Chronicles of London Bridge
by Richard Thompson · English · Gutenberg #47475 · 1,070,148 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Chronicles of London Bridge
Author: Richard Thompson
Release date: November 27, 2014 [eBook #47475]
Language: English
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Produced by Veronika Redfern, Chris Curnow and the Online
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Redfern.
Chronicles
OF
LONDON BRIDGE.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY D. S. MAURICE, FENCHURCH STREET.
[Illustration]
Chronicles
OF
LONDON BRIDGE:
BY
AN ANTIQUARY.
[Illustration]
LONDON:
SMITH, ELDER, AND CO.
CORNHILL.
M.DCCC.XXVII.
[Illustration]
TO THE RIGHT WORSHIPFUL
JOHN GARRATT, ESQ.
ALDERMAN OF THE WARD OF BRIDGE WITHIN;
WHO, AS
LORD MAYOR OF LONDON,
LAID THE FIRST STONE
OF THE
NEW LONDON BRIDGE,
ON WEDNESDAY, JUNE 15th, 1825;
These Chronicles
ARE MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED.
PREFACE.
The plan of narrative adopted in the ensuing pages, is recommended by
both the sanction and the example of very learned antiquity; since,
without referring to the numerous classical volumes, which have been
written upon the same principle, two of the most ancient and esteemed
works on English Jurisprudence have honoured it with their selection.
Of the accuracy of the historical events here recorded, the authorities
so explicitly cited are the most ample proofs; and, that they might be
the more generally interesting, whatever may have been their original
language, the whole are now given in English: so that an argument
should lose none of its effect from its too erudite obscurity, nor an
illustration any of its amusement by requiring to be translated.
The collection and arrangement of these materials have been a labour so
unexpectedly toilsome and extended, as, it is hoped, fully to excuse
every delay in the work’s appearance; and, but for the valuable aid
of those numerous friends who have so kindly assisted its progress,
it must have still been incomplete. Of these, the first and the most
fervent has been JOHN GARRATT, ESQ., who, by a singularly happy
coincidence, was at once the founder of the New London Bridge, as Lord
Mayor, and a native, and Alderman, of the Ward containing the Old one.
Of other benefactors to these sheets, the names of HENRY SMEDLEY,
ESQ.; H. P. STANDLEY, ESQ.; HENRY WOODTHORPE, ESQ., Town Clerk; MR.
JOSEPH YORK HATTON; MR. JOHN THOMAS SMITH, of the British Museum; MR.
WILLIAM UPCOTT, of the London Institution; and MR. WILLIAM KNIGHT, of
the New Bridge Works; will sufficiently evince the importance of their
communications; to whom, as well as to the many other friends, whose
kindnesses I am forbidden to enumerate, I thus offer my sincerest
acknowledgments. The Historians of the Metropolis have hitherto passed
over the subject of this work far too slightingly: it will be my most
ample praise to have endeavoured to supply that deficiency, by these
CHRONICLES OF LONDON BRIDGE.
_June 15th, 1827._
DESCRIPTIVE LIST
OF
THE EMBELLISHMENTS.
1. Historical Title-page, displaying a rich Gothic edifice,
surrounded by the Effigies, Armorial Ensigns, &c. of the most
eminent persons connected with the history of London Bridge. The
two upper figures represent Richard, Archbishop of Canterbury,
and Cardinal Hugo di Petraleone, who subscribed so liberally
to its original foundation, (see page 61,) and the two lower
ones, Kings John and Edward I., commemorative of the Bridge
having been finished in the reign of the former, and of the
several grants made to it by the latter. In the upper centre
is suspended a banner, with the present Royal Arms of England,
alluding to the foundation of the New London Bridge in the reign
of George IV.; and beneath it, a representation in tapestry, of
the triumphal entry of Henry V. across the ancient Bridge, in
1415, after the victory of Agincourt, described on pages 220-229:
at the sides of which are groups of banners, &c., commemorative
of some of the principal persons engaged in the battle. Below,
are the Armorial Ensigns of King Henry II., the Priory of St.
Mary Overies, the ancient device of Southwark, and the Monograms
of Peter of Colechurch, and Isenbert of Xainctes; the benefactors
and Architects of the First Stone Bridge at London. Beneath these
is a monumental effigy of Peter of Colechurch; under which appear
the ancient and modern Arms of the City of London, see page 177;
those of Robert Serle, Mercer, and Custos of London in 1214,
the principal citizen to whom the finishing of the Bridge was
entrusted, see page 73; those of Henry Walleis, Lord Mayor in
1282, and an eminent benefactor to London Bridge, see pages 131,
132; and in the centre, the shield of John Garratt, Esq., Alderman
of the Ward of Bridge-Within, and Lord Mayor in 1824-25, who laid
the First Stone of the New Edifice: see pages 635-660.--Designed
and Drawn by W. Harvey, from ancient Historical authorities.
Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
2. Antique Rosette Device on the Title-page, containing the
Armorial Ensigns of England, the City of London, the Borough of
Southwark, and the Priory of St. Mary Overies. Engraven by the
late W. Hughes.
3. Dedication Head-piece: An Ornamental Group, consisting of
the Armorial Ensigns, &c. of the City of London, the Company of
Goldsmiths, and the Right Worshipful John Garratt. Engraven by A.
J. Mason.
4. Page 1. Head-piece: Exterior view of the river-front of
Fishmongers’ Hall, with the Shades’ Tavern below it. Drawn and
Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
5. Initial Letter: View down Fish-Street-Hill, comprising the
Monument, St. Magnus’ Church, and the Northern entrance to London
Bridge. Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
6. Page 39. Ancient Monumental Effigy, from the Church of St.
Mary Overies, Southwark; reported to represent John Audery, the
Ferryman of the Thames, before the building of London Bridge.
Copied from an Etching by Mr. J. T. Smith, Keeper of the Prints
and Drawings in the British Museum. Drawn and Engraven by G. W.
Moore.
7. Page 57. Ancient Water-Quintain, as it was played at upon the
River Thames, near London Bridge, in the 12th century: Copied from
an Illuminated Manuscript in the Royal Library in the British
Museum. Drawn by W. H. Brooke; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
8. Page 57. Ancient Boat-Tournament of the same period: copied
from the same authority. Drawn and Engraven by the same.
9. Page 74. Architectural Elevation of the Centre and Southwark
end of the First Stone Bridge erected over the Thames at London,
A. D. 1209. Drawn from Vertue’s Prints, and other authorities;
Engraven by the late W. Hughes.
10. Page 80. Ground-plan of London Bridge, as first built of Stone
by Peter of Colechurch, A. D. 1209. Drawn from the measurements
and surveys of Vertue and Hawksmoor; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
11. Page 84. Western Exterior of the Chapel of St. Thomas, on the
centre pier of the First Stone London Bridge, A. D. 1209. Drawn
from the same authorities, and Engraven by the late W. Hughes.
12. Page 85. Interior View of the Upper Chapel contained in the
above, looking Westward. Drawn from Vertue’s Prints, and Engraven
by the late W. Hughes.
13. Page 86. Interior View of the Crypt, or Lower Chapel,
contained in the above, looking Eastward. Drawn from the same
authorities by W. H. Brooke; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
14. Page 87. Southern Series of Windows in ditto. Drawn from the
same authorities, and Engraven by the late W. Hughes.
15. Page 302. Ancient Date of 1497, carved in stone, found on
London Bridge in 1758, and supposed to commemorate a repair done
in the former year. Engraven by G. W. Moore.
16. Page 304. Eastern View of part of London Bridge, as it
appeared in the reign of King Henry VII.; shewing the houses, &c.
then erected upon it, and the whole depth of the Chapel of St.
Thomas. Copied from an Illuminated Manuscript in the Royal Library
in the British Museum; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
17. Page 308. Ancient Dates of 1509 and 1514, carved in stone, and
found in 1758 with the former. Engraven by G. W. Moore.
18. Page 336. Cage and Stocks on London Bridge, with the
confinement of a Protestant Woman, in the reign of Queen Mary.
Engraven by A. J. Mason.
19. Page 339. Southern View of Traitors’ Gate at the Southwark
end of London Bridge, with the heads erected on it in 1579. Drawn
from the Venetian copy of Visscher’s View of London, and other
authorities; Engraven by H. White.
20. Page 343. Southern front of the old Southwark Gate and Tower,
at the South end of London Bridge, as they appeared in 1647. Drawn
from W. Hollar’s Long Antwerp View of London; Engraven by G. W.
Bonner.
21. Page 344. Southern front and Western side of the Nonesuch
House and Drawbridge erected on London Bridge, at the above
period. Drawn from the same authority; Engraven by T. Mosses.
22. Page 346. Western side of the Nonesuch House on London
Bridge, as it appeared in the time of Queen Elizabeth. Copied
from a Tracing of an Original Drawing on vellum, preserved in the
Pepysian Library, in Magdalen College, Cambridge; Engraven by G.
W. Bonner.
23. Page 356. Ancient Corn Mills erected on the Western side
of London Bridge, at Southwark. Drawn from the same authority;
Engraven by H. White.
24. Page 357. Ancient Water-Works and Water-Tower standing on the
Western side of London Bridge, at the North end. Drawn from the
same authority; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
25. Page 367. General View of the Western side of London Bridge,
with all its ancient buildings, taken from the top of St. Mary
Overies’ Church in Southwark, at the close of the Sixteenth
Century. Drawn by W. H. Brooke; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
26. Page 384. Copy of a Brass Token, issued by John Welday,
living on London Bridge in 1657. Drawn from the Originals in the
Collection of the late Barry Roberts, Esq., in the British Museum;
Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
27. Page 385. Other Tokens in Brass and Copper, issued by
Tradesmen residing at London Bridge. Drawn from the Originals in
the British Museum; Engraven by G. W. Moore.
28. Page 387. Obverses of Two Medalets struck by P. Kempson, and
P. Skidmore, of London Bridge, and Bridge-Gate. Drawn from the
Originals, and Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
29. Page 397. Group of buildings at the Northern end of London
Bridge, destroyed in the Fire of 1632-33. Drawn from the Venetian
Copy of Visscher’s View of London; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
30. Page 403. Ground Plan of the Old Stone Bridge of London after
the Fire of 1632-33, the extent of which is indicated by the
dotted line attached to the seventh sterling from the left hand,
or City end, where the Waterhouse was situate. Copied from an
Original Drawing on Parchment, preserved in the Print Room of the
British Museum; Engraven by G. W. Moore.
31. Page 405. Northern end of London Bridge after the Fire of
1632-33, shewing the Old Church of St. Magnus, and the temporary
wooden passage erected on the sites of the houses, as it appeared
in 1647. Drawn from the Long Antwerp View by Hollar; Engraven by
G. W. Bonner.
32. Page 407. View of the same part of London Bridge in the
year 1665, before the Great Fire of London, shewing the last
wooden passage and King’s Gate, afterwards burned. Copied from a
contemporary etching by Hollar; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
33. Page 445. View of the Northern end of London Bridge, and part
of the banks of the Thames as they appeared in ruins after the
Great Fire of London in 1666. Copied from a contemporary view by
W. Hollar; Engraven by H. White.
34. Page 446. Ancient View of Fishmongers’ Hall from the river,
before the Great Fire of London, A. D. 1666. Drawn from the Long
Antwerp View, by W. Hollar; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
35. Page 462. View of the Northern end of London Bridge, with
the Water Works and Tower, as they appeared in 1749. Copied from
Buck’s View of London; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
36. Page 487. Southern side of Bridge Gate, as rebuilt in 1728.
Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
37. Page 501. Eastern side of London Bridge before the taking down
of the Houses in 1758. Drawn from Scott’s View, taken from St.
Olave’s Stairs. Copied by W. H. Brooke; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
38. Page 516. Chapel of St. Thomas on London Bridge, with the
adjoining houses, as they appeared at their taking down in 1758.
Drawn from a contemporary Etching; Engraven by the late W. Hughes.
39. Page 517. Southern front of the Nonesuch House on London
Bridge, with the Draw-Bridge, as they appeared in their
dilapidated state previously to their taking down in 1758. Drawn
from a picture then painted by J. Scott; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
40. Page 518. Eastern View of the Southwark Gate and Tower on
London Bridge, as they appeared previously to their taking down in
1758. Drawn from the same authority; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
41. Page 521. Northern View of the Temporary Bridge adjoining
London Bridge on fire during the night of April 11, 1758. Drawn by
W. H. Brooke from an Engraving by Wale and Grignion, with other
contemporary authorities; Engraven by H. White.
42. Page 526. Western side of London Bridge, shewing the ruins of
the Temporary Bridge, and the destruction occasioned by the fire
of 1758. Drawn by W. H. Brooke, from the view by A. Walker and W.
Herbert; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
43. Page 532. Part of the middle of London Bridge, shewing the
wooden Centering upon which the Great Arch was turned, when the
Chapel Pier was taken away, and the whole edifice repaired in the
year 1759. From a Drawing by Mr. W. Knight; Engraven by G. W.
Bonner.
44. Page 537. Section of the Northern Pier of the Great Arch of
London Bridge, shewing its modern state, and the ancient method
of constructing the Piers. From a Drawing by Mr. W. Knight, in
August, 1821, when open for examining the foundation. Engraven by
G. W. Bonner.
45. Page 578. Elevation and Ground-plan of Old London Bridge,
shewing the various forms, &c. of the Sterlings, the line of
soundings taken along their points, a section of the bed of the
River, and the different sizes of the several Locks; with Mr.
Smeaton’s method of raising the ground under the great Arch, and
the timbers laid down to strengthen it in 1793-94. Reduced from
the large survey made by Mr. George Dance in July, 1799, and
published with the Second Report on the Improvement of the Port of
London. Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
46. Page 604. South-Eastern View of London Bridge, A. D. 1825.
Drawn and Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
47. Page 612. Eastern View of the Sixth Arch of London Bridge,
from the City end, usually called the Prince’s Lock, as it
appeared in the great Frost of 1814; shewing the modern stone
casing, with the original building beneath it. Copied by
permission from a View taken on the spot and engraved by Mr. J. T.
Smith. Drawn and Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
48. Page 628. Silver Effigy of Harpocrates, discovered in digging
the foundations of the New London Bridge, and presented to the
British Museum by Messrs. Rundell, Bridge, and Rundell, November
12, 1825. Drawn from the Original by W. Harvey; Engraven by J.
Smith.
48. Page 631. Architectural Elevation and Ground-plan of the
New London Bridge, shewing its foundation-piles, and relative
situation to the former edifice. From the original authorities.
Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
50. Page 641. Entrance to the Coffer-Dam from London Bridge, as it
appeared decorated for laying the First Stone of the New Bridge
on Wednesday, June 15, 1825. Drawn on the spot; Engraven by G. W.
Bonner.
51. Page 642. Western end of ditto. Drawn from the River; Engraven
by G. W. Bonner.
52. Page 643. General View of the Exterior of ditto. Drawn on the
Southern side; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
53. Page 646. General View of the Interior of ditto, looking
Southward; shewing the position of the First Stone, with the
cavity beneath it for depositing the Coins, &c. From a Drawing
made on the spot; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
54. Page 651. Representation of the Silver-Gilt Trowel, presented
to the Right Honourable John Garratt, for laying the First Stone
of the New London Bridge. Drawn from the original; Engraven by G.
W. Bonner.
55. Page 662. Obverse of a Medal struck to commemorate the above
ceremony, containing busts of the Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress.
Drawn by W. H. Brooke from the original Model, in the possession
of Joseph York Hatton, Esq., executed by Peter Rouw and W. Wyon,
Esquires, Modeller and Die-Sinker to His Majesty. Engraven by A.
J. Mason.
56. Page 664. Western side of the New London Bridge, looking down
the River. Drawn by T. Letts; Engraven by G. W. Bonner.
“This is a Gentleman, every inch of him; a Virtuoso, a clean
Virtuoso:--a sad-coloured stand of claithes, and a wig like the curled
back of a mug-ewe. The very first question he speered was about
the auld Draw-Brig, that has been at the bottom of the water these
twal-score years. And how the Deevil suld he ken ony thing about the
auld Draw-Brig, unless he were a Virtuoso?”
CAPTAIN CLUTTERBUCK’S INTRODUCTORY EPISTLE TO THE MONASTERY.
[Illustration]
Chronicles
OF
LONDON BRIDGE.
So numerous are the alterations and modernisms in almost every street
of this huge metropolis, that I verily believe, the conservators of our
goodly city are trying the strength of a London Antiquary’s heart; and,
by their continual spoliations, endeavouring to ascertain whether it be
really made “of penetrable stuff.” For my own part, if they continue
thus improving, I must even give up the ghost; since, in a little time,
there will not be a spot left, where any feature of age will carry
back my remembrance to its ancient original. What with pullings-down,
and buildings-up; the turning of land into canals, and covering over
old water-ways with new paved streets; erecting pert plaister fronts
to some venerable old edifices, and utterly abolishing others from off
the face of the earth; London but too truly resembles the celebrated
keepsake-knife of the sailor, which, for its better preservation, had
been twice re-bladed, and was once treated with a new handle. One year
carried with it that grand fragment of our city’s wall, which so long
girdled-in Moorfields; while another bedevilled the ancient gate of St.
John’s Priory with Heraldry, which Belzebub himself could not blazon,
and left but one of the original hinges to its antique pier. Nay,
there are reports, too, that even Derby House, the fair old College of
Heralds,--where my youth was taught “the blasynge of Cote Armures,”
under two of the wisest officers that ever wore a tabard,--that even
_that_ unassuming quadrangle is to be forthwith levelled with the dust,
and thus for ever blotted from the map of London! Alas for the day!
Moorgate is not, and Aldgate is not! Aldersgate is but the shadow of
a name, and Newgate lives only as the title of a prison-house! In the
absence, then, of many an antique building which I yet remember, I have
little else to supply the vacuum in my heart, but to wander around the
ruins of those few which still exist:--to gaze on the rich transomed
bay-windows that even yet light the apartments of Sir Paul Pindar’s
now degraded dwelling; to look with regret upon the prostituted Halls
of Crosby House; or to roam over to the Bankside, and contemplate the
fast-perishing fragments of Winchester’s once proud Episcopal Palace.
It was but recently, in my return from visiting the spot last
mentioned, that I betook me to a Tavern where I was erst wont to
indulge in another old-fashioned luxury,--which has also been taken
away from me,--that of quaffing genuine wine, drawn reaming from the
butt in splendid silver jugs, in the merry old SHADES by LONDON BRIDGE.
I loved this custom, because it was one of the very few fragments of an
ancient Citizen’s conviviality, which have descended to us: a worthy
old friend and relative, many a long year since, first introduced me
to the goodly practice, and though I originally liked it merely for
_his_ sake, yet I very soon learned to admire it for its own. It was a
most lovely moonlight night, and I placed myself in one of the window
boxes, whence I could see the fastly-ebbing tide glittering with
silvery flashes; whilst the broad radiance of the planet, cast upon the
pale stone colour of the Bridge, strikingly contrasted with the gas
star-like sparks which shone from the lamps above it. “Alas!” murmured
I, “pass but another twenty years, and even thou, stately old London
Bridge!--even _thou_ shalt live only in memory, and the draughts which
are now made of thine image. In modern eyes, indeed, these may seem
of little value, but unto Antiquaries, even the rudest resemblance of
that which is not, is worth the gold of Ind; and Oh! that we possessed
some fair limning of thine early forms; or Oh! for some faithful old
Chronicler, who knew thee in all thine ancient pride and splendour, to
tell us the interesting story of thy foundation, thine adventures, and
thy fate!”
It was at this part of my reverie, that the Waiter at the Shades
touched my elbow to inform me, that a stout old gentleman, who called
himself MR. BARNABY POSTERN, had sent his compliments, and desired
the pleasure of my society in the drinking of a hot sack-posset. “My
services and thanks,” said I, “wait upon the ancient, I shall be
proud of his company: but for sack-posset, where, in the name of Dame
Woolley, that all-accomplished cook, hath he learned how to----? but he
comes.”
My visitor, as he entered, did not appear any thing very remarkable;
he looked simply a shrewd, hale, short old gentleman, of stiff formal
manners, wrapped in a dark-coloured cloak, and bearing in his hand a
covered tankard, which he set upon the table betwixt us; after which,
making a very low bow, he took his seat opposite to me, and at once
opened the conversation.
“Your fame,” said he, “MR. GEOFFREY BARBICAN, as a London Antiquary,
is not unknown to me; and I have sometimes pleased myself with the
thought, that you must be even a distant relation of my own, since
tradition says, that the _Barbicans_ and the _Posterns_ originally
received their names from having been gate-keepers in various parts of
this fair city: but of that I will not positively speak. Howbeit, I am
right glad of this fellowship, because I have some communications and
reflections which I would fain make to you, touching the earlier days
of that Bridge, under which the tide is now so rapidly running.”
