As regards the port-reeve--the _port-gerefa_, _i.e._, reeve of the port or town of London(84)--the nature and extent of his duties and authority, much uncertainty exists. Whilst, in many respects, his position in a borough was analogous no doubt to the shire-reeve or sheriff of a county, there were, on the other hand, duties belonging to and exercised by the one which were not exercised by the other. Thus, for instance, the port-reeve, unlike the sheriff, exercised no judicial functions in a criminal court, nor presided over court-leets in the city as the sheriff did in his county by _turn_, the latter being held independently by the alderman of each ward.(85)
In the next place the charter brings prominently to our notice the fact that there was already existing within the City's walls a strong Norman element, existing side by side with the older English burgesses, which the Conqueror did well not to ignore. The descendants of the foreign merchants from France and Normandy, for whose protection Ethelred had legislated more than half a century before, had continued to carry on their commercial intercourse with the Londoners, and were looking forward to a freer interchange of merchandise now that the two countries were under one sovereign. Their expectation was justified. No sooner had London submitted to the Norman Conqueror than, we are told, "many of the citizens of Rouen and Caen passed over thither, preferring to be dwellers in that city, inasmuch as it was fitter for their trading, and better stored with the merchandise in which they were wont to traffic."(86) But by far the most important clause in the charter is that which places the citizens of London in the same position respecting the law of the land as they enjoyed in the days of their late king, Edward the Confessor. Here there is distinct evidence that the Conqueror had come "neither to destroy, nor to found, but to continue."(87) The charter granted nothing new; it only ratified and set the royal seal(88) to the rights and privileges of the citizens already in existence.
It is recorded that William granted another charter to the citizens of London, vesting in them the City and Sheriffwick of London, and this charter the citizens proffered as evidence of their rights over the cloister and church of St. Martin le Grand, when those rights were challenged in the reign of Henry VI.(89) This charter has since been lost.