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The history of the charters granted to Bristol begins about this time. A charter granted by Henry II. in 1172 exempted the burgesses of Bristol from certain tolls throughout the kingdom, and confirmed existing liberties. Another charter of the same year granted the city of Dublin to the men of Bristol as a colony with the same liberties as their own town.
As a result probably of the close connexion between Bristol and Ireland the growth of the wool trade was maintained. Many Bristol men settled in Dublin, which for a long time was a Bristol beyond the seas, its charters being almost duplicates of those granted to Bristol. About this time Bristol began to export wool to the Baltic, and had developed a wine trade with the south of France, while soap-making and tanning were flourishing industries. Bristol was still organized manorially rather than municipally. Its chief courts were the weekly hundred court and the court leet held three times a year, and presided over by the reeve appointed by the earl of Gloucester. By the marriage of Earl John with the heiress of Earl William of Gloucester, Bristol became part of the royal demesne, the rent payable to the king being fixed, and the town shook off the feudal yoke. The charter granted by John in 1190 was an epoch in the history of the borough. It provided that no burgess should be impleaded without the walls, that no non-burgess should sell wine, cloth, wool, leather or corn in Bristol, that all should hold by burgage tenure, that corn need not be ground at the lord's mill, and that the burgesses should have all their reasonable gilds. At some uncertain date soon after this a commune was established in Bristol on the French model, Robert FitzNichol, the first mayor of Bristol, taking the oath in 1200. The mayor was chosen, not, like the reeve whom he had displaced, by the overlord, but by the merchants of Bristol who were members of the merchant gild. The first documentary evidence of the existence of the merchant gild appears in 1242. In addition, there were many craft gilds (later at least twenty-six were known to exist), the most important being the gilds of the weavers, tuckers and fullers, and the Gild of the Kalendars of Bristol, which devoted itself to religious, educational and social work. The mayor of Bristol was helped by two assistants, who were called provosts until 1267, and from 1267 to 1311 were known as stewards, and after that date as bailiffs. Before this time many religious houses had been founded. Earl Robert of Gloucester established the Benedictine priory of St James; there were Dominican and Franciscan priories, a monastery of Carmelites, and an abbey of St Augustine founded by Robert FitzHardinge.
In the reign of John, Bristol began the struggle to absorb the neighbouring manor of Bedminster, the eastern half of which was held by the Templars by gift of Earl Robert of Gloucester, and the western half, known as Redcliffe, was sold by the same earl to Robert FitzHardinge, afterwards Lord Berkeley. The Templars acquiesced without much difficulty, but the wealthy owners of the manor of Redcliffe, who had their own manorial courts, market, fair and quay, resisted the union for nearly one hundred years. In 1247 a new course was cut for the river Frome which vastly improved the harbour, and in the same year a stone bridge was built over the Avon, bringing Temple and Redcliffe into closer touch with the city. The charter granted by Henry III. in 1256 was important. It gave the burgesses the right to choose coroners, and as they already farmed the geld payable to the king, Bristol must have been practically independent of the king. The growing exclusiveness of the merchant gild led to the great insurrection of 1312. The oligarchical party was