“My dear Mr. Postern,” said I, in rapture, “nothing could delight me
more than an Antiquary’s stories of that famous edifice; but moralising
I abominate, since I can do that for myself, even to admiration;
so, my good friend Mr. Barnaby, as much description, and as many
rich old sketches, as you please, but no reflections, my kinsman, no
reflections.”
“Well,” returned my visitor, “I will do my best to entertain you; but
you very well know, that we old fellows, who have seen generations
rise and decay, are apt to make prosing remarks:--However, we’ll
start fairly, and taste of my tankard before we set out: trust me,
it’s filled with that same beverage, which Sir John Falstaff used to
drink o’nights in East Cheap; for the recipé for brewing it was found,
written in a very ancient hand upon a piece of vellum, when the Boar’s
Head was pulled down many a long year ago. Drink, then, worthy Mr.
Barbican; drink, good Sir;--you’ll find it excellent beverage, and I’ll
pledge you in kind.”
Upon this invitation, I drank of my visitor’s tankard; and believe me,
reader, I never yet tasted any thing half so delicious; for it fully
equalled the eulogium which Shakspeare’s jovial knight pronounces upon
it in the Second part of “_King Henry the Fourth_,” Act iv. sc. iii.;
where the merry Cavalier of Eastcheap tells us, that “a good Sherris
sack hath a two-fold operation in it: it ascends me into the brain,
dries me there all the foolish, and dull, and crudy vapours which
environ it: makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble,
fiery, and delectable shapes; which, delivered o’er to the voice, (the
tongue,) which is the birth, becomes excellent wit. The second property
of your excellent Sherris is,--the warming of the blood; which, before
cold and settled, left the liver white and pale, which is the badge
of pusillanimity and cowardice: but the Sherris warms it, and makes
it course from the inwards to the parts extreme. It illumineth the
face; which, as a beacon, gives warning to all the rest of this little
kingdom, man, to arm; and then, the vital commoners, and inland petty
spirits, muster me all to their Captain, the heart; who, great, and
puffed up with this retinue, doth any deed of courage; and this valour
comes of Sherris: so that skill in the weapon is nothing, without Sack:
for that sets it a-work: and learning, a mere hoard of gold kept by a
devil, till Sack commences it, and sets it in act and use.--If I had
a thousand sons, the first human principle I would teach them, should
be,--to forswear thin potations, and addict themselves to Sack!”
Truly, indeed, I felt all those effects in myself; whilst my visitor
appeared to be so inspired by it, that, as if all the valuable lore
relating to London Bridge had been locked up until this moment, he
opened to me such a treasure of information concerning it, that, I
verily believe, he left nothing connected with the subject untouched.
He quoted books and authors with a facility, to which I have known no
parallel; and, what is quite as extraordinary, the same magical philtre
enabled me as faithfully to retain them. Indeed, the posset and his
discourse seemed to enliven all my faculties in such a manner, that the
very scenes of which my companion spake, appeared to rise before my
eyes as he described them. When Mr. Postern had pledged me, therefore,
by drinking my health, in a very formal manner, he thus commenced his
discourse.
“You very well know, my good Mr. Barbican, that Gulielmus Stephanides,
or, as the vulgar call him, William Fitz-Stephen, who was the friend
and secretary of Thomas à Becket, a native of London, and who died
about 1191, in his invaluable tract ‘_Descriptio Nobilissimæ Civitatis
Londoniæ_,’ folio 26, tells us that to the North of London, there
existed, in his days, the large remains of that immense forest which
once covered the very banks of this brave river. ‘_Proxime patet ingens
foresta_,’ &c. begins the passage; and pray observe that I quote from
the best edition with a commentary by that excellent Antiquary Dr.
Samuel Pegge, published in London, in the year 1772, in quarto. Ever,
Mr. Barbican, while you live, ever quote from the _editio optima_
of every author whom you cite; for, next to a knowledge of books
themselves, is an acquaintance with the best editions. But to return,
Sir; in those woody groves of yew, which the old citizens wisely
encouraged for the making of their bows, were then hunted the stag,
the buck, and the doe; and the great Northern road, which now echoes
the tuneful Kent bugle of mail-coach-guards, was then an extensive
wilderness, resounding with the shrill horns of the Saxon Chiefs,
as they waked up the deer from his lair of vert and brushwood. The
very paths, too, that now behold the herds of oxen and swine driven
town-ward to support London’s hungry thousands, then echoed with the
bellowing of savage bulls, and the harsh grunting of many a stout wild
boar. But, as you have observed, _I_ am to describe scenes, and _you_
are to moralise upon their changes, so we’ll hasten down again to the
water-side, only observing, that the site of the ancient British London
is yet certainly marked out to you, by the old rhyming stone in Pannier
Alley, by St. Paul’s, which saith:--
‘WHEN Y^V HAVE SOVGHT
THE CITY ROVND,
YET STILL THIS IS
THE HIGHEST GROVND.’
“Now, Julius Cæsar tells you in his Commentaries ‘_De Bello Gallico_,’
_lib._ v. _cap._ xxi. that ‘a British town was nothing more than a
thick wood, fortified with a ditch and rampart, to serve as a place of
retreat against the incursions of their enemies.’ Here, then, stood
our good old city, upon the best ’vantage ground of the Forest of
Middlesex; the small hive-shaped dwellings of the Britons, formed of
bark, or boughs, or reeds from the rushy sides of these broad waters,
being interspersed between the trees; whilst their little mountain
metropolis, the ‘_locum reperit egregiè naturâ, atque opere munitum_,’
a place which appeared extremely strong, both by art and nature,--as
the same matchless classic called those primitive defences,--was
guarded on the North by a dark wood, that might have daunted even
the Roman Cohorts; and to the South, where there was no wilderness,
morasses, covered with fat weeds, and divided by such streams as
the Wall-brook, the Shareburn, the Fleta, and others of less note,
stretched downward to the Thames. As Cæsar and his Legions marched
straight from the coast, worthy old Bagford was certainly in the right,
when, in a letter to his brother-antiquary Hearne, he said, that the
Roman invader came along the rich marshy ground now supporting Kent
Street,--in truth very unlike the road of a splendid conqueror,--and,
entering the Thames as the tide was just turning, his army made a wide
angle, and was driven on shore by the current close to yonder Cement
Wharf, at Dowgate Dock. This you find prefixed to Tom Hearne’s edition
of Leland’s ‘_Collectanea de Rebus Britannicis_,’ London, 1774, 8vo.,
volume i. pp. lviii. lix.: and many an honest man, since ‘the hook-nosed
fellow of Rome,’ before a bridge carried him over the waters dry-shod,
has tried the same route, in preference to going up to the Mill-ford,
in the Strand, or York-ford which lay still higher. In good time,
however, the Romans, to commemorate their own successful landing there,
built a _Trajectus_, or Ferry, to convey passengers to their famous
military road which led to Dover. But history is not wholly without the
mention of a Bridge over the Thames near London, even still earlier
than this period; for, when Dion Cassius is recording the invasion of
Britain by the Emperor Claudius I., A. D. 44, he says,--‘The Britons
having betaken themselves to the River Thames, where it discharges
itself into the Sea, easily passed over it, being perfectly acquainted
with its depths and shallows: while the Romans, pursuing them, were
thereby brought into great danger. The Gauls, however, again setting
sail, and _some of them having passed over by the Bridge, higher up the
River_, they set upon the Britons on all sides with great slaughter;
until, rashly pursuing those that escaped, many of them perished in
the bogs and marshes.’ This passage, which it must be owned, however,
is not very satisfactory, is to be found in the best edition of the
‘_Historiæ Romanæ_,’ by Fabricius and Reimar, Hamburgh, 1750-52, folio,
volume ii. page 958; in the 60th Book and 20th Section. The Greek
text begins, ‘Ἀναχωρησάντων δ’ ἐντεῦθεν τῶν Βρεττανῶν ἐπὶ τὸν Ταμέσαν
ποταμὸν,’ [Greek: Anachôrêsantôn d’ enteuthen tôn Brettanôn epi ton
Tamesan potamon] &c.; and the Latin--‘_Inde se Britanni ad fluvium
Tamesin_.’ I have only to remind you that Dion Cassius flourished about
A. D. 230. Before we finally quit Roman London, however, I must make
one more historical remark. The inscription on the monument which I
quoted from Pannier Alley, is dated August the 27th, 1688; and if even
at _that period_,--through all the mutations of the soil, and more than
sixteen centuries after the Roman Invasion,--the ground still retained
its original altitude, it yet further proves on how admirable a site
our ancient London was originally erected:--well worthy, indeed, to be
the metropolis of the world. This also is remarked by honest Bagford,
in his work already cited, where, at page lxxii., he says,--‘For many
of our ancient kings and nobility took delight in the situation of the
old Roman buildings, which were always very fine and pleasant, the
Romans being very circumspect in regard to their settlements, having
always an eye to some river, spring, wood, &c. for the convenience
of life, particularly an wholesome air. And this no doubt occasioned
the old Monks, Knights Templars, and, after them, the Knights of St.
John of Jerusalem, as also the Friars, to settle in most of the Roman
buildings, as well private as public, which thing, if duly considered,
will be found to be a main reason why we have so few remains of them.’
“As I have always considered that the Romans had no more to do
with Britain, than Joe the waiter here would have in a Conclave of
Cardinals, I will not trouble you with any sketch of the dress or
manners of the ferryman and his customers, during their government.
Indeed, as a native of London, I always lament over it as the time of
our captivity; and so I shall hasten on to the tenth century, when our
Runic Ancestors from Gothland were settled in Britain;--when courage
was the chiefest virtue, and the rudest hospitality----”
“Have pity upon me, my excellent Mr. Postern,” interrupted I, “for I
am naturally impatient at reflections; if you love me, then, give me
scenery without meditations, and history without a moral.”
“Truly, Sir,” said he, “I was oblivious, for I’d got upon a favourite
topic of mine, the worth of our Saxon fore-fathers; but we’ll cut them
off short by another draught of the sack-posset, and take up again
with the establishment of a ferry by one Master Audery, in the year
nine hundred and ninety----Ah! see now, my memory has left me for the
precise year, but nevertheless, Mr. Geoffrey Barbican, my service to
you.” When he had passed me the tankard, after what I considered a very
reasonable draught, Mr. Postern thus continued.
“I hold it right, my friend, to mix these convivialia with our
antiquarian discussions, because I know that they are not only ancient,
but in a manner peculiar to this part of the water-side; for we find
Stephanides, _Stephanus ab Stephano_, as I may jocularly call him, whom
I before quoted, saying at folio 32, ‘_Præterea est in Londonia super
ripam fluminis_,’ &c. but we’ll give the quotation in plain English.
‘And moreover, on the banks of the river, besides the wine sold in
ships’--that is to say, foreign wines of Anjou, Auxere, and Gascoigne,
though even then we had some Saxon and Rhenish wines well worth the
drinking,--‘besides the wines sold in ships and vaults, there is a
public eating-house, or cook’s shop. Here, according to the season,
you may find victuals of all kinds, roasted, baked, fried, or boiled.
Fish, large and small, with coarse viands for the poorer sort, and more
delicate ones for the rich, such as venison, fowls, and small birds. In
case a friend should arrive at a Citizen’s house, much wearied with his
journey, and chuses not to wait, an-hungered as he is, for the buying
and cooking of meat,
The water’s served, the bread’s in baskets brought,
_Virg. Æn._ i. 705.
and recourse is immediately had to the bank above-mentioned, where
every thing desirable is instantly procured. No number so great, of
knights or strangers, can either enter the city at any hour of day or
night, or leave it, but all may be supplied with provisions, so that
those have no occasion to fast too long, nor these to depart the city
without their dinner. To this place, if they be so disposed, they
resort, and there they regale themselves, every man according to his
abilities. Those who have a mind to indulge, need not to hanker after
sturgeon, nor a guinea-fowl, nor a gelinote de bois,’--which some
call red-game, and others a godwit--‘for there are delicacies enough
to gratify their palates. It is a public eating-house, and is both
highly convenient and useful to the city, and is a clear proof of its
civilization.’
“Thus speaks Fitz-Stephen of the time of Henry II. between the years
1170 and 1182; and if you look but two centuries later, you shall find
that John Holland, Duke of Exeter, held his Inn here at Cold Harbour,
and gave to his half-brother, King Richard the Second, a sumptuous
dinner, in 1397. Then too, when this spot became the property of the
merry Henry Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, by the gift of Henry the
Fourth, the same King filled his cellars with ‘twenty casks and one
pipe of red wine of Gascoigne, free of duty.’ This you have on the
authority of John Stow, on the one part, in his ‘_Survey of London_,’
the best edition by John Strype, &c. London, 1754, folio, volume i.
page 523; and of Master Thomas Pennant, on the other, in his ‘_Account
of London_,’ 2nd edition, London, 1791, 4to, page 330.”
“Aye, Master Postern,” said I, “and that same Cold Harbour is not the
less dear to me, forasmuch as Stow noteth, in the very place which you
have just now cited, that Richard the Third gave the Messuage, and
all its appurtenances, to John Wrythe, Garter Principal King of Arms,
and the rest of the Royal Heralds and Pursuivants, in 1485.”--“True,
Mr. Geoffrey, true,” answered my visitor; “and you may remember that
here also, in these very Shades, did King Charles the merry, regale
incognito; and here, too, came Addison and his galaxy of wits to finish
a social evening. Then, but a little above to the North, was the famous
market of East Cheap; of which our own Stow speaks in his book before
cited, page 503, quoting the very rare ballad of ‘_London Lickpenny_,’
composed by Dan John Lydgate, of which a copy in the old chronicler’s
own hand writing, is yet extant in the Harleian Manuscripts, No. 542,
article 17, folio 102, of which stanza 12 says,--
‘Then I hied me into Estchepe;
One cried ribes of befe, and many a pie,
Pewtar potts they clatteryd on a heape,
Ther was harpe, pipe, and sawtry,
Ye by cokke, nay by cokke, some began to cry,
Some sange of Jenken and Julian, to get themselves mede;
Full fayne I wold hade of that mynstralsie
But for lacke of money I cowld not spede!’
“Lydgate, you know, died in the year 1440, at the age of sixty. In the
present day, indeed, we have only the indications of this festivity
in the names of the ways leading down to, or not far from, the
river; as, Pudding Lane, Fish Street Hill, the Vine-tree, or Vintry,
Bread-street,----”
“Hold! hold! my dear Mr. Barnaby,” interrupted I, “what on earth
has all this long muster-roll of gluttony to do with London Bridge?
You are, as it were, endeavouring to prove, that yonder is the moon
lighting the waters; for certes, it is a self-evident truth, that the
citizens of London have from time immemorial been mighty trencher-men;
nay, if I remember me rightly, your own favourite Stephanides says,
‘The only plagues of London are, immoderate drinking of idle fellows,
and often fires:’ so _that_ we’ll take for granted, and get on to the
Bridge.”
“You are in the right,” answered Mr. Postern; “the passage begins
‘_Solæ pestes Londoniæ_,’ &c. at folio 42, and truly I wished but to
shew you how proper a place these Shades are to be convivial in; but
now we will but just touch upon the Saxon Ferry and Wooden Bridge, and
then come at once to the first stone one, founded by the excellent
Peter of Colechurch, in the year 1176. I would you could but have seen
the curious boat in which, for many years, Audery the Ship-wight, as
the Saxons called him, rowed his fare over those restless waters.
It was in form very much like a crescent laid upon its back, only
the sharp horns turned over into a kind of scroll; and when it was
launched, if the passengers did not trim the barque truly, there was
some little danger of its tilting over, for it was only the very centre
of the keel that touched the water. But our shipman had also another
wherry, for extra passengers, and that had the appearance of a blanket
gathered up at each end, whilst those within looked as if they were
about to be tossed in it. His oars were in the shape of shovels, or
an ace of spades stuck on the end of a yard measure; though one of
them rather seemed as if he were rowing with an arrow, having the barb
broken off, and the flight held downwards. It is nearly certain, that
at this period there was no barrier across the Thames; for you may
remember how the ‘_Saxon Chronicle_,’ sub anno 993, tells you that
the Dane Olaf, Anlaf, or Unlaf, ‘_mid thrym et hundnigentigon scipum
to Stane_,’--which is to say, that ‘he sailed with three hundred and
ninety ships to Staines, which he plundered without, and thence went to
Sandwich.’
“Before I leave speaking of this King Olaf, however, I wish you to
observe the paction which he made with the English King Ethelred, for
we shall find him hereafter closely connected with the history of
London Bridge. The same authority, and under the same year and page,
tells you that, after gaining the battle of Maldon, and the death of
Alderman Britnoth, peace was made with Anlaf, ‘and the King received
him at Episcopal hands, by the advice of Siric, Bishop of Canterbury,
and Elfeah of Winchester.’ On page 171, in the year 994, you also
find this peace more solemnly confirmed in the following passage.
‘Then sent the King after King Anlaf, Bishop Elfeah, and Alderman
Ethelwerd, and hostages being left with the ships, they led Anlaf with
great pomp to the King, at Andover. And King Ethelred received him at
Episcopal hands, and honoured him with royal presents. In return Anlaf
promised, as he also performed, that he never again would come in a
hostile manner to England.’ I quote, as usual, from the best edition of
this invaluable record by Professor Ingram, London, 1823, 4to. It is
generally believed, however, that the year following Anlaf’s invasion,
namely 994, there was built a low Wooden Bridge, which crossed the
Thames at St. Botolph’s Wharf yonder, where the French passage vessels
are now lying; and a rude thing enough it was, I’ll warrant; built
of thick rough-hewn timber planks, placed upon piles, with moveable
platforms to allow the Saxon vessels to pass through it Westward. A
Bridge of any kind is not so small a concern but what one might suppose
you could avoid running against it, and yet William of Malmesbury, the
Benedictine Monk, who lived in the reign of King Stephen, and died in
1142, says, that, in 994, King Sweyn of Denmark, the Invader, ran foul
of it with his Fleet. This you find mentioned in his book, ‘_De Gestis
Regum Anglorum_,’ the best edition, London, 1596, folio:--though, by
the way, the preferable one is called the Frankfurt reprint of 1601,
as it contains all the errata of the London text, and adds a good many
more of its own; for I am much of the mind of Bishop Nicolson, and
Sir Henry Spelman, who observe that the Germans committed abundance
of faults with the English words. In this record, which is contained
in Sir Henry Savile’s ‘_Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores Post Bedam_,’ of
the foregoing date and size, at folio 38^b, is the passage beginning
‘_Mox ad Australes regiones_,’ _&c._ of which this is the purport.
“‘Some time after, the Southern parts, with the inhabitants of
Oxford and Winchester, were brought to honour his’--that is to say
King Sweyn’s--‘laws: the Citizens of London alone, with their lawful
King’--Ethelred the Second--‘betook themselves within the walls, having
securely closed the gates. Against their ferocious assailants, the
Danes, they were supported by their virtue, and the hope of glory. The
Citizens rushed forward even to death for their liberty; for none could
think himself secure of the future if the King were deserted, in whose
life he committed his own: so that although the conflict was valiant on
both sides, yet the Citizens had the victory from the justness of their
cause; every one endeavouring to shew, throughout this great work,
how sweet he estimated those pains which he bore for him. The enemy
was partly overthrown; and part was destroyed in the River Thames,
over which, in their precipitation and fury, they never looked for the
Bridge.’
“I know very well that the truth of this circumstance is much
questioned by Master Maitland, at page 43 of his ‘_History of London_,’
continued by the Rev. John Entick, London, 1772, folio, volume i.;
wherein he denies that any historian mentions a Bridge at London, in
the incursion of Anlaf or Sweyn; and asserts that the loss of the
army of the latter was occasioned ‘by his attempting to pass the
River, without enquiring after Ford, or Bridge.’ He affirms too, that
Stow mistakes the account given by William of Malmesbury; and that
the Monk himself distorts his original authority in saying that the
invaders had not a regard to the Bridge. Now, if, as the margin of
Maitland’s History states, the Saxon Chronicle were _that_ authority,
the Library-keeper of Malmesbury had no greater right to speak as
Maitland does, than he had for using those words which I have already
translated,--‘part were destroyed in the River Thames, over which, in
their precipitation and fury, they never looked for the Bridge:’ for
the words of the Saxon Chronicle, at page 170, are, in reality,--‘And
they closely besieged the City and would fain have set it on fire,
but they sustained more harm and evil than they ever supposed that
the Citizens could inflict on them. The Holy Mother of God’--for the
Invasion took place on her Nativity, September the 8th,--‘on that day
considered the Citizens, and ridded them of their enemies.’ Here then
is no word of a Bridge, nor, indeed, does any Historian record the
event as William of Malmesbury does. _Lambarde_--whom I shall quote
anon,--when he relates it, cites the ‘_Chronicle of Peterborough_,’ and
the ‘_Annals of Margan_,’ but neither of them have the word Bridge upon
their pages. He, most probably, took this circumstance from Marianus
Scotus, a Monk of Mentz, in Germany, who wrote an extensive History of
England and Europe ending in 1083, but, of this, only the German part
has been printed, although it was amazingly popular in manuscript.
