Bristol perambulation
Also called 'beating the bounds' it usually involved a party of civic officers (headed by the mayor and sheriffs) walking or riding around the 8 miles (12.9 km) land boundary of the city and county of Bristol.
[1] The first action required following this was for the boundary of the town's existing lands to be accurately surveyed and agreed, by notable people from Bristol, Gloucestershire and Somerset.
This resulted in a long textual description of the route taken, describing landmarks and places along the way, such as ditches, embankments and existing stone boundary markers.
[4] The route and the shirestones must have been subject to regular checks by the mayor or his officers over the following centuries to ensure that boundary stones had not been moved or disturbed.
[8] A typical entry, which has been published in full, is that for September 1628: Item paide for the Charges goeing about the Shirestones viz for ale & cakes at Jacobs Well ij.s.
: vj.d., for labourers to open the wayes vj.s., for butter, cheese plums sugar, duckes carrienge the provisions and other thinges as per William Loydes note xvij.s.vij.d., for wyne at Robert Shewardes xxxj.s., for bread & cakes xj.s., and for sweete meates & comfittes to the widowe Patch xvj,s,.
[11] In part this was a response to the English Reformation, which had resulted in many religious processions being abolished because they were associated with saints' days or incorporated rituals or practices that were seen as papist.
The historian Matthew Woodcock argues that city and town governments saw Perambulation Day as a way 'to actively stage a reaffirmation and celebration of communal identity'.
Writing in the late 18th century, the antiquarian William Barrett noted that in his time 'the circumference of the whole within the liberties as appears by the perambulation round it, (which to preserve its true limits and boundaries, is made annually, at choosing a new mayor) consists of seven miles two quarters and fifty-five pearch.
[19] Great pains were taken to follow the exact route, in some cases passing through private houses, going through one window by ladder and out the other, or traversing walls.
In July 2023 historian Evan Jones from the University of Bristol produced a free online map to allow ordinary people to perambulate the city according to its original 1373 boundary.
[22] This includes the location of the shirestones recorded in the 1736 survey and a route along public roads / rights of way that sticks as closely as possible to the original boundary.
