Town crier
officer of who makes public pronouncements
A town crier, also called a bellman, is an officer of a royal court or public authority who makes public pronouncements as required.
Duties and functions
The town crier was used to make public announcements in the streets. Criers often dressed elaborately, by a tradition dating to the 18th century, in a red and gold coat, white breeches, black boots and a tricorne hat.
In English-speaking countries, they carried a handbell to attract people's attention, as they shouted the words "Oyez, Oyez, Oyez!" before making their announcements. The word "Oyez" means "hear ye," which is a call for silence and attention. Oyez derives from the Anglo-Norman word for listen (modern French, oyez, infinitive, ouïr, but has been largely replaced by the verb écouter). The proclamations book in Chester from the early 19th century records this as "O Yes, O Yes!".
History
Europe
Prior to widespread literacy, town criers were the means of communication with the people of the town since many people could not read or write. Proclamations, local bylaws, market days, advertisements, were all proclaimed by a bellman or crier.
In ancient Rome, they typically proclaimed public business during the market days that formed a kind of weekend every eight days.
“Town crier” enters the record as officer of who makes public pronouncements. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Town, crier and officer can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Town crier” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Town, crier and officer provides the most credible route into that argument.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1500389. The Library of Congress control number is sh97005258. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Town crier” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.