“We have, however, an earlier description of London Bridge in a
state of warlike splendour, than is commonly imagined, or at least
referred to, by most Antiquaries; and that too from a source of
no inconsiderable authority: for the learned old Icelander Snorro
Sturlesonius, who wrote in the 13th century, and who was assassinated
in 1241, on page 90 of that rather rare work by the Rev. James
Johnstone, entitled ‘_Antiquitates Celto-Scandicæ_,’ Copenhagen, 1786,
quarto, gives the following very interesting particulars of the Battle
of Southwark, which took place in the year 1008, in the unhappy reign
of Ethelred II., surnamed the Unready.
“‘They’--that is the Danish forces--‘first came to shore at London,
where their ships were to remain, and the City was taken by the Danes.
Upon the other side of the River, is situate a great market called
Southwark,’--Sudurvirke in the original--‘which the Danes fortified
with many defences; framing, for instance, a high and broad ditch,
having a pile or rampart within it, formed of wood, stone, and turf,
with a large garrison placed there to strengthen it. This, the King
Ethelred,’--his name, you know, is Adalradr in the original,--‘attacked
and forcibly fought against; but by the resistance of the Danes it
proved but a vain endeavour. There was, at that time, a Bridge erected
over the River between the City and Southwark, so wide, that if two
carriages met they could pass each other. At the sides of the Bridge,
at those parts which looked upon the River, were erected Ramparts
and Castles that were defended on the top by penthouse-bulwarks and
sheltered turrets, covering to the breast those who were fighting in
them: the Bridge itself was also sustained by piles which were fixed
in the bed of the River. An attack therefore being made, the forces
occupying the Bridge fully defended it. King Ethelred being thereby
enraged, yet anxiously desirous of finding out some means by which he
might gain the Bridge, at once assembled the Chiefs of the army to a
conference on the best method of destroying it. Upon this, King Olaf
engaged,’--for you will remember he was an ally of Ethelred,--‘that
if the Chiefs of the army would support him with their forces, he
would make an attack upon it with his ships. It being ordained then in
council, that the army should be marched against the Bridge, each one
made himself ready for a simultaneous movement both of the ships and of
the land forces.’
“I must here entreat your patience, Mr. Geoffrey Barbican, to follow
the old Norwegian through the consequent battle; for although he gives
us no more scenery of London Bridge, yet he furnishes us with a minute
account of its destruction, and of a conflict upon it, concerning
which all our own historians are, in general, remarkably silent. I say
too, with Falstaff, ‘play out the play;’ for I have yet much to say
on the behalf of that King Olaf, who, we shall find, is the patron
protector of yonder Church at the South-East corner of London Bridge,
since he died a Saint and a Martyr. Snorro Sturleson then, having
cleared the way for the forcing of London Bridge on the behalf of
King Ethelred, thus begins his account of the action, entitling it,
in the Scandinavian tongue, Orrosta, or the fight. ‘King Olaf, having
determined on the construction of an immense scaffold, to be formed of
wooden poles and osier twigs, set about pulling down the old houses in
the neighbourhood for the use of the materials. With these _Vinea_,
therefore,’--as such defences were anciently termed--‘he so enveloped
his ships, that the scaffolds extended beyond their sides; and they
were so well supported, as to afford not only a sufficient space for
engaging sword in hand, but also a base firm enough for the play of his
engines, in case they should be pressed upon from above. The Fleet, as
well as the forces, being now ready, they rowed towards the Bridge, the
tide being adverse; but no sooner had they reached it, than they were
violently assailed from above with a shower of missiles and stones,
of such immensity that their helmets and shields were shattered, and
the ships themselves very seriously injured. Many of them, therefore,
retired. But Olaf the King and his Norsemen having rowed their ships
close up to the Bridge, made them fast to the piles with ropes and
cables, with which they strained them, and the tide seconding their
united efforts, the piles gradually gave way, and were withdrawn from
under the Bridge. At this time, there was an immense pressure of stones
and other weapons, so that the piles being removed, the whole Bridge
brake down, and involved in it’s fall the ruin of many. Numbers,
however, were left to seek refuge by flight: some into the City, others
into Southwark. And now it was determined to attack Southwark: but the
Citizens seeing their River Thames occupied by the enemy’s navies, so
as to cut off all intercourse that way with their interior provinces,
were seized with fear, and having surrendered the City, received
Ethelred as King. In remembrance of this expedition thus sang Ottar
Suarti.’
“And now, Sir, as this is, without any doubt, the first song which was
ever made about London Bridge, I shall give you the Norse Bard’s verses
in Macpherson’s Ossianic measure, as that into which they most readily
translate themselves; premising that the ensuing are of immeasurably
greater authenticity.
‘And thou hast overthrown their Bridges, Oh thou Storm of the
Sons of Odin! skilful and foremost in the Battle! For thee was it
happily reserved to possess the land of London’s winding City.
Many were the shields which were grasped sword in hand to the
mighty increase of the conflict; but by thee were the iron-banded
coats of mail broken and destroyed.’
And ‘besides this,’ continues Snorro, ‘he also sang:’
‘Thou, thou hast come, Defender of the Earth, and hast restored
into his Kingdom the exiled Ethelred. By thine aid is he
advantaged, and made strong by thy valour and prowess: Bitterest
was that Battle in which thou didst engage. Now, in the presence
of thy kindred the adjacent lands are at rest, where Edmund, the
relation of the country and the people, formerly governed.’
‘Besides this, these things are thus remembered by Sigvatus.’
‘That was truly the sixth fight which the mighty King fought with
the men of England: wherein King Olaf,--the Chief himself a Son
of Odin, valiantly attacked the Bridge at London. Bravely did the
swords of the Völscs defend it, but through the trench which the
Sea-Kings, the men of Vikes-land, guarded, they were enabled to
come, and the plain of Southwark was full of his tents.’
“Such were the martial feats of King Olafus, upon the water; and now
let us turn to his more pious and peaceful actions upon the land,
that caused the men of Southwark to found to his honour yonder fane,
which still bears his name and consecrates his memory. And in so
doing, I pray you to observe that I am not wandering from the subject
before us; for that Church is one of the Southern boundaries of London
Bridge, and, as such, possesses some interest in its history. The
other, on the same side, is the Monastery of St. Mary Overies, of the
which I shall hereafter discourse; whilst the two Northern ones are
St. Magnus’ Church, and that abode of festivity which rises above us,
Fishmongers’ Hall, of which the story will be best noticed when we
shall have arrived at the time of the Great Fire. There are within
the City walls and Diocese of London, three Churches dedicated to
the Norwegian King and Martyr, St. Olaf; and in consequence, Richard
Newcourt, in his ‘_Repertorium Ecclesiasticum Parochiale Londinense_,’
which I shall hereafter notice, volume i. page 509, takes occasion to
speak somewhat of his history; collected, most probably, from Adam
of Bremen’s ‘_Historia Ecclesiarum Hamburgensis et Bremensis_.’ He
was the Son of Herald Grenscius, Prince of Westfold, in Norway, and
was celebrated for having expelled the Swedes from that country,
and recovering Gothland. It was after these exploits that he came
to England, and remained here as an ally of King Ethelred for three
years, expelling the Danes from the Cities, Towns, and Fortresses, and
ultimately returning home with great spoil. He was recalled to England
by Emma of Normandy, the surviving Queen of his friend, to assist her
against Knute; but as he found a paction concluded between that King
and the English, he soon withdrew, and was then created King of Norway
by the voice of the nation. To strengthen his throne, he married the
daughter of the King of Swedeland; but now his strict adherence to
the Christian faith, and his active zeal for the spread of it, caused
him to be molested by domestic wars, as well as by the Danes abroad:
though these he regarded not, since he piously and valiantly professed,
that he had rather lose his life and Kingdom than his faith in Christ.
Upon this, the men of Norway complained to Knute, King of Denmark,
and afterwards of England, charging Olaf with altering their laws and
customs, and entreating his assistance; but the Norwegian hero was
supported by a young soldier named Amandus, King of Swethland, who had
been bred up under Olaf, and taught to fight by him. He, at first,
overthrew the Dane in an engagement; but Knute, having bribed the
adverse fleet, procured three hundred of his ships to revolt, and then
attacking Olaf, forced him to retreat into his own country, where his
subjects received him as an enemy. He fled from the disloyal Pagans to
Jerislaus, King of Russia, who was his brother-in-law, and remained
with him till the better part of his subjects, in the commotions of
the Kingdom, calling him to resume his crown, he went at the head of
an army; when, whilst one party hailed his return with joy, the other,
urged by Knute, opposed him by force, and in a disloyal battle at
Stichstadt, to the North of Drontheim, says Newcourt, page 510, with
considerable pathos, they ‘murthered this holy friend of Christ, this
most innocent King, in Anno 1028,’ but he should have said 1030. His
feast is commemorated on the fourth of the Kalends of August, that is
to say on the 29th of July; for Grimkele, Bishop of Drontheim, his
capital City, a pious priest whom he had brought from England to assist
him in establishing Christianity in Norway, commanded that he should be
honoured as a Saint, with the title of Martyr. His body was buried in
Drontheim, and was not only found undecayed in 1098, but even in 1541,
when the Lutherans plundered his shrine of its gold and jewels; for it
was esteemed the greatest treasure in the North. Such was St. Olave,
to whose memory no less than four Churches in London are dedicated;
for, says Newcourt, he ‘had well deserved, and was well beloved of our
English Nation, as well for his friendship for assisting them against
the Danes, as for his holy and Christian life, by the erection of many
Churches which to his honourable memory they built and dedicated to
him.’ I notice only one of these, because it is contiguous to London
Bridge, which is called St. Olave, Southwark. It stands, as you very
well know, on the Northern side of Tooley Street; and although many
people would think St. Tooley to be somewhat of a questionable patron
for a Church, yet I would remind you that it was only the more usual
ancient English name of King Olave, as we are told on good authority,
by the Rev. Alban Butler in his ‘_Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and
other principal Saints_,’ London, 1812, 8vo. volume vii. where also,
on pages 378-380, you have many further particulars of the life of
this heroic Prince. You may also meet with him under a variety of
other names, as Anlaf, Unlaf, Olaf Haraldson, Olaus, and Olaf Helge,
or Olave the Holy. Of his Church in Southwark I will tell you nothing
as to its foundation, but remark only that its antiquity is proved by
William Thorn’s ‘_Chronicle of the Acts of the Abbots of St. Austin’s
Canterbury_;’ which is printed in Roger Twysden’s ‘_Historiæ Anglicanæ
Scriptores Decem_;’ London, 1652, folio. Thorn, you may remember, was a
Monk of St. Augustine’s, in 1380; and on column 1932 of the volume now
referred to, he gives the copy of a grant from John, Earl of Warren,
to Nicholas, the Abbot of St. Augustine’s, giving to his Monastery all
the estate which it held in ‘Southwark standing upon the River Thames,
between the Breggehouse and the Church of Saint Olave.’ By this we know
it to be ancient, for that grant was made in the year 1281. And now I
will say no more of St. Olave, but that a very full and interesting
memoir of him, and his miracles, is to be found in that gigantic work
entitled the ‘_Acta Sanctorum_,’ Antwerp, 1643-1786, 50 volumes, folio,
and yet incomplete, for the year descends to October only:--see the
seventh volume of July, pages 87-120.
“And now let me chaunt you his Requiem, by giving you, from the same
authority, a free translation of the concluding stanza of that Latin
Hymn to his memory, which Johannes Bosch tells us was inserted in the
Swedish Missal, and sung on his festival; it is in the same measure as
the original.
‘Martyr’d King! in triumph shining,
Guardian Saint, whom bliss is ’shrining;
To thy spirit’s sons inclining
From a sinful world’s confining
By thy might, Oh set them free!
Carnal bonds are round them ’twining,
Fiendish arts are undermining,
All with deadly plagues are pining,
But thy power and prayers combining,
Safely shall we rise to thee!--AMEN.’
“One of the last notices of London Bridge which occurs in the days of
King Ethelred, and I place it here because it is without date, is in
his Laws, as they are given in the ‘_Chronicon_’ of John Brompton,
Abbot of Jorvaulx, in the City of York, who lived about the year 1328.
His work was printed in Twysden’s Scriptores, which I last quoted; and
at column 897, in the xxiii. Chapter of the Statutes there given, is
the following passage.
“‘_Concerning the Tolls given at Bylyngesgate._
‘If a small ship come up to Bilynggesgate, it shall give one halfpenny
of toll: if a greater one which hath sails, one penny: if a small ship,
or the hulk of a ship come thereto, and shall lie there, it shall give
four pence for the toll. For ships which are filled with wood, one log
of wood shall be given as toll. In a week of bread’--perhaps a festival
time, ‘toll shall be paid for three days; the Lord’s day, Tuesday, and
Thursday. Whoever shall come to the Bridge, in a boat in which there
are fish, he himself being a dealer, shall pay one halfpenny for toll;
and if it be a larger vessel, one penny.’
“Concerning Brompton’s translation of these laws, Bishop Nicolson, in
his ‘_English, Scotch, and Irish Historical Libraries_,’ London, 1736,
folio, page 65, says that they are pretty honestly done, and given at
large: but they may be seen with several variations and additions very
fairly written in the collections of Sir Simonds D’Ewes, preserved with
the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, No. 596. John Brompton,
however, at column 891 of his Chronicle, tells us one circumstance more
concerning London Bridge before the Invasion of Knute; for he says,
under the year 1013, ‘After this, many people were overthrown in the
Thames, at London, not caring to go by the Bridge;’ that is to say,
because it had been broken in the two recent battles as I have already
told you, and there were also erected several fortifications about the
City.’
“Perhaps it was the error of Sweyn in getting his Fleet foul of London
Bridge, which made Knute the Dane, his Son, go so laboriously to work
with the Thames, upon his Invasion in 1016; and I shall give you this
very wonderful story in the words of the Saxon Chronicle, page 197.
‘Then came the ships to Greenwich, and, within a short interval, to
London; where they sank a deep ditch on the South side, and dragged
their ships to the West side of the Bridge. Afterwards they trenched
the City without, so that no man could go in or out, and often fought
against it; but the Citizens bravely withstood them.’ There are some
who doubt this story, but honest William Maitland, who loved to get
to the bottom of every thing, as he went sounding about the river for
Cæsar’s Ford, also set himself to discover proofs of Knute’s Trench:
and you may remember that he tells us, in his work which I have already
cited, volume i. page 35, that this artificial water-course began at
the great wet-dock below Rotherhithe, and passing through the Kent
Road, continued in a crescent form to Vauxhall, and fell again into the
Thames at the lower end of Chelsea Reach. The proofs of this hypothesis
were great quantities of fascines of hazels, willows, and brushwood,
pointing northward, and fastened down by rows of stakes, which were
found at the digging of Rotherhithe Dock in 1694; as well as numbers of
large oaken planks and piles, also found in other parts.
“Florence of Worcester, who, you will recollect, wrote in 1101, and
died in 1119, in his ‘_Chronicon ex Chronicis_,’ best edition, London,
1592, small 4to. page 413; and the famous old Saxon Chronicle, page
237; also both mention the easy passage of the rapacious Earl Godwin,
as he passed Southwark in the year 1052. The tale is much the same in
each, but perhaps the latter is the best authority, and it runs thus.
‘And Godwin stationed himself continually before London, with his
Fleet, until he came to Southwark; where he abode some time, until the
flood came up. When he had arranged his whole expedition, then came the
flood, and they soon weighed anchor and steered through the Bridge by
the South side.’ This relation is also supported by Roger Hoveden, in
his Annals, Part I. in ‘_Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores post Bedam_,’ by
Sir H. Savile, folio 253^b, line 41.
“And now, worthy Mr. Barbican, before we enter upon the conjectures
and disputes relating to the real age and founders of the first
Wooden Bridge over the Thames at London, let me give you a toast,
closely connected with it, in this last living relique of old Sir John
Falstaff. You must know, my good Sir, that when the Church-Wardens
and vestry of St. Mary Overies, on the Bankside yonder, meet for
conviviality, one of their earliest potations is to the memory of their
Church’s Saint and the patroness who feeds them, under the familiar
name of ‘_Old Moll!_’ and therefore, as we are now about to speak of
them and their pious foundation most particularly, you will, I doubt
not, pledge me heartily to the Immortal Memory of Old Moll!”
“I very much question,” returned I, “if either the good foundress of
the Church, or she to whom it was dedicated,--if Mary the Saint, or
Mary the Sinner,--were ever addressed by so unceremonious an epithet in
their lives; but, however, as it’s a parochial custom, and your wish,
here’s Prosperity to St. Saviour’s Church, and the Immortal Memory of
Old Moll!” Mr. Postern having made a low bow of acknowledgment for my
compliance, thus continued.
“I have made it evident then, and, indeed, it is agreed to on all
sides, that there _was_ a Wooden Bridge over the Thames, at London,
at least as early as the year 1052; and Maitland, at page 44 of his
History, is inclined to believe that it was erected between the years
993 and 1016, at the public cost, to prevent the Danish incursions
up the River. John Stow, however, in volume i., page 57, of his
‘_Survey_,’ attributes the building of the first Wooden Bridge over
the Thames, at London, to the pious Brothers of St. Mary’s Monastery,
on the Bankside. He gives you this account on the authority of Master
Bartholomew Fowle, _alias_ Fowler, _alias_ Linsted, the last Prior of
St. Mary Overies; who, surrendering his Convent on the 14th of October,
1540,--in the 30th year of Henry VIII.,--had a pension assigned him of
£100 per Annum, which it is well known, that he enjoyed until 1553.
This honest gentleman you find spoken of in John Stevens’s ‘_Supplement
to Sir William Dugdale’s Monasticon Anglicanum_,’ London, 1723, folio,
volume ii., page 98; and from him old Stow states, that, ‘a Ferry being
kept in the place where now the Bridge is built, the Ferryman and his
wife deceasing, left the said Ferry to their only daughter, a maiden
named Mary; which, with the goods left her by her parents, as also
with the profits rising of the said Ferry, built a house of Sisters in
the place where now standeth the East part of St. Mary Overies Church,
above the choir, where she was buried. Unto the which house she gave
the oversight and profits of the Ferry. But afterwards, the said house
of Sisters being converted into a College of Priests, the Priests built
the Bridge of Timber, as all the other great Bridges of this land
were, and, from time to time, kept the same in good reparations. Till
at length, considering the great charges of repairing the same, there
was, by aid of the Citizens of London, and others, a Bridge built with
arches of stone, as shall be shewed.’
“The first who attacks this story is William Lambarde, the Perambulator
of Kent, in his ‘_Dictionarium Angliæ Topographicum et Historicum_,’
London, 1730, quarto, page 176; wherein he scruples not to call Prior
Fowler ‘an obscure man,’ whom he charges with telling this narrative,
‘without date of time, or warrant of writing,’ and then sums up his
remarks in these words. ‘As for the first buildinge, I leave it to
eche man’s libertye what to beleve of it; but as for the name Auderie,
I think Mr. Fowler mistoke it, for I finde bothe in the Recordes of
the Queene’s Courtes and otherwise, it signifieth over the water, as
Southrey, on the South side of the water: the ignorance whereof, might
easily dryve Fowler--a man belyke unlearned in the Saxon tongue,--to
some other invention.’
“Maitland and Entick, at page 44 of their History, are not much more
believing than Lambarde, the Lawyer; for they assert that the Convent
of Bermondsey, founded by Alwin Child, a Citizen of London, in the year
1082, was the first religious house on the South side of the River,
within the Bills of Mortality. The second, say they, speaking after
Sir William Dugdale in his ‘_Monasticon Anglicanum_,’ London, 1661,
folio, pages 84, 940, was the Priory of St. Mary Overies, founded by
William Giffard, Bishop of Winchester, in the reign of King Henry I.
Now Bishop Tanner, in his ‘_Notitia Monastica_,’ best edition by James
Nasmith, Cambridge, 1787, folio, XX. Surrey,--for you know the book is
unpaged and arranged alphabetically under Counties, of which Pennant
heavily complains,--is inclined to think that Stow was in the right,
although he had not discovered any thing either in print or manuscript
to support his narrative. He is also willing to believe, that Bishop
Giffard did not do more for St. Mary Overies, than rebuild the body of
the Church: and, certainly, that he did not, in 1106, place Regular
Canons there, since he refers to Matthew of Westminster to prove that
they were then but newly come into England, and placed in that Church;
whilst Bishop Giffard was himself in exile until the year 1107. The
‘_Domesday Book_,’ also, the most veritable and invaluable record of
our land, thus hints at a Religious House in Southwark; which, as that
Survey was made about the year 1083, was, of course, long anterior to
the times of which I spake last. You will find the passage in Nichols’
edition of the register, London, 1783, folio, volume i. _Sudrie_, folio
32 a, column 1; and the words are as follow. ‘The same Bishop,’--that
is to say, Odo, Bishop of Baieux,--‘has in Southwark one Monastery, and
one Harbour. King Edward held it on the day he died.’--January the 5th,
1066--‘Whoever had the Church, held it of the King. From the profits
of the Harbour, where ships were moored, the King had two parts.’
