The Scholars’ Disputation on Bartholomew Eve

A correspondent from Morley, near Leeds, reminded Hone of a custom little noticed by antiquaries: on the eve of St Bartholomew scholars from different schools met for disputation, to try their proficiency in learning, as Stow and the astrologer Lilly both mention. In London they gathered in the churchyard of the priory of St Bartholomew in Smithfield. He had it on authority he could not doubt that the practice lingered in Yorkshire into the early eighteenth century at Lee Fair, near Woodkirk, an annual wake and mart held early in September, where by tradition the scholars of Leeds, Wakefield and perhaps other towns were brought to dispute.