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THE CHESTER HAND OR GLOVE
Notes on the Chester Hand or glove
by Stewart - Brown , M.A., F.S.A. 17th December 1912
As you see, this is a rudely carved representation in wood of a hand. it measures
12 3/8 inches from the wrist to the tip of the second finger, and is 5 3/4 inches in width at the wrist, and weighs
15 1/4 ounces. It is obviously of considerable age, and shows a certain amount of wear and tear; and a piece. at
some time or other (probably, as we shall see, in 1836), has been cut out of it. It has been painted, doubtless
very often, and with ( different coloured paint such as white, red and black. At the point where the Hand is severed
from the arm there is you will see, a metal ring and hook inserted By these the Hand was attached to the end of
a long pole ...........
The Hand bears some incised lettering round the wrist, and, when I saw it recently with Mr. Entwistle, the deputy
curator of the Liverpool Museum, we carefully examined the lettering; it was, however, impossible then to make
it out clearly owing to the fact that the incisions had got filled up, partly with the Daunt used to colour it
and partly, no doubt, with a certain amount of the dirt of ages. Mr. Entwistle, at my request, carefully dissolved
away the plaster, paint and dirt, with potash (which accounts for the cleaned appearance of the wrist, and a most
interesting inscription (which has not in any way been touched up) was revealed as follows
On the back of the wrist -
HVGO COMES CESTRIA
On the inside of the wrist - GVILDA
DE CIVIT. MERCAT. MCLIX
Cestria, in the first
line, ought, of course, to be Cestriae or Cestrie, and since Prof. Newstead made his cast referred to above, someone
has, most improperly, endeavoured to improve upon the original by inserting an "E" after the word on
the cast.
Civit, is an abbreviation of civitate, and the last word is doubtless mercatoria , which frequently occurs with
guilda in the charters, &c. We get, therefore, a statement upon the Hand as follows
"Hugh Earl of
Chester. Guild Merchant of the City 1159 "
What then is the significance
of the inscription? An obvious suggestion is that it refers to or commemorates the foundation of the Guild Merchant
of the City of Chester.
Now we know that the Charter of Randle Blundeville, dated about 1201, confirmed to the citizens of Chester their Guild Merchant with all the liberties and free customs which they had in the time of his ancestors at the said Guild. This Charter, then, presupposes an earlier grant of a Guild in the time of one of Randle Blundeville's ancestors. There is no such Charter known to exist, but it is possible that in 1159 Hugh Cyfelioc (who was of course the father of Randle Blundeville) did grant a Guild Merchant to the City of Chester, and in accordance with an ancient custom sent, or presented, to the City a Glove as a symbol of the concession.
There are difficulties in this explanation, but it is the best I can make. I am aware that Canon Morris, relying no doubt on the word ancestors," suggests that the date could not be later than the time of Randle Gernons ( 1128 - 53 ) and might be as early as 1087 - 1107
Accompanying the Chester
Glove in Mr. Mayer's collection ( now in the Public Museum, Liverpool ) was a label to the following effect No.
25.
 |
This piece of oak, better known in the
City of Chester by the name of the glove, has for many centuries been occasionally hung out as an indication of the commencement of each fair. In olden times the glove was suspended from a pole in the front of the old Pentice, opposite the Cross. On the removal of the Pentice in the year 1803 (in order to widen the passage into Northgate and Watergate streets) the glove afterwards was hung out at every fair from that period to the year 1836 from the south-east corner of St. Peter's Church. |
The following statement is made in July 1858 by Samuel Brown, herald painter of Chester:
The old wooden glove was suspended from the outer wall of the south spout (near Northgate street) of St. Peter's
Church, Chester the origin of which was, tradition says, that when fairs were first held in Chester in July and
October, the glove was hung out fourteen days before each fair, to represent the hand of friendship, and to invite
the neighboring towns to send their merchandise to Chester, particularly the Irish weavers of linen, great quantities
of which were disposed of at these fairs .
The Corporation allowed the sexton of St. Peter's 5s. per annum for taking care of and hanging out the glove, but
of late years they reduced the salary to 2s., and at last to 1s. 6d., when in
1836 Peter Catheral, the sexton, received orders to discontinue the hanging out, and was told he might do what he liked with it.Then he gave it to the then clerk, Edward Sidall, gun-maker, and in 1837 Sidall gave it to a man by the name of Joseph Huxley, an upholsterer, whose father-in-law (a Sergeant Wilkinson begged it from Huxley, his son-in-law, and in 1837 Wilkinson sent it to Liverpool. Nothing has been heard of it since.
The writer of this knew all the parties well July, 1858. Samuel Brown, herald painter.'
The identical wooden hand is to he seen now in the Liverpool Museum, case 437, No. 3,973, with the following words wooden hand hung out for some centuries in Chester, to indicate the opening of the City Fairs. Having made the discovery myself, might I be allowed to suggest that it would be an act of grace and courtesy of the directors of the Liverpool Museum to send the hand back to the ancient city, to the Grosvenor Museum, as its future resting place?'
It is worth quoting a statement from the article
on "Gloves" in the Encyclopaedia Britannica ( 11th edition) that the hands which appear in the armorial
bearings of certain German towns are really gloves, and reminiscent of the bestowal of one as a symbol of the concession
whereby the town was founded or the market, or mint, there established. In these cases, the glove was sent as a
pledge of personal fulfilment. An ancient example of this use (says the article) is
" the practice of tendering a folded glove as a gage for wagering one's law. The origin of this custom is
probably not far to seek. The promise to fulfil a judgement of a court of law, a promise secured by the delivery
of a wed or gage, is one of the oldest, if not the very oldest, of all enforceable contracts. This gage was originally
a chattel of value which had to be deposited at once by the defendant as security unto his adversary's hand; and
that the glove became the formal symbol of such deposit is doubtless due to its being the most convenient loose
object for the purpose. The custom survived after the contract [undertaking] with the vadium, wed or gage had been
superseded by the contract with pledges (personal sureties) " ...
' He shall wage his law with his folded glove ( de son gaunt plyee ) and shall deliver it into the hand of the
other, and then take his glove back and find pledges for his law.'
The throwing down of a glove as a challenge and the taking it up as an acceptance is really a survival of this
wagering system.
Then again, there is the use of the glove as a symbol of investiture in the ancient German conveyance of land pictured
to us by Maitland , in which the donor took from his hand the war glove or gauntlet which would protect that hand
in battle , and gave it to the donee who puts it on - thus his hand is invested and equiped to fight in defence
of this land against all comers .
.
Its alternative name The Glove may have arisen because of the association with the trade of leather ( gloves ), and may have been originally a large stuffed glove . The Ale sellers were commanded in 1573 to hang wooden hands out of their windows as a sign of quality , The last of the glovers Mr. Ffoulkes is also recorded as suspending a Glove from the ceiling of the Row of Eastgate Street , his father had resided in Gloverstone in a house shown on Lavaux's Map .
'At an assembly at the City of Chester in Common Hall pleas .... upon Saturday twentieth day of February .... Wm , Wilson Esqr Mayor of the City of Chester .... put the question whether or noe a glove should be hung forth according to the usual custom at faire times to give notice of the approaching faire to be held the last Thursday in February according to the grant of the late King unanimous consent that a glove shall be hung out to give notice of the said ensuing faire .' ( Assembly Books 1687 Chester Records Office )
