[Footnote 352: Harl. MS. 6,195, f. 7. See also Ashley, pt. ii. 148. The church referred to is the now demolished one dedicated to S. Nicholas, which was supported by the Corpus Christi guild.] [Footnote 353: Corp. MS. B. 75.] [Footnote 354: Sharp, _Antiq._, 18.] [Footnote 355: Burton on Ship Money, Corp. MS. A. 35.] [Footnote 356: Poole, _Coventry_, 75.] [Footnote 357: Poole, 80.] [Footnote 358: Sharp, _Antiq._, 22.] [Footnote 359: Poole, 359-363.] CHAPTER XII _The Lammas Lands_ We have passed the period wherein the men of Coventry rebelled against their overlord the prior; in the late fourteenth century we enter upon one marked by internal strife. The law passed under Edward II.,[360] forbidding victuallers to hold any municipal office was frequently evaded, and in many towns the great power of this class was a source of endless trouble. Excitements in the guild-hall when the men, whose wages were fixed at statute rate, found they would not avail to buy them proper food, the shouting of angry crowds when the chamberlains at their Lammas ride refused to pull down fences to admit the freemen's sheep and cattle as they had done in times past, must have warned the mayor and his brethren to give heed to their ways. Murmurings were heard at an early date. In 1370 the customs laid on food for the purpose of raising money for murage provoked a rising. In 1387 the townsfolk "cast their loaves at the mayor's head, because the bakers kept not the assize",[361] neither did the mayor punish them according to his office, and again and again we hear of risings owing to that fruitful cause of trouble, the enclosure of the common lands.[362] [Illustration: Swanswell Gate]