation for the dramatic shows, that the gildsmen were thrown together. Usually all the members of one craft lived on the same street or in the same part of the town, and were therefore members of the same parish church and constantly brought under one another's observation in all the daily concerns of life.
Foreigners coming from other countries or traders from other English towns were prohibited from buying or selling in any way that might interfere with the interests of the gildsmen. They must buy and sell at such times and in such places and only such articles as were provided for by the gild regulations. They must in all cases pay the town tolls, from which members of the gild were exempt.
There were said to be at that date in the Drapers' Company of the craft of drapers in the clothing, including the masters and four wardens, one hundred and fourteen, of the brotherhood out of the clothing one hundred and fifteen, of the bachelors' company sixty. It was from this prominence of the liveried gildsmen, that the term "Livery Companies" came to be applied to the greater London gilds.
That the business of the gild might be increased, it was often desirable to enter into special arrangements with neighboring cities whereby the rights, lives, and properties of gildsmen were guaranteed; and the gild as a whole was responsible for the debts of any of its members. The most important duty of the gild had been the regulation of the home market.
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