The author of a late publication, entitled _Caledonia_, gives it as his opinion, that the monks were the earliest Gild brethren, and had exclusive privileges of trade and of fishery when boroughs had scarcely an existence. To which the annual reviewer of that work objects, and affirms that the origin of Gilds lies hidden in obscurity inaccessible: and against the idea of their being of monkish origin, he urges, their being constructed so much on the principles of a purse club, that they can hardly not have been founded by married men. {412} The truth seems to be, that they originated among the Anglo-Saxons, long before the Conquest, if not also before their conversion to Christianity, and the commencement of English monkery. At first, they may be supposed to assume a simple and homely appearance, among the civil institutions of the Anglo-Saxon community; but afterwards to pass through different changes, and especially after the conquest, when the general state of society and the whole order of things experienced so considerable a revolution. They were then, at first, perhaps, put down or laid aside, and afterwards revived and resumed: at least, we hear little or nothing of them under the first Norman kings, or till about the 13th century. The most common and prevailing opinion seems to be, that the gilds sprung from the Anglo-Saxons _tithings_: though it may, perhaps, be questioned, if the tithings themselves did not take their rise from them. Jacob, from Camden, informs us,— “that the origin of gilds and fraternities is said to be from the Saxon law, by which neighbours entered into an association, and became bound for each other, to bring forth him who committed any crime, or make satisfaction to the party injured; for which purpose they raised a sum of money among themselves, and put it into a common stock, whereout a pecuniary compensation was made according to the quality of the offence committed. From hence came our fraternities and gilds: and they were in use in this kingdom long before any formal licences were granted for them: though at this day [that is, in Camden’s time] they are a company combined together, with orders and laws made by themselves, by the prince’s licence.” {413a} Chambers, in his Cyclopædia, expresses himself much to the same purpose.—