YOU’D expect plenty of applicants for the job of ale taster in Taunton – but whoever got the job was hardly likely to be still standing by the end of it.

That’s because the role, which died out after 1,000 years, at one stage involved trying beer produced by 1,851 brewers over a seven-day period.

Ale tasters were among the positions held by members of Taunton Court Leet – and if you didn’t have the stomach for that post, it’s questionable whether you’d want to be a rhine ridder.

The team of eight had to check the town’s sewers, which ran through streets, were well looked after and free from obstructions.

Somerset County Gazette:

In the days before Wessex Water had been set up, twice a year the court would ordered the inhabitants of the streets through which the rhines flower to clean them out – there were many cases put before the court of people failing in their duty.

Environmental health didn’t exist when Taunton Court Leet was first established in the eighth century, but instead there were shamble keepers and they were in charge of seeing butchers didn’t charge excessive prices for their meat or cut the hides of beasts slaughtered by them.

The court was responsible for the maintenance of the criminal and civil law in the borough of Taunton until its significance diminished in the 17th and 18th centuries.

But the historical organisation still exists to this day, although without the powers it once enjoyed.

Members met for its annual law day on Friday in the old council chamber at Taunton’s Municipal Buildings, in Corporation Street.

The ancient ceremony was presided over by the Senior Bailiff, Terry Price, with 23 jurors appointed and sworn in by the Steward, Bill Morris, who gave a talk on the history of the court.

The guest list included Taunton Deane Mayor Cllr Marcia Hill, the Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Somerset Mr Brian Tanner, Somerset County Council chairman Christine Lawrence, the Deputy Chairman of Magistrates Stephanie Qadir and the Lord of the Manor John White.