Quotation from: Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period

Written by: Paul Lacroix


The profit derived from the sale of herrings at that time was so great
that it soon became a special trade; it was, in fact, the regular practice
of the Middle Ages for persons engaged in any branch of industry to unite
together and form themselves into a corporation. Other speculators
conceived the idea of bringing fresh fish to Paris by means of relays of
posting conveyances placed along the road, and they called themselves
_forains_. Laws were made to distinguish the rights of each of these
trades, and to prevent any quarrel in the competition. In these laws, all
sea-fish were comprised under three names, the fresh, the salted, and the
smoked (_sor_). Louis IX. in an edict divides the dealers into two
classes, namely, the sellers of fresh fish, and the sellers of salt or
smoked fish. Besides salt and fresh herrings, an enormous amount of salted
mackerel, which was almost as much used, was brought from the sea-coast,
in addition to flat-fish, gurnets, skate, fresh and salted whiting and
codfish.

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