This "house in the City" was situated to the south of Thames Street, bordering on the river, closely adjoining Dowgate Wharf, one of the principal landing places, and it became known, later on, as the Steel-yard. Several suggestions as to the origin of this name, more or less ingenious, have been made, but it seems most probable that it was due to the fact that there, or thereabouts, was situated a weighing place for foreign goods imported by the Hansa, similar to the King's weigh-house in Cornhill. In this settlement the merchants lived the semi-monastic life required by their rules, avoiding as far as possible intimate association with the people by whom they were surrounded, but with whom they carried on their business; yet at the same time not so exclusively withholding themselves as in the remote settlements of Bergen and Novgorod. Indeed, in return for the privileges which were conceded to them they were required, to a certain extent, to take part in the civil life of London and to share in the duties of its defence. One of the duties they were required to discharge was the maintenance of one of the city gates--that known as Bishopsgate, from the fact that it had been first erected by Saint Erkenwald, sometime Bishop of London; and one of the first troubles they had with the city Corporation arose in consequence of their neglect properly to perform this duty. It is recorded that in the tenth year of Edward I., who had renewed his father's charter, that a great controversy arose between the Mayor and the "Haunce of Almaine" about the reparation of this gate, then likely to fall, and the matter was brought before the King's Court of Exchequer. The result was that the German merchants were found to have neglected their duty, and they were called upon to pay two hundred and ten marks sterling to the Mayor and citizens, and to undertake that they and their successors should from time to time repair the gate. The names of the merchants who at that time were residing in London, and answered to the court, are given by Stow, and the list is interesting as showing the different parts of Germany represented at that time. They were, Gerard Marbod the Alderman, Ralph de Cusarde of Cologne, Bertram of Hamburg, John de Dele, burgess of Muenster, and Ludero de Denevar, John of Arras, and John de Hundondale, all three burgesses of Treves; so that unless the Alderman himself was from Luebeck, the head city of the League was not represented. An interesting point arises in connection with the repairs of this gate. London in the thirteenth century was a city of wood, with only its walls and churches built of stone, and brick as a building material was almost unknown. But in the great cities of the Hanse League, in Luebeck, Hamburg, and Bruges, brick was the ordinary material, and for the Steel-yard merchants it was as easy to bring bricks from Flanders as stone from Surrey or Kent, and the material itself was very much cheaper.