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Men and women who wish to uphold the interests of the textile trade should “make fashion follow the trade, and not trade the fashion,” declared Daniel Defoe in 1705. But long before this time the East India Company had discovered that the exploitation of fashion for profit is a more artful business than a mere dictatorship exercised by the “trade.” After 1660 the Company's policy regarding the import of cotton textiles was particularly concerned to influence the type and design of goods produced in India to make them serve current English needs and trends in taste. Striking success was achieved by the end of the century, but thereafter the flow of cotton manufactures was impeded by serious difficulties, chiefly the restrictions imposed on the trade by prohibition acts in 1701 and 1721, together with the competitive development of domestic calico-printing.The English had of course been familiar with cotton for several centuries before 1660, although the acquaintance brought little opportunity to build up technological skill in the processing of pure cotton goods from the raw state to the finished piece. Imports had included raw “cotton-wool” from the Levant for use in stuffing and quilting and fustians of European manufacture containing cotton. But probably it was not until the sixteenth century that a cotton weft was used in the production of domestic fustians, and not until the seventeenth that cotton was brought into linen and smallwares manufacturing. The early history of pure cotton fabrics in England is debatable ground, partly because of confusing terminology; so-called “cottons,” for instance, were produced in England before 1660, but the term is descriptive of the finishing process, or “cottoning,” rather than of content.

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The study and documentation of ceremony and ritual, a broad concern of Records of Early English Drama, has stimulated discussion about their purpose and function in an urban context. Briefly, in academic estimation their role is largely positive, both in shaping civic consciousness and in harmonizing diverse classes and interests while-as a convenient corollary-simultaneously confirming local hierarchies. Profitable self-promotion is also part of this urban picture, since ceremony and entertainment, like seasonal fairs, potentially attracted interest from outside the immediate locality. There are, however, factors that compromise this overall picture of useful urban concord: the dominance of an urban elite, for instance, may effectually be stabilized, promoted, or even disguised by ceremony and ritual; on the other hand, marginalized groups (women and the poor) have normally no place in them at all. l Those excluded from participation in civic ritual and ceremonial might, nevertheless, be to some extent accommodated in the pre-Reformation infrastructure of trade guilds and religious guilds. Both organizational groups crossed social and economic boundaries to draw male and female members together in ritual and public expression of a common purpose and brotherhood-signalling again (in customary obit, procession, and feasting) harmony and exclusivity, themes with which, it seems, pre-Reformation urban life was preoccupied. But although women were welcome within guild ranks, office was normally denied them. Fifteenth-century religious guilds also saw a decline in membership drawn from the poorer members of society, with an overall tendency for a dominant guild to become identified with a governing urban elite. 2 Less obvious perhaps, but of prime importance to those excluded from any of the above, was the parish church itself, whose round of worship afforded forms of ritual open to all. Yet each church was uniquely defined: by its history, dedication, and parish boundaries; by building form, furniture, and decoration; by memorials of its dead; and by its cult of particular saints. The individuality thus created offered a sense of belonging for even the humblest parishioner. A small offering for the Font Taper, the gift or planned bequest

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