‘Now,’ concludes the worthy Dr. Tanner, ‘if _Monasterium_ here denote
any thing more than an ordinary Church, it may be thought to mean this
Religious House, there being no pretence for any other in this Borough
to claim to be as old as the Confessor’s time, or, indeed, as the
making of the Domesday Book, A. D. 1083.’ _Vide_ Sign. U u 2; _Notes_
r, and s.
“Maitland, however, cannot be brought to believe in the foundation of
a Wooden Bridge by the Brethren of St. Mary; and on page 44 of his
work, already cited, he thus gives the reasons for his non-conformity.
‘As the Ferry,’ he commences, ‘is said to have been the chief support
of the Priory, ’twould have been ridiculous in the Prior and Canons,
to have sacrificed their principal dependence, to enrich themselves
by a wild chimera of increasing their revenues in the execution of a
project, which, probably, would have cost six times the sum of the
intrinsic value of their whole estate; and, when effected, would,
in all likelihood, not have brought in so great an annual sum as
the profits arising by the Ferry, seeing it may be presumed that
foot-passengers would have been exempt from Pontage.’ He next proceeds
to quote a deed of King Henry I., which I shall produce in its proper
order of time, exempting certain Abbey lands from being charged with
the work of London Bridge: which he considers as a sufficient proof
that the Priests of St. Mary did not preserve the erection in repair,
and therefore, says he, ‘as the latter part of this traditionary
account is a manifest falsehood, the former _is very likely_ to be
of the same stamp.’ He then sums up all by these bold words. ‘As it
appears that some religious foundations only were exempt from the
work of this Bridge, and they, too, by charter, _I think ’tis not to
be doubted_, but all civil bodies and incorporations were liable to
contribute to the repairs thereof. And, consequently, that Linsted
and his followers exceed the truth, by ascribing all the praise of so
public a benefaction to a small House of Religious; who, with greater
probability, only consented to the building of this Bridge, upon
sufficient considerations and allowances, to be made to them for the
loss of their Ferry, by which they had been always supported.’ Such
are the objections against the attributing the building of the First
Wooden Bridge to the Monks of Southwark; but we may remark, by the
way, that Stow was a laborious and inquisitive Antiquary, who saw and
inquired, as well as read for himself, and, in all probability, had
both seen and conversed with Prior Fowle; whilst Maitland and Entick
were often contented to write in their libraries from the works of
others, and speak of places with which they were but very slightly
acquainted. We may add too, that, as the Priests of St. Mary were
Regular Canons of St. Austin, by their rule they were not permitted
to be wealthy, but were to sell the whole of their property, give
to the poor, have all things in common, and never be unemployed. I
know very well, that in opposition to Stow’s account of Mary Audery’s
foundation, you may bring forward that assertion made in Stevens’s
‘_Supplement to Dugdale_,’ which I have already cited, volume ii. page
97; wherein she is called ‘a noble woman,’ and, consequently, could
not be the Ferryman’s daughter. But of this let me observe, that the
authority of Stow’s ‘_Survey_,’ given in the margin, is mis-quoted; for
although it is certain that the action itself was sufficiently noble,
yet the old Citizen never calls her other than ‘a Maiden named Mary.’
You may see the place to which Stevens refers, in Strype’s edition of
the ‘_Survey_,’ volume ii. page 10; and let me remark now, before I
quit the history of St. Mary Overies, as connected with that of London
Bridge, that there is yet extant there, a monumental effigy conveying
the strongest lesson of man’s mortality; it being the resemblance of
a body in that state, when corruption is beginning its great triumph.
Prating Vergers and Sextons commonly tell you, that the persons whom
these figures represent, endeavoured to fast the whole of Lent, in
imitation of the great Christian pattern, and that dying in the act,
they were reduced to such a cadaverous appearance at their decease.
There has, however, been a new legend invented for this sculpture,
as it is commonly reported to be that of AUDERY, THE FERRYMAN,
[Illustration]
father of the foundress of St. Mary Overies. It was formerly placed on
the ground, under the North window of the Bishop’s Court, which, before
the present repairs, stood at the North East corner of the Chapel of
the Virgin Mary. Where it will be removed to hereafter, time only can
unfold, for, as yet, even the Churchwardens themselves know not.
“In speaking of this person’s tomb, I must not, however, omit to
notice, that there is a singularly curious, although, probably,
fabulous tract of 30 pages, of his life, the title of which I shall
give you at length. ‘_The True History of the Life and sudden Death of
old John Overs, the rich Ferry-Man of London, shewing, how he lost his
life, by his own covetousness. And of his daughter Mary, who caused the
Church of St. Mary Overs in Southwark to be built; and of the building
of London Bridge._’ There are two editions of this book, the first of
which was published in 12mo., in 1637, and a reprint of it in 8vo.,
which, though it be shorn of the wood-cuts that decorated the _Editio
Princeps_, is, perhaps, the most interesting to us, inasmuch as it
bears this curious imprint.--‘_London: Printed for T. Harris at the
Looking-Glass, on London Bridge: and sold by C. Corbet at Addison’s
Head, in Fleet-street, 1744. Price six pence_.’ You may see this work
in Sir W. Musgrave’s Biographical Tracts in the British Museum; its
first nine pages are occupied with a definition and exhortation against
covetousness, in the best Puritanic style of the seventeenth century;
and then, on page 10, the history opens thus:--‘Before there was any
Bridge at all built over the Thames, there was only a Ferry, to which
divers boats belonged, to transport all passengers betwixt Southwark
and Churchyard Alley, that being the high-road way betwixt Middlesex,
and Sussex, and London. This Ferry was rented of the City, by one John
Overs, which he enjoyed for many years together, to his great profit;
for it is to be imagined, that no small benefit could arise from the
ferrying over footmen, horsemen, all manner of cattle, all market folks
that came with provisions to the City, strangers and others.’
“Overs, however, though he kept several servants, and apprentices, was
of so covetous a soul, that notwithstanding he possessed an estate
equal to that of the best Alderman in London, acquired by unceasing
labour, frugality, and usury, yet his habit and dwelling were both
strongly expressive of the most miserable poverty. He had, as we have
already seen, an only daughter, ‘of a beautiful aspect,’ says the
tract, ‘and a pious disposition; whom he had care to see well and
liberally educated, though at the cheapest rate; and yet so, that
when she grew ripe and mature for marriage, he would suffer no man
of what condition or quality soever, by his good will, to have any
sight of her, much less access unto her.’ A young gallant, however,
who seems to have thought more of being the Waterman’s heir than his
son-in-law, took the opportunity, whilst he was engaged at the Ferry,
to be admitted into her company; ‘the first interview,’ says the story,
‘pleased well; the second better; but the third concluded the match
between them.--In all this interim, the poor silly rich old Ferryman,
not dreaming of any such passages, but thinking all things to be as
secure by land as he knew they were by water,’ continued his former
wretched and penurious course of life. From the disgusting instances
which are given of this caitiff’s avarice, he would seem to have
been the very prototype and model of Elwes and Dancer; and, as the
title-page of the book sets forth, even his death was the effect of
his covetousness. To save the expense of one day’s food in his family,
he formed a scheme to feign himself dead for twenty-four hours; in
the vain expectation that his servants would, out of propriety, fast
until after his funeral. Having procured his daughter to consent to
this plan, even against her better nature, he was put into a sheet,
and stretched out in his chamber, having one taper burning at his
head, and another at his feet, according to the custom of the time.
When, however, his servants were informed of his decease, instead of
lamenting, they were overjoyed; and, having danced round the body, they
brake open his larder, and fell to banqueting. The Ferryman bore all
this as long, and as much like a dead man, as he was able; ‘but, when
he could endure it no longer,’ says the tract, ‘stirring and struggling
in his sheet, like a ghost, with a candle in each hand, he purposed to
rise up, and rate ‘em for their sauciness and boldness; when one of
them thinking that the Devil was about to rise in his likeness, being
in a great amaze, catched hold of the butt-end of a broken oar, which
was in the chamber, and, being a sturdy knave, thinking to kill the
Devil at the first blow, actually struck out his brains.’ It is added,
that the servant was acquitted, and the Ferryman made accessary and
cause of his own death. The estate of Overs then fell to his daughter,
and her lover hearing of it, hastened up from the country; but, in
riding post, his horse stumbled, and he brake his neck on the highway.
The young heiress was almost distracted at these events, and was
recalled to her faculties only by having to provide for her father’s
interment; for he was not permitted to have Christian burial, being
considered as an excommunicated man, on account of his extortions,
usury, and truly miserable life. The Friars of Bermondsey Abbey were,
however, prevailed upon, by money, their Abbot being then away, to
give a little earth to the remains of the wretched Ferryman. But upon
the Abbot’s return, observing a grave which had been but recently
covered in, and learning who lay there, he was not only angry with
his Monks for having done such an injury to the Church, for the sake
of gain, but he also had the body taken up again, laid on the back of
his own Ass, and, turning the animal out at the Abbey gates, desired
of God that he might carry him to some place where he best deserved
to be buried. The Ass proceeded with a gentle and solemn pace through
Kent Street, and along the highway, to the small pond once called St.
Thomas a Waterings, then the common place of execution, and shook
off the Ferryman’s body directly under the gibbet, where it was put
into the ground, without any kind of ceremony. Mary Overs, extremely
distressed by such a succession of sorrows, and desirous to be free
from the importunity of the numerous suitors for her hand and fortune,
resolved to retire into a cloister; which she shortly afterwards did,
having first provided for the foundation of that Church which still
commemorates her name.
“Such is the story related by this tract; and, if it were possible,
one might suppose, that the pious maiden, out of her filial love,
had placed that effigy in her fane, which I before mentioned to be
sculptured in memory of her father; since it would, by no means,
improperly represent the cadaverous features of the old Waterman. The
figure, itself, is of the third form of the classes of Sepulchral
Monuments, invented by Maurice Johnson, Esq.,--namely, tables with
effigies or sculptures,--and the last of the arrangement adopted by
Smart Lethullier, Esq., that is to say,--the representation of a
skeleton in a shroud, lying either under, or on, a table tomb. Richard
Gough, you know, in his ‘_Sepulchral Monuments_,’ London, 1786-96,
folio, volume i., part 1, Introduction, page cxi. where you will
find all these particulars, attributes most of these figures to the
fifteenth century, and Audery certainly died very long before the
time of William I. However this may be, as I am laying before you all
the illustrations of Bridge history, both authentic and traditional,
which are now to be found, I must not omit to add, that the supposed
effigy of Audery is six feet eight inches in length; and represents
his decayed body lying in its winding-sheet. His hair is turned up in
a roll above his head, though in the ‘_History of Southwark_,’ by M.
Concannen, Junior, and A. Morgan, Deptford, 1795, octavo, page 101,
_Note_, he is erroneously stated to have ‘a shorn crown,’ and is,
therefore, supposed to represent Linsted, the last Prior of St. Mary’s.
“Captain Francis Grose has inserted this figure, not very respectably
engraven, in his ‘_Antiquities of England and Wales_,’ London, 1773-87,
royal quarto, six volumes, in the Addenda attached to volume iv.,
plate iii.; and he observes, on page 36, that ‘it is a skeleton-like
figure, of which the usual story is told, that the person thereby
represented attempted to fast forty days, in imitation of Christ,’ as
he remarks on the preceding page, but died in the attempt, having first
reduced himself to that appearance. The best engraving of this effigy
was published in ‘_Mr. J. T. Smith’s Antiquities of London, and its
Environs_,’ London, 1791, quarto.
“Be this figure, however, who it may, the Waterman or the Priest, his
tomb has outlived both his name and his dust. Whether he only carried
passengers over the River Thames, or was occupied in teaching them how
to cross that last fatal River,--which John Bunyan quaintly tells you
hath _no_ Bridge,--‘after life’s fitful fever he sleeps well,’--
“Aye, and so shall I soon,” cried I, stretching myself, and
interrupting Mr. Postern; “let him rest in peace, my good Sir, and come
out of Church now; for, truly, it’s high time to close your Sermon, and
let us hear somewhat about a River which _hath_ a Bridge, that was once
the wonder of the world.”
“I thank you,” replied my narrator, “I thank you, Mr. Geoffrey
Barbican, for recalling me to the subject of our conversation; for this
is the very point at which I would proceed with my history. You know,
Sir,” continued he, in a much brisker tone, “I have already observed to
you, that the First Wooden Bridge was erected much farther to the East
than yonder stone bulwark; for when King William I. granted a Charter
to the foundation of St. Peter’s Abbey, at West-Minster, in the second
year of his reign, A. D. 1067, he confirmed to the Monks serving God in
that place, a Gate in London, then called Butolph’s Gate, with a Wharf
which stood at the head of London Bridge. This has ever been received
as a well-established fact; for Stow relates it in his ‘_Survey_,’
volume i., pages 22 and 58; and Mr. John Dart, in his ‘_History
and Antiquities of the Abbey Church of St. Peter, Westminster_,’
London, 1723, folio, volume i., page 20, supports it, in his List of
Benefactors to the Abbey, in the time of King Edward the Confessor.
“The record is also given at length, by Stow, in English; but you may
see it in the original Latin, in a curious Manuscript in the Cotton
Library, marked _Faustina_, A. iii., which is entitled, ‘_A Registry
of the Regal and Pontifical Charters, Privileges, Agreements, and
Covenants, of the Bishops and Abbots of the Church of the blessed
Peter of Westminster; many whereof are Saxon ones, written in the
Norman-Saxon characters._’ This volume is a little stout quarto,
written in a small fair Church text, on parchment; adorned with many
vermillion initial letters, and rubrics, or heads of chapters. The
Charter to which I have now referred you, chapter xliv., is the last
but one in the reign of King William I., folio 63, b, of the modern
pagination; and, put into English, is as follows:--
“‘Concerning the lands of Almodus, of St. Butolph’s Gate, and of the
Wharf at the head of London Bridge.
“‘William, King of England, to the Sheriffs and all Ministers, as,
also, to his faithful subjects of London, French and English, greeting:
Know ye, that I have granted unto God and to St. Peter of Westminster,
and to the Abbot Vitalis, the House which Almodus, of the Gate of St.
Botolph, gave to them when he was made a Monk; that is to say, his
Lord’s Court, with his Houses, and one Wharf which is at the head of
London Bridge, and others of his lands in the same City, like as King
Edward more fully and beneficially granted them: and I will and command
that they shall enjoy the same well, and quietly, and honourably,
with sake and soke, and shall hold all the customs and laws of the
aforesaid. And I defend them that none shall do them any injury.
Witness, Walkeline, Bishop of Winchester, and William, Bishop of
Durham, and R., Earl of Mell., and Hugh, Earl of Warwick.’
“And now let me remark that, by this we are informed that the City end
of the Bridge was not anciently the foot of it, which is asserted by
the evidence of Richard Newcourt, in his ‘_Ecclesiastical History of
the Diocess of London_,’ London, 1708-10, folio, volume i., page 396,
where he says, that ‘St. Magnus’ Church is sometimes called, in Latin,
the Church of St. Magnus the Martyr, in the City of London, near the
foot, or at the foot, of London Bridge.’
“This First Wooden Bridge, however, was not fated to stand long; for,
on the sixteenth of November, the feast of St. Edmund the Archbishop,
in the year 1091, ‘at the hour of six, a dreadful whirlwind from the
South-East, coming from Africa, blew upon the City, and overthrew
upwards of six hundred houses, several Churches, greatly damaged the
Tower, and tore away the roof and part of the wall of the Church of
St. Mary le Bow, in Cheapside. The roof was carried to a considerable
distance, and fell with such force, that several of the rafters, being
about twenty-eight feet in length, pierced upwards of twenty feet into
the ground, and remained in the same position as when they stood in the
Chapel.’
“The best accounts of this terrible event are to be found in the
‘_Chronicle_’ of Florence of Worcester, page 457, which was literally
copied into the ‘_Annales_’ of Roger de Hoveden, Chaplain to King Henry
II., printed in the ‘_Scriptores post Bedam_,’ already cited, page
462;--in William of Malmesbury, page 125;--and in the ‘_Chronicle_’ of
John of Brompton, which I have also before quoted, page 987.
“During the same storm, too, the water in the Thames rushed along with
such rapidity, and increased so violently, that _London Bridge was
entirely swept away_; whilst the lands on each side were overflowed
for a considerable distance. I cannot help observing how slightly,
and erroneously, the ‘_Annals of Waverley_’ notice this most dreadful
devastation; for at page 137, of the best edition by Dr. Thomas Gale,
volume ii. of his ‘_Historiæ Anglicanæ Scriptores_ xv.’ Oxford, 1691,
folio, they merely state that ‘a vehement wind struck down London
the 6th of the kalends of November,’--that is to say, on the 27th of
October,--‘at the hour of six!’ I doubt not but the truth was, that the
good Monks of Waverley Abbey in Surrey felt nothing of this _ventus
vehemens_ themselves, and therefore gave a much more trivial record of
it, than if it had shaken but a single bell in the turrets of their own
_Cenobium_. The ‘_Annals of Waverley_,’ you know, were, down to about
1120, almost a translation from the ‘_Saxon Chronicle_,’ executed in
the twelfth century. The following year, 1092, the sixth of the reign
of William Rufus, was marked by a season fatal to bridges in general;
although there is no mention that our’s at London participated in the
destruction. This fact is related by William of Malmesbury, page 125,
and by Roger de Hoveden, page 464, in these words:--‘Also, in his
sixth year, there was such an excessive rain, and such high floods,
the rivers overflowing the low grounds that lay near them, as the like
was remembered by none. And afterward, in the winter, ensued a sudden
frost; whereby the great streams were congealed in such a manner that
they could draw two hundred horsemen and carriages over them; whilst at
their thawing, many bridges, both of wood and stone, were borne down,
and divers water mills were broken up and carried away!’
“Frequent destructions by fire seem, also, to have been a very general
fate of all our ancient buildings; for, in 1093, the wooden houses and
straw roofs of the London Citizens were again in flames, and a great
part of the City was thus destroyed.
“Too soon after this calamity, at a most inauspicious time for
commencing, or executing, expensive public works, in 1097, King William
Rufus imposed a heavy tax upon his subjects for the re-building of
London Bridge,--though _that_ might very well be defended,--the
erecting of the palace of West-Minster Hall, and the construction
of a wall round the Tower. The ‘_Saxon Chronicle_’ speaks of these
ill-advised undertakings in the blended tones of sorrow and of anger.
‘This was, in all things,’ says that faithful old history, at pages
316, 317, ‘a very heavy-timed year, and beyond measure laborious from
the badness of the weather, both when men attempted to till the land,
and, afterwards, to gather the fruits of their tilth; and from unjust
contributions they never rested. Many counties also, that were confined
to London by work, were grievously oppressed, on account of the wall
that was building about the Tower, and _the Bridge that was nearly all
afloat_, and the King’s Hall that they were building at West-Minster;
and many men perished thereby.’
“Our brave old River of Thames itself, however, is of the same
changeful nature as Luna, the mistress of his tides; for, if at one
time, he overflows his banks, blows up his Bridge, or drowns an
invading army, by the fury of his waves; at another season he contracts
his waters into their narrowest channel, or draws them back into his
urn, without leaving enough to float a wherry over his bed. Of this
I shall give you several instances, as we get lower down the stream
of time; and now only remark, in chronological order, that on the 6th
of the Ides of October, _videlicet_ the 10th, in the 15th Year of the
reign of Henry I. 1114, the River was so dried up, and there was such
want of water, that between the Tower of London and the Bridge, and
even under it, ‘a great number of men, women, and children,’--says
Stow, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 58,--‘did wade over both on
horse and foot,’ the water coming up to their knees.
“The original account of this is to be found in the ‘_Annales_’
of Roger de Hoveden, page 473; from whom we derive the additional
information, that this defect of water commenced in the middle of the
night preceding, and lasted until the darkest part of the next. The
same historian, also, records, on the same page, that in the year 1115,
the winter was so severe, that all throughout England the Bridges were
broken by the ice.
