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JAKKE2. Jack Straw was one of the leaders of the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. The revolt began in the counties of Kent, Sussex, Essex, and Bedford. Wat Tyler, a tiler of roofs, and the priest John Ball were the other leaders. On Monday before Corpus Christi, 1381, John Ball, Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, and sixty thousand people marched on London to speak with King Richard II and to gain their freedom from serfdom. At Canterbury they invaded the cathedral, damaged it, and wrecked the apartments of the archbishop. At Rochester they forced Sir John Newton to join them. Then they dispatched him to speak with the king on their behalf at the Tower. The king sent a reply that he would speak with the rebels on Thursday morning if they came down to the river Thames. On the Feast of Corpus Christi, the king met the rebels at Rotherhithe. But the Earl of Salisbury told the assembly that they were not properly dressed to speak to the king, and the king returned to the Tower. Thereupon the rebels set out for London, destroying several fine houses, and released the prisoners in the king's prison at Marshalsea. On Friday the king again met the rebels in a meadow at Mile End. In the meantime, Tyler, Straw, and Ball murdered the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Grand Prior of St. John, and a Dominican friar attached to the Duke of Lancaster. The king agreed to the demands for freedom at Mile End and ordered thirty secretaries to draw up the letters that very day. Half the people returned home, but the other half remained to plunder and terrorize the London citizens. The King met the remaining rabble at Smithfield. Here Tyler tried to assault the king and was instantly killed. Later, Jack Straw and John Ball were found hiding in a ruin. They were executed and their heads, with Tyler's, were fixed on London Bridge. The peasants who had gone home were later punished (Froissart, Chronicles II.73-76).

The noise of the people and animals as they chase the fox is like that of Jack Straw and his company as they attacked the Flemish Quarter, NPT 3394-3397.


J. Froissart, Chronicles, ed. and trans. J. Jolliffe, 236-252; R.H. Hilton, Bond Men Made Free; ibid., The English Peasantry in the Later Middle Ages.
From CHAUCER NAME DICTIONARY
Copyright © 1988, 1996 Jacqueline de Weever
Published by Garland Publishing, Inc., New York and London.

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