The manufacture of cloth, which in later centuries dominated-the whole economy of Gloucestershire, was already firmly established in the-county in the early Middle Ages. Wool from the great sheep-runs of the Cotswolds had much to do with the rise of the industry. There, was more pride than accuracy in the old boast "In Europe the best wool is the English, In England the best wool is the Cotswold", but only Herefordshire wool commanded a higher price. Though great quantities were carried off from Gloucestershire by-agents of the Bardi and the Peruzzi, whose annual tours of the monastic houses of the west provided the raw material for the skilled weavers of the cities of northern, Italy, a certain proportion must always have been retained for local use. The Italians were gradually ousted by English buyers, and in the fifteenth century the Grevels, Fortheys and their fellow merchants of the Staple derived great wealth from the export of wool to Flanders. But from the time of Edward III spasmodic efforts were made to discourage or prohibit the export of raw wool and to promote the manufacture of cloth, and when the Tudor period began the county was as well known for its broadcloth as for its wool.