“But although London Bridge was an edifice to which there was a
continual and heavy cost attached, yet its possessions were, even
anciently, very extensive; for you find that so early as in the
23d year of Henry I., A. D. 1122, Thomas de Ardern, and Thomas his
son, gave to the Monks of Bermondsey, and the Church of St. George
in Southwark, the tenth of his Lord’s corn lands in Horndon, and
the immense sum of Five Shillings per annum rent, out of the Lands
pertaining to London Bridge. Calculate this, my good Sir, at twenty
times its present value; for we know that in the Great Charter of
King John, Chapter II. a knight paid but five pounds to the King as a
Relief when he came to his estate; and _that_, Lord Coke tells you in
his _Second Institute_, even several years later, was the fourth part
of his annual income. Remember too, that sixpence by the week was then
a living stipend to an ordinary labourer; that the Black Book of the
Exchequer--which was written about the reign of Henry I.--ordains that
a tenant shall pay one shilling to the King, instead of providing bread
for one hundred soldiers for one meal; that the provender of twenty
horses for one night, also to be paid by a tenant, was commuted for
four pence; that in 1185, the tenants of Shireburn paid by custom two
pence, or four hens, which they would; and, lastly, recollect, that
in 1125,--called by Robert de Monte, the dearest year ever known,--a
horseload of wheat was sold but for six shillings: in ordinary times,
as in 1043, it was sixpence the quarter. Of all this you may see
most abundant and curious proof, in Bishop Fleetwood’s ‘_Chronicon
Preciosum_,’ London, 1745, 8vo. pages 55, 56; and therefore the gift of
Thomas de Ardern was munificent.
“I should observe that Stow obtained the knowledge of this donation
from the manuscript ‘_Annals of Bermondsey Priory_,’ which are now
preserved in the Harleian Library in the British Museum, No. 231,
very fairly written in a good legible black text upon vellum; having
vermillion rubrics of the King’s Reign, and the date of the year. It is
a rather small quarto volume, of 71 written leaves, delicately paged
by some later hand; and the passage occurs on the reverse of folio 11.
The Harleian Catalogue calls it, in Latin, ‘the Annals of the Abbey
of St. Saviour’s of Bermondesie, from the year of our Lord 1042, down
to the year of our Lord 1433; in which, beside the public affairs of
each reign,’--told in the words of other Chronicles--‘many things are
narrated which belong to the history of the same Abbey.’
“You have already seen that London Bridge was a public work, to which
all England furnished some labourers; but, as I mentioned some time
back, Maitland, in his ‘_History of London_,’ volume i. page 44,
notices a deed cited by Stow, exempting the lands of Battle Abbey, in
Sussex. This was granted by King Henry I. but is perhaps now lost, for
it remains wholly unnoticed by the learned Editors of the new edition
of Dugdale’s ‘_Monasticon_;’ and I must therefore give it you in the
very words of the old Antiquary himself, who says, page 58, that in
his time it remained with the seal very fair, in the custody of Joseph
Holland, Esq.;--it is as follows:--
“‘Henry, King of England, to Ralph, Bishop of Chichester, and all the
Officers of Sussex, sendeth greeting. Know ye, &c. I command by my
kingly authority, that the manor called Alceston, which my father gave
with other lands to the Abbey of Battle, be free and quiet from shires
and hundreds, and all other customs of earthly servitude, as my father
held the same, most freely and quietly; and namely, _from the work of
London Bridge_, and the work of the Castle at Pevensey: and this I
command upon my forfeiture. Witness, William Pont de l’Arche, at Berry.’
“The second year of the succeeding King, however, namely Stephen,
saw London Bridge in a state to require the exertions of all England
to raise it: for, in 1136, a fire broke out in the dwelling of one
Aileward, near London Stone, that consumed Eastward as far as Aldgate;
and to the Shrine of St. Erkenwald, in St. Paul’s Cathedral, to the
West. On the Southern side of London the Wooden Bridge over the Thames
was destroyed, but was soon after repaired, since Stephanides, whose
description of London was written between 1170 and 1182, speaks of
it as affording a convenient standing place to the spectators of the
Citizens’ Water Tournaments. I shall give you the whole passage,
because it describes a very curious sport of the twelfth century,
which was celebrated in the immediate vicinity of this very spot; and
the account is at page 76, beginning ‘_In feriis Paschalibus_;’ we’ll
content ourselves, however, with Dr. Pegge’s translation of it, which
runs thus.
“‘At Easter, the diversion is prosecuted on the water; a target is
strongly fastened to a trunk or mast, fixed in the middle of the
River, and a youngster standing upright in the stern of a boat, made
to move as fast as the oars and current can carry it, is to strike the
target with his lance; and if in hitting it he break his lance, and
keep his place in the boat, he gains his point, and triumphs; but if
it happen that the lance be not shivered by the force of the blow, he
is of course tumbled into the water, and away goes his vessel without
him. However, a couple of boats full of young men is placed, one on
each side of the target, so as to be ready to take up the unsuccessful
adventurer, the moment he emerges from the stream, and comes fairly to
the surface. The Bridge, and the balconies on the banks, are filled
with spectators, whose business it is to laugh.’
“Of this singular sport, Joseph Strutt copied in his ‘_Sports and
Pastimes of the People of England_,’ London, 1801, 4to. page 92, plate
x. a very curious illumination, contained in a volume of the Royal
Manuscripts in the British Museum,--2 B. vii.--which consists of a
history of the Old Testament, the Psalter, the Hymns of the Church, and
a Calendar; all richly painted in water-colours, and beautified with
gold,--‘yellow, glittering, precious gold,’--so highly embossed, as to
be ‘sensible to feeling as to sight.’
“That volume brings back old days to my recollection, whenever I behold
it; for, in the year 1553, it belonged to Queen Mary of England, and
is bound in a truly regal style for her; being in thick boards covered
with crimson velvet, richly embroidered with large flowers in coloured
silks and gold twist; besides being garnished with gilt brass bosses
and clasps, on the latter of which are engraven the Royal devices
and supporters. Another, and more pleasing proof of its having been
her’s,--inasmuch as it records a good action of a London Citizen
concerned with the affairs of this brave river,--is to be found in
a Latin note written in a beautiful black text hand, on the reverse
of the last leaf of the volume. ‘This Book,’ it states, ‘formerly a
gift, was afterwards carried away by a sailor; but that excellent and
honest person, Baldwin Smith, Receiver of the Customs of the Port of
London, hath restored and given it unto the most illustrious Mary,
Queen of England, France, and Ireland, in the month of October, in
the year of our Lord, 1553, in the first year of her reign.’ The text
of this volume is said to have been written, and the illuminations
executed, in the fourteenth century, though, from their style, I cannot
help thinking that the period is nearly an hundred years too late;
for beneath the pages of the Psalter is a series of most interesting
and excellent drawings, in pen-and-ink outlines, very slightly and
delicately tinted with colours, which was certainly a far more ancient
custom. However that may be, this series consists ‘_de omnibus rebus,
et quibusdam aliis_,’ for there are the representations of animals and
birds, field-sports, games, legends, martyrdoms, battles, and fables,
of an almost infinite variety; and in the course of them occur the
figures of a water-quintain, both as it is described by Fitzstephen,
and also of a more warlike character. The first of these was engraved
by Strutt in the work which I have before referred to, and gives a very
perfect idea of the RIVER TILTING OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY,
[Illustration]
which the illuminator had, no doubt, personally witnessed in his own
time. The other, which has also been engraven in the same work, page
113, plate xv. shews two armed knights getting ‘grysly together,’ as
the ‘_Morte d’Arthur_’ calls it, in boats;
[Illustration]
and you will find it under the 60th Psalm, ‘_Dominus repulisti nos_,’
&c.
“Stow, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 301, mentions a very rude
imitation of this kind of jousting on the water at London; when he
says, ‘I have seen also in the summer season, upon the River of
Thames, some rowed in wherries, with staves in their hands, flat at
the fore-end, running one against another, and, for the most part,
one or both of them were overthrown and well ducked.’ In Queen Mary’s
Manuscript, under the psalm of ‘_Misericordiam et judicium cantabo_,’
is also a representation of two fiends hurling a Monk from a rude stone
Bridge; but as I rather think that did not occur at London, I mention
it no farther.
“But now, to return to our subject:--Stow relates the particulars of
the great fire of 1135-36, at page 58 of his ‘_Survey_,’ citing in
the margin the ‘_Annals of Bermondsey_,’ and the ‘_Book of Trinity
Priory_,’ as his authorities. The latter of these is, perhaps, now no
more; but in the former you may find the conflagration mentioned at
page 13 b, where it is said to have happened in the year 1135, and
to have extended to the Church of St. Clement Danes. It was probably
in the Register of Trinity Priory, that Stow found a notice that
London Bridge was not only repaired, but a new one erected of elm
timber, in 1163, by the most excellent Peter of Colechurch, Priest and
Chaplain; since I find it in none of the historians with whom I am
acquainted. It is, however, much better authenticated that the same
pious architect began his labours upon the first stone one in 1176;
for, in the ‘_Annals of Waverley_,’ at page 161, you find the following
entry.--‘1176. In this year, the Stone Bridge at London is begun by
Peter, the Chaplain of Colechurch.’ Here, therefore, ends the history
of the infancy of London Bridge: and a very chargeful infancy it was,
for, as old Stow says, ‘it was maintained partly by the proper lands
thereof, partly by the liberality of divers persons, and partly by
taxations in divers shires, as I have proved, for the space of 215
years,’--And now, Mr. Geoffrey Barbican, your very good health.”
“Sir, my hearty thanks to you,” replied I, rubbing my eyes, “for
this Bridge Story is as dull as proving a Peerage, where there’s
no reliance, and much doubting:--but how’s this, Master Postern!”
continued I, looking into the tankard, “you have drank, and I have
drank, and yet the jug is as full as ever, and as hot as it was as
first?”
“You’re pleased to be facetious, good Sir,” answered my visitor, “for
truly I’m no Saint Richard to work such miracles; but, if you please,
we’ll now return to the Bridge again.
“We are here entering upon the golden age of London Bridge, for the new
stone building, by Peter of Colechurch, was such an ornament as the
Thames had never before witnessed; indeed, in my poor judgment, it very
far surpassed that erection, of which I shall hereafter have occasion
to speak; and perhaps, for its time, even that which now stretches
itself across the flood. The person to whom was entrusted the building
of the first stone Bridge at London, was, as I have already told you,
named Peter, a Priest and Chaplain of St. Mary Colechurch; an edifice,
which, until the Great Fire of London, stood on the North side of the
Poultry, at the South end of a turning denominated Conyhoop Lane, from
a Poulterer’s shop having the sign of three Conies hanging over it.
This Chapel, of which the skilful Peter was Curate, was dedicated to
the Blessed Virgin, and was famous as the place where St. Edmund and
St. Thomas à Beckett were presented at the baptismal Font; still it
must have been something very like having a church on a first floor,
for you may remember Stow says, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 552,
that it was ‘built upon a vault above ground, so that men are forced to
ascend into it by certain steps.’ Of the architectural knowledge of the
Curate thereof, I have already shewed you that the Citizens of London
had experienced some proofs, since he is said to have rebuilt their
last wooden Bridge: and John Leland the Antiquary--whom I shall anon
quote more particularly,--observes, in the notes to his famous ‘_Song
of the Swan_,’--a book of which I will also speak hereafter,--that
Radulphus de Diceto, Dean of London, who wrote about 1210, states
from his own knowledge, that he was a native of this City. The same
venerable Antiquary also tells us in his ‘_Itinerary_,’ edited by
Thomas Hearne, Oxford, 1768-69, octavo, volume vii. part I. marginal
folio 22, page 12,--that ‘a Mason beinge Master of the Bridge Howse,
buildyd _à fundamentis_ the Chapell on London Bridge, _à fundamentis
propriis impensis_;’ or, as we should now say, from bottom to top,
at his own costs and charges. The property of Peter of Colechurch,
however, would not stand Bridge-building by itself; and therefore the
present will be the most fitting place, to give you some account of the
other contributors to this great national work.
“Master Leland, in the same place which I last quoted, observes that
‘a Cardinale, and Archepisshope of Cantorbyri, gave 1000 Markes or
_li._ to the erectynge of London Bridge.’ Now, the Cardinal who is
here alluded to, was Hugo, Hugocio, or Huguzen di Petraleone, a Roman,
Cardinal Deacon of St. Angelo, whom Pope Alexander III. sent, in
1176, to France, Scotland, and England, as his Legate; which you may
find stated in Alphonso Ciaconio’s noble book entitled ‘_Vitæ et Res
Gestæ Pontificum Romanorum, et Sanctæ Romanæ Ecclesiæ Cardinalium_,’
Rome, printed with the Vatican types, in 1630, folio, page 578, a work
of about 3000 pages in extent; of an enormous size, fairly bound in
embossed vellum, and adorned with a prodigious number of copper-plates
and wood-cut Armorial Ensigns; by the latter of which we are shewn,
that this foreign contributor to the building of London Bridge bore
for his arms, Quarterly, Argent and Gules, and over all, in the centre
point, a sieve of the first. Whilst the Cardinal resided in England,
he took some notice of the dispute which was then going on concerning
the Primacy, between the Archbishops of Canterbury and York: when at a
meeting held at Westminster, Roger de Ponte, the turbulent possessor of
the latter see, arrogantly took his seat at the Cardinal’s right hand.
Upon which the domestics of Richard, the mild and amiable Archbishop
of Canterbury, took him thence by force, and in the ensuing scuffle he
was beaten, and turned out of the assembly, with his episcopal robes
sadly rent. Now this Richard was a Benedictine Monk, and Prior of
the Monastery of St. Martin’s, Dover; who was elected to the See of
Canterbury on the death of Thomas à Beckett, in 1174. ‘He was a man,’
says Bishop Godwin, when writing his memoirs, ‘very liberal, gentle,
and passing wise;’ and, what gives him great honour in _my_ sight, he
was the very Prelate whom Leland mentions in the passage I quoted, as
subscribing so nobly to the foundation of London Bridge. And yet, ’tis
strange, that only in his ‘_Itinerary_,’ and in Stow’s ‘_Survey_,’
volume i. page 58, is this donation recorded; for even in the best and
most splendid edition of Bishop Godwin’s volume, ‘_De Præsulibus Angliæ
Commentarius_,’ by William Richardson, Canon of Lincoln, Cambridge,
1743, folio, page 79, the old Citizen is referred to at note _y_, as
his authority for the fact. I cannot omit now giving you the blazon of
this Prelate’s own arms, as they appear in that noble illuminated copy
of Archbishop Parker’s work, ‘_De Antiquitate et Privilegiis Ecclesiæ
Cantuariensis cum Archiepiscopis ejusdem 70_,’ Lambeth, 1572, folio,
page 123, which is estimated to be fully worth its weight in gold. This
truly valuable volume was presented by our late good King George the
Third to the British Museum, and formerly belonged to Queen Elizabeth.
The arms, however, were Azure, three Mullets in bend, between two
Cottises Argent; and whenever you turn to this volume, on which the
ancient Art of Illuminating shed its latest rays, I pray you fail not
carefully to inspect it: for you will find it a copy of that edition
printed at his own palace, by John Day; with many leaves impressed on
vellum, and the whole of the book carefully ruled with red-ink lines,
the initials coloured and gilded, and all the Armorial Ensigns, with
the Frontispiece, excellently well emblazoned. And I pray you also,
forget not well to note the binding; since a richer, or more fancifully
embroidered covering there are few tomes which can exhibit. The ground
of it is green velvet, intended to represent the _vert_ of a park, and
it is surrounded by a broad border of pales with a gate, worked in
brown silk and gold twist; whilst within are trees, flowers, shrubs,
tufts of grass, serpents, hinds, and does, all executed in richly
coloured silks, and gold and silver wire. At the back are the Queen’s
badges of red and white roses; the edges of the leaves are gilt, and
the volume was once secured by ribbons of crimson silk.
“Of this most splendid book I must, indeed, yet add another word,
that it may be estimated as it so well deserves. Dr. Ducarel, in
his account of that astonishing copy of it which is deposited in
the Archiepiscopal Palace at Lambeth, says, ‘It was first printed
at Lambeth by John Daye in 1572; and so small a number were then
published, that, except this complete copy, there is but one extant
in England, known to be so, which is preserved in the Public Library
of Cambridge, as I am informed.’ See his Letter of July the 15th,
1758, addressed to Archbishop Secker, which is inserted in the Rev.
H. J. Todd’s ‘_Catalogue of the Archiepiscopal Manuscripts in Lambeth
Palace_.’ London, 1812, folio, page 242, Art. 959.
“The life of Archbishop Richard, which this book contains, is nearly
the same as that related by Francis Godwin, Bishop of Landaff; and
before I leave speaking of this early and Reverend patron of London
Bridge, let me endeavour to clear his memory from something like
a stain which attaches to it. He received the Archbishop’s Pall,
immediately after the death of a man of unconquerable spirit and
insurmountable pride, for you will remember that he was successor to
Beckett: and, perhaps, it was the strong contrast afforded by his
yielding and quiet disposition, which has made some suppose that he did
nothing worthy of memory. I am, however, myself rather surprised at
the manner of his decease, when it is allowed by all his biographers,
that he was a man so charitable, of such benefit to the revenues of the
church, and was so liberal both to the poor, the nation, the King,
and even the Pontiff himself. The story of his death is related by
Gervase of Dover, by Henry Knyghton, the Canon of Leicester, and in the
Chronicle of William Thorne, the Monk of St. Augustine’s, Canterbury;
but I shall recite it to you from the old English edition of Francis
Godwin’s ‘_Catalogue of the Bishops of England, from the first planting
of the Christian Religion in this Island:_’ London, 1615, 4to. page
96. ‘The end of this man,’ says the Prelate, ‘is thus reported, how
that being a sleepe at his Mannor of Wrotham, there seemed to come vnto
him a certaine terrible personage’--Knyghton and Thorne say ‘the Lord
appeared unto his sight,’--‘demaunding of him, who he was; whereunto,
when for feare, the Archbishop answered nothing, Thou art he, quoth
the other, that hast destroyed the goods of the Church, and I will
destroy thee from off the earth: this having said, he vanished away. In
the morning betime, the Archbishop got him up, and taking his iourney
toward Rochester, related this fearfull vision vnto a friend of his by
the way. Hee had no sooner told the tale, but hee was taken suddenly
with a great cold and stifenesse in his limmes, so that they had much
adoo to get him so farre as Haling, a house belonging to the Bishop
of Rochester. There he tooke his bed, and being horribly tormented
with the cholike, and other greefes, vntill the next day, the night
following, the 16th of February, hee gaue vp the ghost, anno 1183.’
“Though such was his untimely end, yet his being so great a benefactor
to the original building of old London Bridge, ought to make his
name revered by every true-hearted Citizen of London; and, indeed,
Bridge-building has been thought by some to be an act of real piety,
witness those rude old verses printed in Leland’s ‘_Itinerary_,’ volume
vii. part I. Marginal folio 64 b, page 79, which were composed on the
erecting of the Bridge at Culham, in Oxfordshire, and hung up by Master
Richard Fannand, Ironmonger, of Abingdon, in the Hall of St. Helen’s
Hospital.
‘Off alle werkys in this worlde that ever were wrought,
Holy Chirche is chefe, there children been chersid.
For by baptim these barnes to blisse been ybrought,
Thorough the grace of God, and fayre refresshed.
Another blessid besines is Brigges to make,
Where, that the pepul may not passe after greet showers;
Dole it is to drawe a deed body out of a lake,
That was fulled in a fount stoon, and a felow of oures.
King Herry the fifte, in his fourthe yere,
He hathe yfounde for his folke a Brige in Berke schyre,
For cartis with carriages may goo and come clere,
That many Wynters afore were mareed in the myre.
And some oute of ther sadels flette to the grounde
Went forthe in the water wist no man whare;
Fyve wekys after or they were yfounde,
Ther kyn and ther knowlech caught them uppe with care.’
“By this then, you see there is much virtue in your Bridge-builder.
