Castle Characters - Isolde of Pandon
For this week’s blog post, Corey has been carrying out research into another of our Castle Characters. This time, we will be looking at one of Newcastle’s most successful late thirteenth century entrepreneurs, Isolde of Pandon.
Isolde of Pandon was the daughter of a Flemish wool merchant and was married to Gilbert, another wool merchant. Wool was one of the most important exports from England during the medieval period and was a real money-spinner for smart merchants. English wool was exported to places such as Flanders and the Low Countries to be turned into fabrics and clothes. The wool trade made Isolde extremely wealthy, so wealthy, in fact, that she was the richest person in Northumberland, having a whopping £86 in 1296!
Isolde and Gilbert held a licence to export wool from Newcastle and were clearly very successful in this enterprise owing to their shared wealth. Living in Pandon, just to the east outside of Newcastle upon Tyne, and owned a warehouse on the Quayside, so the couple were in a fantastic spot to ply their trade. Unfortunately this entrepreneurial power couple were not to last, because in 1287, Gilbert died. Isolde, clearly one tough merchant, carried on the family business until 1293. She later married a merchant from Italy called Gerardino of Lucca and carried on trading wool and hides. Gerardino’s connections within his hometown propelled Isolde to the centre of European banking and trade, the Italian town of Lucca was one of the foremost centres of trade and finance.
Whether by miraculous coincidence or design, Isolde was very fortunately placed as Newcastle was one of only two ports allowed to export wool, with the other being London. The trade of wool was surprisingly very complicated with the necessities of royal interest for tax purposes and a series of other interested parties who wished to assert English dominance over competitor countries in the trade of wool and to destroy competition within England. Who would have thought that wool could cause such a commotion?
Wool was Newcastle’s number one export, with the trade of coal coming second. Isolde would have been at the centre of a booming market that put Newcastle amongst the richest towns in England, fourth behind London, York and Bristol. This wealth would have made Newcastle an important royal centre for the collection of tax and custom duties as the town had a rich and successful merchant class centred around the Quayside and areas around Newcastle Castle and St Nicholas Church. The castle, sheriff and bailiffs would have been very familiar to Isolde, who would have had many dealings with them both in providing taxes and duties and for raising grievances.
On market days, it is safe to assume that Isolde (or, more likely, her staff) were prowling about Newcastle’s cloth market area just to the north of St Nicholas’ Church next to the Bigg Market (as we commonly know it today). Isolde and her followers would probably have been seeking out Northumbrian shepherds who were bringing their wool to sell in Newcastle. Both parties will have been seeking a good deal; however, it isn’t too unrealistic to consider that, due to her wealth, Isolde was pretty good at bargaining for the deal to be in her benefit, and that she was able to throw her financial clout around and dominate the market. All of the wool bought at market would then have been taken to Isolde’s warehouse on the Quayside and then either sold to other merchants or shipped to other parts of England or northern Europe.
Medieval England was full of peculiar practices, ideas and customs. One such practice was the use of wool as a currency! In times when the crown was short of a bob or two, the kings could call upon wool as a source of assured capital that could be used instead of currency. The most prominent of these kings were Richard I, Edward I and Edward III – all warrior kings hell bent on conquest. Who would have thought that a material used to make comfortable hats, jumpers and scarves could fund and fuel war?
England during the medieval period was a feudal society, with powerful landowners such as barons controlling large tracts of land. On this land, peasants would farm both livestock and crops for their lords’ benefit. Sheep formed a very important element of the baronial landholdings, with large tracts of land being given over to rearing sheep.
The barons were able to supply large quantities of wool to the English market, so it is a certainty that wool formed a large percentage of a lords’ annual income. On the other hand, the landowners would grant small tracts of land to the peasants so that they could support themselves and their families and villages would often have tracts of land called commons where peasants could pasture sheep and other livestock. Peasants could, therefore, provide small quantities of wool to the English market. Another big player in the wool game was the monasteries, who used their lands and the lay community, those who were not part of the clergy but worked for the monasteries, to farm and sheep were a major part of this. It can be argued that almost everyone in medieval England had interests in the wool trade and used it to accumulate wealth.