ABSTRACT
The medieval village was a largely self-sufficient community but if it wished to obtain such goods as salt, fish, wine, millstones and metal implements it had to find the money required for payment. As regular markets for food emerged in the towns and at fairs, so food exports from the villages were encouraged, thus involving an occupation of carters taking goods from place to place. Wine from Gascony, fish and foodstuffs were other main items entering the port but there was a great variety, including silks, linens and millstones. A study of late medieval Colchester shows a catchment area for local foodstuffs of 7 to 8 miles. The most detailed references to the carriers are to be found in medieval brokage books, which record the actual charges imposed by towns on pack horses and carts. The evidence from Southampton and elsewhere demolishes the myth of wretched medieval roads and of carriage being on pack horses except in remoter areas.