The names of all the Benefactors to London Bridge, indeed, were fairly
painted on a tablet, and hung up in St. Thomas’s Chapel, which stood
upon the middle of it; and, doubtless, the donation of King Henry II.
would be found there recorded, if that grateful testimonial were yet
in existence. The King’s gift, however, is supposed to have been, in
fact, the gift of the people, being the produce of a tax upon wool;
and hence arose that absurd tradition, which the commonalty invented
to make a wonder of the matter, that ‘London Bridge was built upon
woolpacks,’ I am, indeed, inclined to think that the measure was not
very popular; for the people of England seldom failed to complain
of any additional duty placed upon that commodity; and of this you
find some reliques in Lord Coke’s Commentary on the 30th Chapter of
the ‘_Magna Charta_’ of King Henry III., contained in his ‘_Second
Institute_,’ pages 58, 59. He is there speaking, you know, of the
taking away of evil tolls and customs, and he observes, that some have
supposed that there was a tribute due to the King by the Common Law,
upon all wools, wool-fells,--that is, the undressed sheep skins,--and
leather, to be taken as well of the English as of strangers, known by
the name of _Antiqua Custuma_. This amounted to half a mark, or 6_s._
8_d._ for every sack of wool of 26 stone weight; and a whole mark upon
every last of leather. But even this his Lordship also endeavours to
prove a recent custom, by a Patent Roll from the Exchequer, of the 3rd
of Edward I., A. D. 1274, which states, that the Prelates, Chiefs,
and the whole Common Council of the kingdom, had consented to grant
this new custom of wool to him, and to his heirs. Now, even the words
‘_novam consuetudinem_’ may signify only a revival of the ancient tax,
for some specific cause; as it might have lain dormant since the days
of building London Bridge; thus having reference to a new occasion, and
not to the date. But shortly previous to the final confirmation of the
Great and Forest Charters, however, in the 25th of Edward I., 1296, the
King set a new toll of forty shillings upon every sack of wool, without
the consent of his Parliament; which the Commonalty felt to be a very
heavy imposition. Against this they petitioned, and in the aforesaid
‘_Confirmationes Chartarum_,’ Chapter vii. it was provided that such
things should be abolished, and not taken, but by common consent and
good will; excepting the customs before granted. There appears to me,
however, even a still nearer connection between the Duties raised
for the building of London Bridge, and the xxiii. Chapter of the
‘_Magna Charta_’ of King John, for you there find that ‘No City, nor
Freeman, shall be distrained to make Bridges or water-banks, but such
as have of old been accustomed to do so:’ from which it is evident,
that the taxation was general, and that this instrument was to make
it particular; though, according to Lord Coke’s exposition, there was
nothing gained by it: for, in his ‘_Second Institute_,’ folio 29, he
says, that in the reigns of Richard I. and John, fictitious exactions
were made in the names of Bridges, Bulwarks, and the like, but that
neither the erection, nor the paying for them, was abolished by this
act, since they could not be erected but by the King himself, or by an
Act of Parliament.--But Mr. Barbican!--You doze, worthy Sir!”
“Why truly, Mr. Postern,” said I, rubbing my eyes, “Tax-gathering is
always dull work; and I verily thought we’d lost sight of the Bridge
in the paying for it. You’re as minute with all your authorities, as a
Flemish painter that marks every hair on a cat’s back, and I can turn
over your old dull authors in my own dusty book-room.”
“I must acknowledge,” said my visitor, “that such details are rather
dry; but you very well know, my good friend, as Father Le Long said,
‘Truth is so delightful, that we should consider no labour too
great to obtain it:’ and, indeed, I wished to bring before you some
circumstances which lie widely scattered, although they, nevertheless,
most excellently illustrate the story, and I would do all honour to the
memory of the worthy Peter of Colechurch.”
“Really, Sir,” answered I, “if his blessing be worth having, it ought
to rest upon your head; for had you been Peter of Colechurch himself,
ten times over, you could scarcely have taken more pains with your
history: and so,--here’s your health, and his, Mr. Barnaby.”
“My best thanks to you, my honoured friend,” replied Mr. Postern,
“and I’ll shortly repay your attention by a piece of a more brilliant
description; for having once got the Bridge built, and paid for, we’ll
take a look at the picturesque old edifice itself, and at some of the
many gorgeous sights and interesting scenes which took place upon it:
indeed it shall go hard but what I’ll find you amusement. The building,
then, which the never-to-be-forgotten Peter of Colechurch began, took
as long to complete as Solomon’s Temple, for thirty and three years
were employed in erecting it. Ere that period, however, the charitable
Priest who designed it, the learned Architect and wise builder who
watched its progress, went the way of all flesh; as we shall find
hereafter, in 1205, and not, as Maitland erroneously says, in the third
of King John, A. D. 1201, though he also supposes that he might then
be worn out by age or fatigue, since in the Patent Rolls of the Tower
of London, of that year, M. 2, No. 9, is the following Letter Missive
of the King to the Mayor and Citizens of London, recommending a new
Architect. For other references you may consult Maitland’s History,
page 45; Thomas Hearne’s edition of the ‘_Liber Niger Scaccarii_,’
London, 1771, octavo, volume i. page *470, where it is printed in the
original Latin; and the ‘_Calendarium Rotulorum Patentium in Turri
Londinensi, Printed by Command_,’ London, 1802, folio, page 1, column
1. The Letter is as follows:--
“‘John, by the Grace of God, King of England, &c. to his faithful and
beloved the Mayor and Citizens of London, greeting. Considering how
the Lord in a short time hath wrought in regard to the Bridges of
Xainctes and Rochelle, by the great care and pains of our faithful,
learned, and worthy Clerk, Isenbert, Master of the Schools of Xainctes:
We therefore, by the advice of our Reverend Father in Christ, Hubert,
(Walter) Archbishop of Canterbury, and that of others, have desired,
directed, and enjoined him to use his best endeavour in building your
Bridge, for your benefit, and that of the public: For we trust in the
Lord, that this Bridge, so requisite for you, and all who shall pass
the same, will, through his industry, and the divine blessing, soon
be finished. Wherefore, without prejudice to our right, or that of
the City of London, we will and grant, that the rents and profits of
the several houses which the said Master of the Schools shall cause
to be erected upon the Bridge aforesaid, be for ever appropriated to
repair, maintain, and uphold the same. And seeing that the requisite
work of the Bridge cannot be accomplished without your aid, and that
of others, we charge, and exhort you, kindly to receive and honour the
above-named Isenbert, and those employed by him, who will perform every
thing to your advantage and credit, according to his directions, you
affording him your joint advice and assistance in the premises. For
whatever good office or honour you shall do to him, you ought to esteem
the same as done to us. But, should any injury be offered to the said
Isenbert, or to the persons employed by him, which we do not believe
there will, see that the same be redressed so soon as it comes to your
knowledge. Witness myself, at Molinel,’--in the Province of Bourbon, in
France,--‘the eighteenth day of April.’ ‘A Letter,’ adds Hearne, on
page *471, ‘of the same form, was written to all the King’s faithful
subjects constituting the realm of England;’ and the instrument itself
is also to be found at length in the original Latin, in Sir Symonds
D’Ewes’ extracts from the Records, Harleian MSS. in the British Museum,
No. 86, page 1 a.
“It is, however, by no means clear, notwithstanding this Royal Writ,
that Isenbert was employed by the Citizens to complete the building
of London Bridge; indeed, the Rev. John Entick, in his edition of
Maitland’s ‘_History of London_,’ volume i. page 45, imagines quite
otherwise, because he found that King John, in the seventh year of his
reign, 1205, three years, as _he_ says, before the Bridge was finished,
granted the custody of it to one Friar West, taking it from the Lord
Mayor, and obliging the City to apply certain void places within its
walls to be built on for its support. Strype also quotes the former
instrument as being yet preserved in the ‘_Rotuli Clausi_,’ or Close
Rolls, in the Tower, 7 John, c. 19, for you know it was a private
instrument, and therefore sealed up, and directed to the persons whom
it specially concerned.
“But now let us see how far this supposition is founded in truth.
In the first place, the reference to the Close Rolls is erroneous,
for the writ is to be found on the 15th Membrane, there being no
such article as c. 19; and, in the next place, there was no such
person as Friar West, for the title of Friar was not in use until the
fourteenth century, and the person referred to was called _Wasce_,
though the name of West has been copied and re-copied, and the error
thus perpetuated _ad infinitum_. The actual words of the writ are, in
English, as follow.
“‘The King to Geoffrey Fitz Peter, &c.’--Chief Justice of England.--‘We
will that Brother Wasce, our Almoner, and some other lawful man of
London, provided by you and the Mayor of London, be Attorney for the
custody of London Bridge. And, therefore, we command you that they give
the whole to these men, like as Peter, the Chaplain of Colechurch,
possessed the same from them. Witness for the same, the Prior of
Stoke, at Marlebridge, the 15th day of September.’ Notwithstanding
this instrument, we hear no more of Frater Wasce, nor of Isenbert of
Xainctes, but are told by Stow, page 58, without his referring to
any other authority, that ‘this work, to wit the Arches, Chapel, and
Stone Bridge over the Thames at London, having been thirty-three years
in building, was, in the year 1209, finished by the worthy Merchants
of London, Serle Mercer, William Almaine, and Benedict Botewrite,
principal masters of that work.’
“This new Bridge consisted, then, of a stone platform, erected somewhat
westward of the former, 926 feet long, and 40 in width, standing about
60 feet above the level of the water; and containing a Drawbridge, and
19 broad pointed arches, with massive piers varying from 25 to 34 feet
in solidity, raised upon strong elm piles, covered by thick planks,
bolted together. Such was the FIRST STONE LONDON BRIDGE, commenced by
PETER OF COLECHURCH, A. D. 1176.
[Illustration]
“Deeply as I venerate the memory of the great builder of that Bridge,
which continued for so many centuries the wonder of Europe, yet I
must not omit to notice to you, that many persons have grievously
condemned his labours; the principal objections to which are summed up
in the ‘_Londinium Redivivum_,’ of Mr. James Peller Malcolm, London,
1802-1807, 4to. volume ii. page 386, where he thus heavily censures
that erection. ‘Whatever were the pretensions of Peter of Colechurch to
eminence as an Ecclesiastical Architect, I think any person who views
Vertue’s print of London Bridge, as it stood in 1209, will allow that
he was a very bad Civil Engineer. He seems to have delighted in the
number of his piers, which amounted to nineteen; and he was so ignorant
of the true principles by which he should have been governed, that the
centre was swelled into a Chapel, reducing the adjoining arches to half
the diameter of the remainder. Indeed, it is wonderful that those piers
maintained their situation, when we reflect how the torrent now rushes
through, hurling heavy laden barges along as if they were feathers on
the stream, when every practicable remedy to enlarge them has been
applied.’
“An Architect of nearly an hundred years since, however, has considered
these objections with somewhat more of mathematical proof; and what
is better, even whilst he admits their full force, he still venerates
the memory, and dares to applaud the public spirit, of the blessed
Peter of Colechurch. You will readily guess that I allude to Master
Nicholas Hawksmoor’s ‘_Short Historical Account of London Bridge,
with a proposition for a New Stone Bridge at Westminster_,’ a quarto
pamphlet of 47 pages, and 5 folding Copper-plates, originally published
in the year 1736, for two shillings. The Author observes, at page 9,
that the whole breadth of the River from North to South is nearly 900
feet, and that in his time there were eighteen solid piers of different
dimensions, varying from 34 to 25 feet in thickness. According to
this disposition, he argues, ‘the greatest water way is when the tide
is _above_ the sterlings, which is 450 feet, and, considering the
impediments, it is not half the width of the River for the water to
pass; but when the tide is fallen _below_ the sterlings, the water-way
is reduced to 194 feet,--which is during the greatest part of the
flux and reflux of the tide,--and the river of 900 feet broad, is
forced through a channel of 194 feet, which is not a quarter of the
whole.’ We can at last, however, hardly judge of the Bridge of Peter of
Colechurch with any degree of fairness, for that great benefactor of
London died before he completed his _Pontificate_, as I may jocularly
call it; and the author whom I last quoted, very candidly observes of
him, that he, perhaps, ‘did not intend to add those immense Sterlings
that have so much obstructed the River’s passage betwixt the Stone
piers,’ and which, after all, are the great cause of the evil: for,
says the same person, at page 13, when answering the common objection
to altering London Bridge, on account of the expense attending it, ‘I
have heard some masters of Hoys and Lighters say, that a Tonnage would
willingly be paid for such a conveniency and security of their goods
and vessels; and, as I have heard, an offer _was_ made to pay Tonnage,
if the Drawbridge had been opened, when the City last repaired it,
to avoid the losses they suffered frequently by the Sterlings.’ ‘It
is very probable,’ continues the same authority, ‘that the Sterlings
were made afterwards, to keep the foundation of the piers from being
undermined;--or, perhaps, these Sterlings might be increased after
some damages that befell the piers, by the great quantity of ice
which might be stopt by the narrowness of the arches; and those that
intended to make the legs more secure, used such means as rendered them
the less so, by the violent rapidity which they gave to the River so
restrained,’ In addition to this, he also attempts an apology even for
that very part of Peter’s Bridge, which has been the most condemned;
having, perhaps, designed, says Mr. Hawksmoor, ‘by the narrowness of
his arches, to restrain the ebbing of the tide, the better to preserve
the navigation of the River above the Bridge, though it would not
have any great effect if the Sterlings were taken away,’ considering
‘that if the River had its free course, it would ebb away so fast,
that there would be scarce any navigation above the Bridge, a little
time after high-water.’ This pamphlet also contains a defence of the
Great Pier, which so violently excited the censure of Malcolm, who
thought a Church on a Bridge was thrown away; for at page 12, he states
that it might be intended ‘firstly to be a steadying of the whole
machine, instead of making an angle, as it is in the famous Bridge at
Prague, and in some of the Bridges in France; so that this fortress
was placed in the middle of the Bridge, to stem the violence of the
floods, ice, and all other accidents that might be forced against it.
Secondly,--that if by any accident of the ice or flood, or undermining
any of the legs,’--he means the piers, but Hawksmoor frequently uses
this very ungraceful epithet,--‘some of the arches might fall, as five
did, Anno 1282, yet, by the help of this great buttress,--though this
damage was done on one side,--the arches on the other side stood firm,
so that there was less expense, and greater encouragement to make the
repair. The third reason was, that he had an opportunity to shew his
piety, having a situation for erecting a Chapel, which was done, and
his body deposited in it.’
“At the great repair of London Bridge, which took place between 1757
and 1770, several additional arguments were brought forward against
the original edifice; of which Mr. Robert Mylne, in his Answers to
the Select Committee of the House of Commons, for improving the Port
of London, dated May the 15th, and October the 30th, 1801, printed in
the Fourth Report of that Committee, states the following particulars.
‘The houses,’ says he, ‘being then taken down, and the sides of the
Bridge being dismantled, the internal masses of its great bulk were
found little better than rubbish, and of bad mason-work, &c. without
active exertion, or even inert resistance. The original Piles, under
the original stone-work of a very narrow Bridge, between the two modern
sides and extreme parts, by cutting into the sides of the piers, and by
one old being opened up, and totally removed, have been found composed
of Sapling Oak and some Elm, carelessly worked, neither round nor
square, but much decayed.’
“And now, worthy Mr. Barbican, having told you some of the objections
to, and apologies for, the Bridge of the venerable Peter of Colechurch,
before we ascend to the parapet, to examine the buildings which stood
upon it, let me observe to you, that there are engraved Ground-plans
of this Bridge, in George Vertue’s prints, which I shall mention more
particularly hereafter, and also in Hawksmoor’s tract from which I have
so largely quoted.”
* * * * *
Here let me for a moment interrupt the narrative of Mr. Postern, by
stating that on the next page the Reader has a reduced copy of the
interesting plan last mentioned, to which are subjoined Hawksmoor’s own
measurements, and some additional particulars, also taken from Vertue;
on the accuracy of every part of which, we have the best authority for
placing the most complete reliance.
GROUND PLAN OF THE FIRST STONE BRIDGE AT LONDON: COMMENCED A. D. 1176,
AND COMPLETED A. D. 1209.
[Illustration]
DIMENSIONS AND REFERENCES.
COMMENCING AT THE CITY, OR NORTH END.
Feet. Inches.
Breadth of First Arch 10 --
---------------- Pier 30 --
-------- Second Arch 15 --
---------------- Pier 18 --
Length of Second Pier 47 6
Breadth of Third Arch 25 --
---------------- Pier 17 --
Length of Third Pier 41 6
Breadth of Fourth Arch 21 --
---------------- Pier 18 --
Length of Fourth Pier 47 6
Breadth of Fifth Arch 27 --
---------------- Pier 21 --
Length of Fifth Pier 47 6
Breadth of Sixth Arch 29 6
---------------- Pier 21 --
Length of Sixth Pier 54 --
Breadth of Seventh Arch 29 6
------------------ Pier 21 --
Length of Seventh Pier 54 --
Breadth of Eighth Arch 26 --
---------------- Pier 21 --
Length of Eighth Pier 54 --
Breadth of Ninth Arch 32 9
---------------- Pier 21 --
Length of Ninth Pier 54 --
Breadth of Tenth Arch 25 6
---------- Centre Pier 36 --
Length of Centre Pier 95 --
Extreme Length of ditto 125 --
VERTUE _makes the extreme length of this Pier but 115 feet only._
Feet. Inches.
Breadth of Chapel on the Centre Pier 20 --
Length of ditto 60 --
Exterior height from the Water about 110 --
Breadth of Eleventh Arch 16 --
------------------ Pier 21 --
Length of Eleventh Pier 37 --
Breadth of Twelfth Arch 24 6
------------------ Pier 21 --
Length of Twelfth Pier 38 --
Breadth of Thirteenth Arch 25 8
-------------------- Pier 27 --
Length of Thirteenth Pier 50 --
Breadth of Drawbridge, or Fourteenth Arch 29 4
VERTUE _makes this space 30 feet broad._
Feet. Inches.
Breadth of Fourteenth Pier 17 --
Length of Fourteenth Pier 26 --
Breadth of Fifteenth Arch 22 10
-------------------- Pier 26 --
Length of Fifteenth Pier 47 7
Breadth of Sixteenth Arch 21 10
-------------------- Pier 15 --
Length of Sixteenth Pier 46 --
Breadth of Seventeenth Arch 29 4
---------------------- Pier 25 --
Length of Seventeenth Pier 46 --
Breadth of Eighteenth Arch 24 --
-------------------- Pier 17 --
Length of Eighteenth Pier 46 --
Breadth of Nineteenth Arch 27 --
-------------------- Pier 17 --
Length of Nineteenth Pier, North Side 49 --
Breadth of Twentieth Arch 15 --
The Piers and Arches were both measured from the squares of the latter,
the triangular ends being left un-noticed, excepting in the instance
of the Great Pier. The length of the whole Bridge was 926 feet; its
height, 60; and the breadth of the Street over it, 40 feet.
* * * * *
“Let us now then, my good Sir,” continued Mr. Postern, “ascend to
the Platform or Street of the old London Bridge, erected by Peter of
Colechurch, and look at the buildings which stood upon it; the most
celebrated of which was the famous Chapel dedicated to St. Thomas à
Becket, the Martyr of Canterbury, whence it was familiarly called
St. Thomas of the Bridge. This was erected upon the Tenth, or Great
Pier, which measured 35 feet in breadth, and 115 from point to point;
whilst the edifice itself was 60 feet in length, by 20 feet broad, and
stood over the parapet on the Eastern side of the Bridge, leaving a
pathway on the West, about a quarter of the breadth of the Pier, in
front of the Chapel. The face of the building itself was forty feet in
height, having a plain gable, surmounted by a cross of about six feet
more; whilst four buttresses, crowned by crocketted spires, divided
the Western end into three parts. The wide centre contained a rich
pointed-arch window, of one mullion, with a quatrefoil in the top;
and the two sides were occupied by the entrances to the Chapel from
the Bridge-Street, each being ascended by three steps. Such was the
general appearance of the WEST FRONT OF THE CHAPEL ON LONDON BRIDGE.
[Illustration]
“The interior of this edifice consisted of two stories, both
consecrated to sacred purposes, and greatly resembling each other
in their appearance. The Upper Chapel was lofty, being supported by
fourteen groups of elegant clustered columns, and lighted by eight
pointed-arch windows divided by stone mullions into a double range
of arches, surmounted by a lozenge. Beneath each of the windows were
three arched recesses, separated by small pillars; and the roof itself
was also originally formed of lofty pointed arches; though, when this
magnificent fane was transformed into a warehouse, a wooden ceiling,
with stout beams crossing each other in squares, was erected, which
cut off the arches where they sprang from the pillars, and divided into
two parts the INTERIOR OF THE UPPER CHAPEL OF ST. THOMAS.
[Illustration]
The Eastern extremity of this building formed a semi-hexagon, having
a smaller window in each of its divisions, with richly carved arches
under them, corresponding with the series already mentioned on the
side: and the architectural lightness and elegance of the whole,
meriting the highest encomium. Beneath this principal edifice, was
a short descending passage, having, on the left hand, a stone basin
cut in a recess in the wall, for containing Holy Water, and leading,
through the solid masonry of the Pier, into the LOWER CHAPEL OF ST.
THOMAS, which was constructed in the Bridge itself.
[Illustration]
“This CRYPT was entered both from the upper apartment and the street,
as well as by a flight of stone stairs winding round a pillar, which
led into it from the nearest Pier: whilst in the front of this latter
entrance, the Sterling formed a platform at low water, which thus
rendered it accessible from the River. The Lower Chapel, which--even
decorated as _that_ was, in my estimation, very far exceeded the upper
one in architectural beauty,--was about 20 feet in height, and its
roof supported by clustered columns, similar to those I have already
described; from each of which sprang seven ribs, the centre, and the
two adjoining it in every division, being bound by fillets with roses
on the intersections; whilst the great horizontal ribs had clusters
of regal and ecclesiastical masks, producing an effect little to be
expected in such a structure, in such a situation; though I may trust
to your correct taste, my good Mr. Barbican, for duly appreciating it.
