These Fair Courts, it may be remarked, were a rough and ready means of administering justice of peculiar interest. "From the end of the eleventh century onwards, the royal grant of license to hold a fair seems to have implied license also to hold a court of summary jurisdiction for offences committed at the fair itself. These obtained the name of Piepowder Courts (pie-poudreux, dusty feet — the suitors appearing informally in their travel-stained condition). In them a jury of merchants found the judgment and declared the law; thus suitors and doomsmen were all of the same class. England is the only country which possesses records of the proceedings at these Courts." Some pleas of the Leicester Piepowder Courts (placita nundinarum villas Leycestriae), of the time of Edward the Third, will be found in the second volume of the Borough Records.
Another fair was granted on April 2nd, 1473, by Edward the Fourth to the Mayor and burgesses dwelling in his town of Leicester. It was to be held there yearly for seven days, viz., three days before the feast of St. Philop and St. James (May 1st), on that feast, and for three days after. Strangers visiting this fair were to be quit of toll, stallage, pickage, and other customs belonging to the King or his heirs. The Mayor and two or three chosen for the purpose might make all arrangements for setting of stalls, etc.
The two last-mentioned fairs are the great pleasure-fairs which were held in Humberstonegate for many centuries, and which became known as the Leicester May Fair and the Leicester October Fair. The May Pleasure Fair used to begin, in the 19th century, on May 12th, and lasted eight days, including the 12th, and the October Pleasure Fair used to begin on October l0th, and lasted 9 days, including the l0th. Cheese Fairs were held on May 13th and Oct. 11th. But after the year 1895, or 1896, the times of the Pleasure fairs were altered, and they were held in late years on the second Thursday in May and October, and the three following days, i.e., on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and the ensuing Monday, the cheese fairs taking place of late years on the second Thursdays in May and October. The stalls and shows occupied the strip of waste
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