HiSCoD

Description (langue originale) : -

Description (anglais) : 'Take, for example, the demands of a crowd in Vannes, Brittany, in May 1643. Grain was scarce that year, and exports had been banned by an arret of the Parlement. On 18 May, however, a new arret reversed the ruling and permitted export of grain by water. Rapid shifts of policy which had the appearance of self-interest were suspect in the eyes of the community. The Parlement was far away in Rennes and there was suspicion that this about-face had been obtained through the intervention of interested parties. When Leguinio, a judicial crier, proclaimed this second arret in the port where ships were loading grain, he was immediately chased away by an angry crowd. When he returned with La Riviere, president in the presidial court, the highest judicial authority in the city, the two men encountered 'a very large collection of people armed with clubs, rocks, hatchets and other tools' surrounding the house of Alexandre Bigot, nicknamed Villiers. As they approached the house, people from the crowd complained to them 'that grain was being loaded contrary to the [recent] prohibition, to the prejudice of the needs of the public which were so great, several of them said, that for the last eight days they had only been able to feed their children animal fodder and vegetables without a single piece of bread'.