There was also a rich SERIES OF WINDOWS IN THE LOWER CHAPEL,
[Illustration]
which looked on to the water, similar in character to, though much
smaller than, those above: whilst the floor was beautifully paved with
black and white marble; for in this place did the pious Architect
propose to rest his bones. His monument, remarkable only for its
plainness, was formed, according to Maitland’s ‘_History_,’ page 46,
under the Chapel staircase, in the middle of the building; and it
measured seven feet and an half, by four in breadth. There was, indeed,
neither brass plate, nor inscription, nor carving found about the
sepulchre, when Mr. Yaldwin, the inhabitant of the Chapel in 1737,
then a dwelling, and warehouse, discovered the remains of a body in
repairing the staircase; though, from the ‘_Annals of Waverley_,’ page
168, we know that the reliques of Peter were certainly entombed in this
place. ‘In 1205,’--runs the passage,--‘died Peter the Chaplain of
Colechurch, who began the Stone Bridge at London, and he is sepultured
in the Chapel upon the Bridge.’ By this entry then, we are assured
that he lay there; and as for an epitaph, was not the whole edifice an
everlasting catafalco to his memory, which should speak for all times?
How finely, indeed, might we apply to him that inscription, which the
son of Sir Christopher Wren composed for his father’s burial-place in
St. Paul’s,--‘He lived, not for himself, but for the public! Reader, if
you seek his monument, look around you!’
“And now, before we enter upon an examination of the bed of the Thames
at London Bridge, and consider whether the River were turned, as
Stow thinks, to admit of its erection, let me cite you some ancient
authorities concerning St. Thomas’s Chapel. The first of these shall
be the ‘_Itinerary of Symon Fitz Simeon, and Hugo the Illuminator_,’
both of whom were Irish Monks, of the Order of Friars Minors, who
visited London on their pilgrimage to Palestine, in 1322. ‘This flux
and reflux,’--say they, at pages 4, 5,--‘continues to the sea from
the famous River named Thames, upon the which is a Bridge, filled
with inhabitants and wealth; and in the midst of them is a Church
dedicated to the blessed Thomas, Archbishop and Martyr, which is well
served continually.’ About the year 1418, also, William Botoner, a
Monk of Worcester, of the Parish of St. James in Bristol, who then
travelled from that City to St. Michael’s Mount in Cornwall, in his
‘_Itinerarium_,’ pages 301, 302, thus spake of London Bridge and the
Chapel. ‘The length of the Chapel of St. Thomas the Martyr, upon
London Bridge, is about twenty yards; having an under Chancel in the
vault, with a choir, but the length of the nave of the said Chapel
contains fourteen yards. The width of the middle steps is one yard. The
length of the Bridge on the South, from the posts to the first gate
newly founded by Henry the Cardinal, unto the two posts erected near
the Church of St. Magnus, consists of five hundred of my steps. _Item_:
there are five great windows on one side,’--of the Chapel,--‘each of
which contains three panes:’ or rather divisions. Of these Itineraries
I will observe nothing farther, than that they were published from the
original Manuscripts in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, by James
Nasmith, the Editor of Tanner’s ‘_Notitia Monastica_;’ in 1778, octavo;
under the title of ‘_Itineraria Symonis Simeonis, et Willielmi de
Worcestre_.’
“Of this Chapel, and also of the first Stone Bridge, there are two
large folio engravings, taken and published, by George Vertue, in
1744-48, which, after his decease, were, with many of his other plates
of Antiquities, presented by his widow to the Antiquarian Society in
1775. The first engraving measures 18-1/4 inches by 20 inches and 3/8,
and contains ‘A View of the West Front of the Chappel of St. Thomas,
on London Bridge; also the Inside View from West to East of the said
Chappel, as it was first built An°. 1209:’--and also ‘London Bridge as
it was first built, An°. 1209:’--a Ground plan, and some measurements
of the same, and a short Historical account of the structure, drawn
up by Sir Joseph Ayloffe, Bart. Vice-President of the Society of
Antiquaries. The publication line states, that it was ‘drawn, engrav’d,
and publish’d by G. Vertue, in Brownlow-Street, Drury-Lane, 1748.’ A
second edition was printed by the Society, in 1777.
“The other plate contains ‘The Inside Perspective View of the Under
Chappel of St. Thomas within London Bridge, from the West to the East
end,’ and beneath it: the ‘Inside South View of the Under Chappel from
East to West, representing the manner and form of this rare piece
of Ancient Architecture, thus drawn and transmitted to posterity,
by G. V., Antiquary, 1744. Published and sold by G. Vertue, in
Brownlow-Street, Drury-Lane, 1747’ This plate, which measures 18-1/4
inches by 20, contains a few additional historical notes, by Sir Joseph
Ayloffe; and a reduced copy of the lower View was engraved in the
23d volume of the ‘_Gentleman’s Magazine_,’ for October, 1753, page
520. I must observe, also, that, in the large interior View on that
plate of Vertue last-mentioned, there are introduced the portraits of
the learned Samuel Gale, and the eccentric Dr. Ducarel. The former,
by whose patronage and assistance Vertue produced these prints, is
standing on the left hand, holding a plan of the Chapel, and listening
to an outlandish-looking man, designed for Peter of Colechurch;
whilst the latter Antiquary is employed in measuring. You find this
information given from Gale’s own lips, in that monument of labour,
the ‘_Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century_,’ by John Nichols,
volume iv. London, 1812, 8vo. page 552, and volume vi. part I. page
402. I shall close this notice of these most ancient views of London
Bridge, by observing to you, that there is a view and a ground-plan
of it, with measurements, engraved by Toms, on the second plate in
Hawksmoor’s work, already cited.
“Let me remark to you, however, Mr. Barbican, as touching the Chapel
which I have thus described to you, that the custom of erecting
Religious Houses on Bridges, is certainly of great antiquity. A notable
instance of this kind was on the Bridge at Droitwich, where the road
passed through the Chapel and separated the congregation from the
reading-desk and pulpit. Another famous Bridge Chapel is also to be
found erected over the River Calder, at Wakefield, in the West Riding
of Yorkshire; of which, a folding view, by W. Lodge, is inserted in
the ‘_Ducatus Leodiensis_’ of Ralph Thoresby, London, 1715, folio,
sometimes placed at page 164. This beautiful fane, you know, was built
by King Edward IV. in memory of his father, Richard, Duke of York,
who was killed in the battle fought near Wakefield, on December the
31st, 1460. The Bridge Chapel, however, though extremely rich in its
architecture, was not so singular as our’s at London, since it was
not built _in_ the pier, and descending even to the water’s edge,
but _upon_ the pier, and the platform of the Bridge itself. Somewhat
like our shrine of St. Thomas, however, as it belonged to the poor
of the town, it was, about 1779, converted into a dwelling-house,
and let at a small annual rent to a retail dealer in old clothes! as
that industrious Antiquary, Richard Gough, tells us, in his ‘_British
Topography_,’ London, 1780, 4to. volume ii. page 437, note, r. ‘To
what base uses may we not return, Horatio!’ The edifice which had
been erected for Monks to chaunt forth their _Requiescats_ in solemn
procession; the shrine which had been endowed for the sweet repose of a
warrior’s soul; the--”
“I’ll tell you what, Mr. Barnaby Postern,” said I, starting up,
“you’ll contribute to _my_ sweet repose, unless you leave wandering in
Yorkshire, and return again to London Bridge: what have we to do with a
bead-roll of all the Bridge Chapels that are scattered through England?
I desire to know but of one; for, by its having existed, we are sure
that there might have been some sort of custom for their erection; and,
as old Chaucer saith,
‘Experience, though none auctoritye
Were in this world, is quite enough for me.’”
“True, Sir, true,” said the mild old Antiquary; “you have once more
brought me back to my starting-post; for I own that I am too apt, when
discoursing upon one subject, to branch out into others which seem to
illustrate, or are in any degree connected with it. You will, however,
I dare say, allow me to remark, that Plutarch denies the derivation of
the word Pontifex from the old Roman custom of sacrificing on Bridges,
which might, nevertheless, be the origin of Chapels being built upon
them. He mentions this in his Life of Numa Pompilius, in his ‘_Vitæ
Parallelæ_,’ best edition, by Augustine Bryan, and M. du Soul, London,
1729-24, 4to. volume i. page 142. The Greek passage begins, ‘Νουμᾷ
δὲ και τὴν των αρχιερεων [Greek: Nouma de kai tên tôn archiereôn],’
&c., and the Latin, ‘_Jam etiam sacerdotum_;’ but I shall give you the
excellent modern English version of Dr. Langhorne, in his very popular
translation of the old Classic, from the edition of Mr. Archdeacon
Wrangham, London, 1813, 8vo. volume i. pages 181, 182: ‘To Numa,’ says
the passage, ‘is attributed the institution of that high order of
priests, called _Pontifices_; over which, he is said to have presided
himself. Some say, they were called _Pontifices_, as employed in the
service of those powerful gods that govern the world; for _potens_, in
the Roman language, signifies powerful. Others, that they were ordered
by their law-giver to perform such offices as were in their power,
and standing excused when there was some great impediment. But most
writers assign a ridiculous reason for the term, as if they were called
_Pontifices_, from their offering sacrifices upon the Bridge, which
the Latins call _Pontem_; such kinds of ceremonies, it seems, being
looked upon as the most sacred, and of the highest antiquity. These
Priests, too, are said to have been commissioned to keep the Bridges in
repair, as one of the most indispensable parts of their sacred office.’
Plutarchus, the author of this, you remember, died about A. D. 140;
and the period of which he wrote, was about 630 years before the birth
of Christ. That giant of learning, also, John Jacob Hoffmann, denies
that the word _Pontifex_ had any thing to do with a Bridge; as you may
see discussed at considerable length, in his ‘_Lexicon Universale_,’
Leyden, 1698, folio, volume iii. page 836, column 2, where he says, it
is compounded of _posse_ and _facere_, that is to say, such persons as
are _able to do_ the thing, or sacrifice: but as the article is equally
long, erudite, and curious, I refer you to the original.
“And now we come to speak of Stow’s singular hypothesis, that the River
Thames was turned in its current, during the erection of the first
Stone Bridge at London. He states this in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i.
page 58, where he also says, that the course of the stream was carried
through ‘a trench cast for that purpose; beginning, as it is supposed,
East about Rotherhithe, and ending in the West about Patricksey, now
termed Battersey.’ Strype, the last, and, perhaps, the best Editor of
our old Metropolitan Historian, on the page above cited, seems inclined
to support this idea; for he says, ‘It is much controverted whether
the River Thames was turned, when the Bridge over it was built, and
whether the River was more subject to overflow its banks anciently than
at present; and from all that hath been seen and written upon the
turning of the River, it seems very evident to me, that it _was_ turned
while the Bridge was building, and that it is more subject to overflow
its banks now, than it was formerly; for the channel of the River must
have been deeper than it is now, or the Palace of Westminster would
never have been built where the Hall and the rest of its remains are
now situated. Is it to be supposed that any Prince would have built
a Palace, where the lower rooms were liable to be overflowed at a
spring-tide, as we see the Hall has been several times of late years,
and the lawyers brought out on porters’ backs? The reason whereof is,
that the sands have raised the channel, and, consequently, the tides
must rise higher in proportion, than they did formerly; and unless some
care is taken to cleanse the River, the buildings on the same level
with the floor of Westminster-Hall, will not be habitable much longer,
as the sand and ouse are still daily increasing, and choking up the
bed of the River.’ Nicholas Hawksmoor, also, on page 8 of his work,
which I have already quoted, says, that ‘many skilful persons have
thought that the River Thames was not turned, but that the flowing of
the tides was then different, and that the water did not rise so high
at the Bridge; for the Thames might heretofore overflow the marshes
near the sea, and have a greater spreading; which being now restrained
by the bank, called the wall of the Thames, into narrower limits,
and the water which comes from the sea into the mouth of the Thames
during the flood, not being received by the marshes, must come up into
the country, and so swell the tide higher at London than it usually
did. The celebrated Sir Christopher Wren was of opinion, that when
the foundation of London Bridge was laid, the course of the River was
_not_ turned, but that every pier was set upon piles of wood, which
were drove as far as might be under low-water mark, on which were laid
planks of timber, and upon them the foundation of the stone piers: the
heads of the said piles have been seen at a very low ebb, and may be so
still when some of the chalk or stone is removed to mend the Sterlings.’
“Maitland, and his Editor Entick, are also both opposed to the idea
that the River was turned during the erection of London Bridge, as
they evince on page 46 of their ‘_History_;’ where they ground their
objections to it on the following arguments. Firstly, it is supposed
that the vestiges of Knute’s Canal--which, as we have seen, took the
same course as Stow supposes the River to have taken,--might have
deceived him; a reason also adopted by Hawksmoor, in the place I last
cited. Secondly, the charge of such an immense work is next objected
to; as the cost of the ground intended for the trench, the embankment
of it, and the damming off the River itself, must have amounted to
at least treble the sum which would otherwise have been required to
erect the Bridge. The total silence of those Historians who mention
the construction of London Bridge, upon the subject of so great a work
as the turning of the River, is next insisted upon: and, finally, the
length of time which the building occupied,--thirty-three years,--is
adduced as alone sufficient to overthrow the whole hypothesis. ‘For,’
adds the author, ‘had the people concerned in erecting it, had dry
ground to have built upon, it might have been finished in a tenth
part of the time, and in a much more durable manner.’ Maitland then
proceeds to state, that, in 1730, he surveyed the Bridge, in company
with Mr. Bartholomew Sparruck, the Water-Carpenter of the same; and
that he observed in many places,--where the stones were washed from
the sterlings,--the mighty frames of piles whereon the stone piers or
pillars were founded; the exterior parts of which, consisted of huge
piles driven as closely together as art could effect. ‘On the tops of
these,’ he continues, ‘are laid long planks, or beams of timber, of
the thickness of ten inches, strongly bolted; whereon is placed the
base of the stone pier, nine feet above the bed of the River, and three
below the sterlings; and on the outside of this wooden foundation,--and
for its preservation,--are drove the piles called the sterlings.’ He
then goes on to observe, that Mr. Sparruck informed him, that he and
the Bridge-Mason had frequently taken out of the lowermost layers of
stones in the piers, several of the original stones, which were laid in
pitch instead of mortar; and that from this circumstance they imagined,
that all the outside stones of the piers, as high as the sterlings,
were originally bedded in the same material, to prevent the water from
damaging the work. This labour was, he thinks, continued at every ebb
tide, until the piers were raised above high-water mark; and hence
he argues, that if the Thames had been turned, there would not have
been any occasion for the use of pitch, and that Plaster of Paris was
not then in use in this country. These are the principal heads of the
dispute concerning the turning of the River: to which I only add my own
settled conviction, that _the course of the Thames was not altered_.”
“But pray, my worthy friend,” said I, as he concluded, “what other
buildings stood upon the Bridge built by Peter of Colechurch, besides
the Chapel of St. Thomas?”
“That is a point,” replied he, “upon which Antiquaries are very far
from being decided: for whilst some assert, with Sir Joseph Ayloffe in
his account of the Bridge attached to Vertue’s prints, that, at first,
there were no houses upon it, and that it was only plainly coped with
stone until 1395,--late in the reign of Richard II.,--others argue that
it was built upon to some extent two centuries before, and, indeed,
there is proof of this being the case in the reign of King Edward I.,
as I shall shew you anon. Stow, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 22,
says that the Bridge Gate, which was erected at the Southwark end,
was one of the four first and principal gates of the City, and stood
there long before the Conquest, when there was only a Bridge of timber,
being the seventh and last mentioned by Fitz-Stephen. Maitland, at page
30 of his first volume, when he comes to speak of the same erection,
denies not only the truth, but even the probability of Stow’s
assertions; and, indeed, Stephanides himself says only at page 24, ‘On
the West,’--that is of London,--‘are two Castles well fortified; and
the City wall is both high and thick with seven double gates, and many
towers on the North side, placed at proper distances. London once had
its walls and towers in like manner on the South, but that vast River,
the Thames, which abounds with fish, enjoys the benefit of tides, and
washes the City on this side, hath, in a long tract of time, totally
subverted and carried away the walls in this part.’ The Latin of this
passage commences at ‘_Ab Occidente duo Castella munitissima_,’ &c.
Maitland then goes on to argue, that Fitz-Stephen could have no regard
to a gate on the South, there being no wall remaining; ‘whereas,’ says
he, ‘on the contrary, it is manifest that his seven gates were in the
continued wall on the land side.’
“It is probable, however, that, at a very early period after its
erection, towers were reared upon London Bridge, for there was one
standing at each end; but of these I shall speak more largely under
future years: remarking only, that it is by no means impossible for a
Watch-tower and gate to have stood upon the Bridge, even from its very
first erection, seeing that it was, as it were, a new key to the City.
A sort of Barbican, Mr. Geoffrey, such as you derive your name from;
for you remember the essential importance which such buildings were
of, and how Bagford speaks of them in his Letter to Hearne, which I
have already quoted, page lxii. ‘Here,’ says he, ‘they kept Cohorts
of Souldiers in continual service’--for your Barbican Tower was of
Roman invention,--‘to watch in the night; that if any sudden fire
should happen, they might be in a readiness to extinguish it, as also
to give notice if an enemy were gathering or marching towards the City
to surprise them. In short, it was a Watch-tower by day; and at night,
they lighted some combustible material on the top thereof, to give
directions to the weary traveller repairing to the City, either with
provision or on some other occasion.’
“But to pass from probabilities to certainties, let us now, having got
the Bridge fairly built of stone, consider the many events and changes
which it hath experienced, from its infancy in the thirteenth Century,
to its old age in the nineteenth: and so, my excellent auditor, Here
begin the Books of the Chronicles of London Bridge.
“That sorrowful exclamation, ‘No sooner born than dead!’ may well, at
the period at which we are now arrived, be uttered over this scarcely
completed edifice; for in the night of the 10th of July, 1212, within
four years after its being finished, a dreadful conflagration took
place upon it. Stow, at page 60 of his ‘_Survey_,’ cites the Book
of Dunmow, William de Packington, and William of Coventry, as his
authorities for that excellent account of it which I shall presently
repeat to you. Let me, however, first observe, that Packington was
Secretary and Treasurer to Edward the Black Prince, in Gascoigne,
about 1380. For _William_ of Coventry, I conceive that we should read
_Walter_ of Coventry; because the former, who wrote about 1360, is
celebrated in page 148 of Bishop Nicolson’s ‘_Historical Libraries_,’
already cited, as the Author of a work ‘concerning the coming of the
Carmelites into England.’ Walter, on the contrary, at page 61, is
mentioned as having compiled three books of Chronicles, about the year
1217, which yet remain in Manuscript in Bennet College, Cambridge.
The ‘_Chronicle of Dunmow_,’ which is the other authority quoted by
Stow, is now to be found only in a small quarto volume in the Harleian
Library of Manuscripts, No. 530, article ii. page 2 a. It consists of
a miscellaneous collection of notes, in the hand writings of Stow,
Camden, and perhaps Sir Henry Savile; transcribed upon old, stained,
and worn-out, paper. The notice of this great fire is very brief, and,
with the heading of the extracts, runs thus: ‘_Collectanea ex Chronico
de Dunmowe_.’--‘1213. London was burned and the Brydge also, and many
peryshed by violence of the fyre.’ Stow’s own account, however, is the
most interesting extant, and is as follows. ‘The Borough of Southwark,’
says he, ‘upon the South side of the River of Thames, as also the
Church of our Lady of the Canons there,’--that is to say the Church
of St. Mary Overies, which changed its name upon being re-founded, in
1106, for Canons Regular, by William de Pont de l’Arche, and William
D’Auncy, Norman knights,--these ‘being on fire, and an exceeding great
multitude of people passing the Bridge, either to extinguish and quench
it, or else to gaze and behold it; suddenly the North part, by blowing
of the South wind was also set on fire; and the people which were even
now passing the Bridge, perceiving the same, would have returned, but
were stopped by the fire: and it came to pass, that as they stayed or
protracted the time, the other end of the Bridge also, namely, the
South end was fired; so that the people, thronging themselves between
the two fires, did nothing else but expect present death. Then there
came to aid them many ships and vessels, into which the multitude so
unadvisedly rushed, that the ships being thereby drowned, they all
perished. It was said, that through the fire and shipwreck, there were
destroyed above three thousand persons, whose bodies were found in part
or half burned, besides those that were wholly burned to ashes, and
could not be found.’
