 As was common in English cities in the Middle Ages , Canterbury employed a town band known as the Waits . There are records of payments to the Waits starting from 1402 , though they probably existed earlier than this . The Waits were disbanded by the city authorities in 1641 for ' misdemeanors ' but were reinstated in 1660 when they played for the visit of King Charles II on his return from exile . Waits were eventually abolished nationally by the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835 . A modern early music group called The Canterbury Waits has revived the name . 