“Such is Stow’s account of this melancholy event, which is best
confirmed by the ‘_Annals of Waverley_,’ page 173; but they state
also, that under this year, ‘1212, London, about the Bridge, was great
part burned, together with the Priory of Southwark.’ Now, if we might
credit the ‘_Historiæ Angliæ_’ of that wily, but elegant Italian,
Polydore Vergil, we might be sure, that even at this period, London
Bridge was built upon: ‘_Ipso illo anno_,’ says he, at page 276 of
his book, setting out, however, with an erroneous date, ‘In that same
year’--1211,--‘all the buildings that were erected upon London Bridge,
were, even upon both sides, destroyed by fire: the which is esteemed
a place of wonder.’ Polydore Vergil, you know, was an Historian of
the reign of King Henry VIII. so we shall refer to him hereafter;
and his work, now cited, was written at that Monarch’s request, so
late as about the year 1521. It is esteemed chiefly for its elegant
diction; and the best edition of it is considered to be that printed at
Leyden, in 1651, octavo; though the foregoing reference is to the last
impression of the Basil folio, A. D. 1570.
“There does not appear, however, to have been any very effectual or
speedy order taken for the restoration of London Bridge; for in the
‘_Rotuli Clausi_,’ or the Close Rolls, of the 15th Year of King John,
1213, Membrane the 3rd, is the following entry. ‘It is commanded to
the Mayor and Sheriffs of London, that the halfpence which are now
taken of foreign Merchants, shall be given to the work of London
Bridge. Witness Myself at the Tower of London, on the 18th day of
December, in the 15th year of our reign.’--You will find the Latin of
this printed in the second impression of Thomas Hearne’s edition of
the ‘_Liber Niger Scaccarii_,’ London, 1771, 8vo. volume i. page *471;
and the original record may be seen in the Tower of London, written
in so small, delicate, and abbreviated a character, that it hardly
makes two lines on the narrow parchment roll. And now that we are
speaking of the repairs of London Bridge, I should observe, that they
are closely connected with the history of the Bridge-House and Yard
in Tooley Street, Southwark; since Stow tells you in his ‘_Survey_,’
volume ii. page 24, that they were so called and appointed, as being ‘a
storehouse for stone, timber, or whatsoever pertaineth to the buildings
or repairing of London Bridge.’ He adds too, that this House ‘seemeth
to have taken beginning with the first foundation of the Bridge either
of stone or timber;’ and that it is ‘a large plot of ground on the
bank of the River Thames, containing divers large buildings for the
stowage’ of materials for the repairs of London Bridge. Of events which
particularly concern this place, I shall, however, speak more fully in
their proper order of time.
“In the year 1235, you will recollect that Isabel, third daughter
of King John, by his third Queen, Isabella of Angoulême, was sent
with great splendour into Germany, to marry the Emperor Frederick
II. She was attended by William Brewer, Bishop of Exeter, and a
Privy Councillor to King Henry III., and also by the Archbishop of
Cologne, the Imperial proxy, who had pronounced her Empress. Upon
this occasion, according to the customs of the ancient Norman Law and
the Feudal System, the King received an aid to furnish her dowry,
of two marks out of every Knight’s Fee;--that is to say, as it is
usually accepted, £1. 6_s._ 8_d._ from every person who possessed an
estate of £20. per annum, which was granted by the Common Council
of the kingdom. This rather uncommon aid, you find certified in
Thomas Madox’s ‘_History and Antiquities of the Exchequer of the
Kings of England_,’ London, 1711, folio, page 412; and in the
voluminous collections of that eminent Antiquary, now preserved with
Sir Hans Sloane’s Manuscripts in the British Museum, No. 4563, page
181 b, is the following very curious document, which connects this
circumstance with the history of London Bridge. ‘To be remembered
concerning the payments of Purprestures’--fines for enclosing and
damaging of Land--‘and of Escheats’--accidental returns of estates to
their principal owners,--‘It is commanded to the Sheriffs, that they
get all the arrears of all the above rents, and the issues of all
Purprestures and Escheats; _excepting the rents of London Bridge_, and
the remainder of the amerciaments belonging to the Circuit of W. of
York,’--most probably Walter Grey, then Archbishop of York, and Lord
Chancellor,--‘as well in the County of Middlesex as at the Tower, and
all the deficiencies (of the aid) for marrying the King’s sister, and
for the passing over this sea into Gascony.’ In the Exchequer Rolls of
the 32nd of Henry III., A. D. 1247, 12 a.
“Towards the latter end of the year 1248, King Henry vainly endeavoured
to collect from his Barons, a sum sufficient to enable him to recover
certain provinces in France; upon which, he offered a portion of his
plate and jewels for sale to the Citizens of London, by whom they were
bought. The King, displeased at finding they readily procured money
for such a purpose, and yet pleaded poverty whenever he solicited a
supply, resolved upon retaliation; and, to that end, kept his Christmas
in the City, forced the inhabitants to present him with divers costly
New Year’s gifts, and established a Market at Westminster, to last for
fifteen days, beginning on the 13th of October, during which time all
other fairs were suspended, and, in London itself, all commerce was
prohibited. I think too, that we may trace the effects of Henry’s anger
yet farther; for, in the Patent Roll of the 34th year of his reign,
1249, Membrane the 5th, is the following writ.
“‘Of taking the City of London into the hands of our Lord the King. The
King, &c. to his faithful W. de Haverhull, his Treasurer; Peter Blund,
Constable of the Tower of London; and Ernald Gerandin, his Chamberlain:
Greeting. We command that without delay, you take into your hands our
City of London, with the County of Middlesex, and London Bridge in
like manner: so that the issues of the same be answered for to us at
our Exchequer at our pleasure. And all the aforesaid shall be in safe
custody, until the receipt of another mandate from us. In testimony of
which thing, etcætera, Witness the King at Merton, on the 20th day of
May.’ The original of this is of course in the Tower.
“In the same National depository of invaluable records, Mr.
Geoffrey, there is, in the Patent Rolls of the 37th of Henry
III.--1252,--Membrane the 4th, an entry entitled ‘A Protection for
the Brethren of London Bridge, concerning the charitable gifts
collected for the reparation of the said Bridge.’ This, like the
foregoing instrument, has not, as I can remember, ever been printed;
and, translated into English, it is as follows. ‘The King to the
Archbishops, &c. Greeting. Know ye that we engage for the protection
and defence of our Brethren of London Bridge, and their men, lands,
goods, rents, and all their possessions. And therefore we command,
that they, the Brethren, and their men, lands, goods, rents, and all
possessions, in their hands, ye should hold protected and defended.
Nor shall any bring upon them, or permit to be brought upon them, any
injury, molestation, damage, or grievance. And if it be that any thing
hath been forfeited by them, amendment shall be made without delay.
And we also desire of you, that when the aforesaid Brethren, or their
Messengers, shall come to you for your alms for their support, or for
that of the aforesaid Bridge, ye shall courteously receive them, and
cause them to be so received in all your Churches, Towns, and Courts;
and that ye will bestow upon them of your goods according to your
charity and the sight of our precept, the alms which they desire. So
that in reward thereof ye may be worthy of all the blessings of mercy,
and our special thanks shall be due unto you. In testimony of which
thing, &c. Witness the King at Portsmouth, the fifteenth day of July.’
“Really,” said I to Mr. Postern, as he concluded the last Charter,
“your memory, Mr. Barnaby, is little less than miraculous! Why, it must
be like a chain cable, to hold together the contents of all these musty
Patent Rolls, with their endless repetitions. I myself am called by my
intimates, ‘_Memory Barbican_,’ and I can recollect events and stories
indifferently well; but _you!_ you remind me of the Wandering Jew, who
has lived eighteen hundred years, and never forgot any thing in his
life!”
“Ah! my good Sir,” answered the Historian of London Bridge, “if my
memory were equal to your praise of it, it were, indeed, worth boasting
of; but in my broken narrative I can shew you but here and there an
isolated fact, whilst to the greater part of the story, we are obliged
to say with _Master Shallow_, ‘Barren! Barren! Beggars all! Beggars
all!’”
“Take a draught out of the fragment of Master Shallow’s fat friend
here,” returned I, pointing to the Sack Tankard, “and set out afresh,
my old kinsman; but pray let us have the spur on the other leg
now, and give us a little History to lighten our Law; with which
request,--Here’s my service to you!” Mr. Postern bowed as I drank, and
after having followed my example, thus continued.
“You must doubtless remember, my good Sir, that during those unhappy
Baronial wars which lasted nearly the whole of the extended reign of
Henry III. it was supposed that Queen Eleanor of Provence opposed the
Sovereign’s agreeing to the Barons’ demands; and that in revenge for
this, how very uncivilly the Citizens treated her at London Bridge.
Matthew of Westminster tells the story under the year 1263, in his
‘_Flores Historiarum_.’ London, 1570, folio, Part ii. page 315; and
he, as you will recollect, was a Benedictine Monk of Westminster,
who flourished, as Bishop Nicholson supposes in his ‘_Historical
Libraries_,’ page 66, about the year 1307, when his history ends. The
event to which I allude was, that as the Queen was going by water
to Windsor, just as her barge was preparing to shoot the Bridge,
the populace intercepted her progress, attacked her with vehement
exclamations and reproaches, and endeavoured to sink her vessel, and
deprive her of life by casting heavy stones and mud into her boat. Upon
this, she was compelled to return to the Tower, where the King had
garrisoned himself, as the City had declared for the Barons, whence
she was removed to the Bishop of London’s Palace, at St. Paul’s. It
was in the latter end of the same year, that Simon de Montfort, the
sturdy Earl of Leicester, and the Baronial leader, marched his forces
through the County of Surrey towards London, in the hope that his
friends, Thomas Fitz-Richard, then Lord Mayor, Thomas de Pynlesdon,
Matthew Bukerel, and Michael Tony, with whom was connected an immense
multitude of the common rabble, would open the Bridge Gates to him.
When the King, however, became acquainted with the Earl’s design, he
left the Tower, and encamped with his troops about Southwark, to oppose
his passage. As the Earl of Leicester relied more upon the assistance
of the Citizens, than on the valour of his own soldiers, he vigorously
attacked the King’s troops, expecting that the Londoners would favour
his entrance. Henry, however, had still several adherents in the City;
and, indeed, Thomas Wikes, in his ‘_Chronicon_,’ page 58, as it is
printed in volume ii. of Gale’s ‘_Scriptores_,’ already cited, tells
us that the Baronial party in London was composed of the meanest and
most worthless, whom the wisest and eldest endeavoured to controul.
During the fight, therefore, some of the Royalists, and especially one
John Gisors, a Norman, perceiving that the City was in motion to assist
De Montfort, locked up the Bridge Gates, and threw the keys into the
Thames. So prompt an action had nearly proved fatal to the Earl of
Leicester, who had approached the Bridge with only a few soldiers, lest
his designs should be discovered; but at length the Gates were broken
open, the Citizens rushed out in multitudes to his rescue; King Henry
was obliged to retreat, and De Montfort entered the City. By this event
we are informed that there certainly _did_ exist a Bridge Gate in the
year 1264; and the historians by whom the fact is related, are Matthew
of Westminster, whose ‘_Flowers of Histories_’ I have already quoted,
of which book, see page 317; and the ‘_Chronicon_’ of Thomas Wikes, a
Canon Regular of Osney, near Oxford, which concludes with the year 1304.
“It would seem almost certain that, at this period, the keeping of
London Bridge, with all its emoluments, was in the possession of
the Brethren of St. Thomas of the Bridge; and the idea is somewhat
supported by the Protection to which I referred you but a short time
since. There is, however, in the Patent Rolls preserved in the Tower
of London, of the 50th of Henry III.--1265,--Membrane the 43rd, the
following instrument.
“‘For the Hospital of St. Catherine, concerning the Custody of London
Bridge, with all the rents thereof for the space of five years.
‘The King to the Brethren and Chaplains ministring in the Chapel of
St. Thomas upon London Bridge, the other inhabitants upon the same
Bridge; and to all others to whom these letters shall come, Greeting:
Know ye, that we commit unto the Master and Brethren of the Hospital
of Saint Catherine near to our Tower of London, the Custody of the
aforesaid Bridge with all its appurtenances, as well the rents and
tenements thereof, as of others which belong to the aforesaid Bridge,
within and without the City: to have and to hold by the said Master and
Brethren for the space of five years. Yet so that out of the aforesaid
rents, tenements, and other goods of the aforesaid Bridge, the repair
and support of the Bridge is to be looked for, and to be done, from
henceforth from that place as it shall be able, and as it hath been
accustomed. And therefore we command you, that to the said Master and
Brethren, as well as to the keepers of the aforesaid Bridge, all things
belonging to that custody be applied, permitted, and paid, until the
term aforesaid. Witness the King at Westminster, on the sixteenth day
of November.’ The Latin of this writ you find printed in Hearne’s
‘_Liber Niger_,’ which I have before quoted, volume i. page *471; and
it affords us certain proof of the early existence of dwellings on
London Bridge.
“I will but remark in passing onwards, that Madox, in his ‘_History
of the Exchequer_,’ already cited, page 534, quotes a Roll to shew
that in the 52nd year of King Henry III.--1267,--Walter Harvey, and
William de Durham, Bailiffs of the City of London, accounted to the
Crown for the sum of £7. 0_s._ 2-1/2_d._ being the amount of the
Custom of Fish brought to London Bridge Street, and other Customs also
taken there. The term for which the Hospital of St. Catherine was to
enjoy the custody of London Bridge, wanted, however, more than a whole
twelvemonth of its completion, when a new Patent was issued by Henry
III. in 1269, the 54th year of his reign, granting it to his Queen
Eleanor of Provence. It is entitled, ‘The King gives to Eleanor, Queen
of England, the custody of London Bridge, with the liberties;’ and you
will find it the third article on the 4th Membrane, in the Patent Roll
for the above year: the Latin is printed by Hearne in the place which I
last cited, page *472, and the writ in English is as follows:”
“‘The King to all etcætera, Greeting. Seeing that some time since we
would have granted to our most dear Consort Eleanor, Queen of England,
the Custody of our Bridge at London, with the liberties and all other
things belonging to that Bridge, to have for a certain term: We,
therefore, do grant to the same Queen, out of our abundant grace and
will, the custody of the Bridge aforesaid, with the liberties and
all other things belonging to that Bridge, to be considered from the
Feast of All Saints,’--1st of November--‘about to arrive; and from the
same Feast of All Saints, until the full end of the six years next
approaching, and following. In testimony of which thing, etcætera,
Witness the King, at Woodstock, on the 10th day of September.’”
“And pray, Mr. Barnaby Postern,” said I, in a drowsy kind of voice, for
I was almost tired at sitting so long silent, “did the Queen enjoy the
whole of her term, or was the custody of London Bridge again otherwise
disposed of?”
“You bring me, worthy Mr. Geoffrey,” answered he, “by your very
seasonable question, to speak of a matter in which the Citizens of
London obtained a great triumph on behalf of their Bridge. It is
somewhat singular, that Stow, at page 60 of his ‘_Survey_,’ volume
i. has very hastily, and, in my poor mind, very imperfectly, related
this matter; whilst Maitland, on page 48 of his ‘_History_,’ volume i.
has told it still less circumstantially. I shall therefore, my good
friend, take the freedom to put the proceedings between the Queen and
the Citizens in somewhat more particular a form, illustrating them by
the very records from whence we derive our information; for to these
let me say, that neither of the authors whom I have mentioned give you
any reference. Previously to commencing, however, I must entreat you
to bear with me, Mr. Barbican, if my proofs cited from the ancient
Rolls of the Kingdom be dull and formal; and to remember that they are
often the only _fragmenta_ we possess of past events. Tracing of local
history is like endeavouring to follow the course of a dried-up river:
a rude channel here and there presents itself; some mouldering ruin,
once the abutment of an ancient Bridge, or----”
“Mr. Postern,” said I, taking up the Tankard, and interrupting him,
“once more, here’s your health, and I wish you safe out of your
wilderness: keep to one thing at a time, man, leave your dried-up
river, and ‘turn again Barnaby,’ to the dispute between Queen Eleanor
of Provence, and the Citizens of London, concerning yonder Bridge.”
“In good time,” continued my visitor, “you have brought me back again.
And now, I would first request you to remember, that King Henry III.
died at London, on the 16th of November, 1272; Prince Edward his son
then being in the Crusade in Palestine; whence, however, he returned to
England in July, or August, 1274. Now, almost the whole of the reign of
Henry III. had been disturbed by the truculent Barons contending with
him for the final settlement of Magna Charta; and these Civil Wars had
very naturally produced numerous abuses with respect to the Estates of
England, such as the Nobility assuming almost regal rights, imposing
heavy tolls, and the officers of the Crown using divers exactions
under colour of the law. Such was the state of English affairs at the
return of King Edward I., and it was one of the first acts of his
reign--as the ‘_Annals of Waverley_’ tell us on page 235,--to enquire
into the state of the revenues, privileges, and lands of the Crown;
as well as to examine into the conduct of the sheriffs and officers,
who had at once defrauded the Sovereign and oppressed his subjects.
For this purpose, as the next circuit of the Justices Itinerant was
not expected for six years then to come,--as they generally travelled
it but once in seven,--the King issued his Letters Patent under the
Great Seal, dated from the Tower of London, on the 11th of October,
1274, appointing Commissioners for each County in England, to make
this important inquisition. They were instructed to summon Juries
to enquire on oath the answers to thirty-five Articles, examining
into the King’s rights, royalties, and prerogatives, and into the
extent of all frauds and abuses; the most full and ample instructions
being given them for their conduct. The returns and answers to these
enquiries constitute that interesting body of Records denominated the
‘_Hundred Rolls_,’ which are preserved in the Wakefield Tower, in the
Tower of London: though, before we make any references to these, let
me remark, that you will find their history, nature, and extent, fully
described in the ‘_Reports from the Select Committee, appointed to
enquire into the State of the Public Records_,’ 1801, folio, pages 54,
57-62; and ‘_Rotuli Hundredorum Tempore Henrici III. et Edwardi I.
in Turri Londinensi, et in Curiâ receptæ Scaccarii Westmonasteriensi,
asservati_.’ London, 1812-18, 2 volumes, folio. The original Patent
Commissions, and Articles of Enquiry, are also still preserved in the
Patent Rolls in the Tower, of the 2nd of Edward I., Membrane the 5th:
by which we are informed, that Bartholomew de Bryaunton, and James de
Saint Victoire, were appointed Inquisitors for the Counties of Kent,
Surrey, Sussex, and Middlesex, and for the City of London: and that
their enquiries for the latter place commenced in the 3rd year of King
Edward I., 1274-75. On the first Membrane of the Roll for London it
is stated, that twelve Jurors of Basinghall, or as it is often called
Bassishaw Ward, gave the following evidence concerning London Bridge,
for the original Latin of which see the ‘_Rotuli Hundredorum_,’ which I
have already quoted, volume i. page 403, column 1.
“‘When they enquired concerning the Rents of the Citizens and
Burgesses, &c.--They said that the custody of London Bridge, which is
wont to belong only to the City, is alienated by the Lady Queen, Mother
of Edward our King; and the Keepers of the said Bridge appointed by
the same Lady Queen, expend but little in the amending and sustaining
of the said Bridge. Whence danger may easily arise, very much to the
damage of the King and of the City.’ This is the second Inquisition
quoted by Stow, on page 60. On the third Membrane of this same Roll,
containing the inquisition made in the Ward of William de Hadestok,
or Tower Ward, the Jurors said that ‘the Lady Queen Eleanor, Mother
of our Lord the King, is now possessed of the Bridge of London, who
keeps it badly, and that it was belonging to the City of London:’ and
also that the custody had been alienated ‘from the Battle of Evesham,’
August the 4th, 1265, as I have already shewn you, until the time of
the inquisition. See page 405, column 1, of the ‘_Hundred Rolls_’
before cited.
“The Jurors of the Ward of Fori, or Fore-street, page 406, column 2 of
the same book, and Membrane 4 of the original Roll, ‘said that London
Bridge had been for a long time in the hands of the City and Citizens
of London, and that such had been always accustomed by general consent,
to be made keepers of the common Bridge of our Lord the King, and of
his City, and of all passers over it; and now,’ they continued, ‘the
aforesaid Bridge is in the hands of the Lady the Queen, and they know
not by what warrant. They said also, that the same Bridge is greatly
and perilously decayed through defect of keeping, which is to the great
peril of our Lord the King and his City, and all passing over it.’ The
evidence of the Jurors of the Ward of Walter le Poter, was to the same
effect: and you will find it on Membrane 5 of the Roll, and on page
408, column 2, of the printed copy. A similar reply was also returned
from the Ward of Peter Aunger, see Membrane 6, and page 410, column 1:
from Coleman Street Ward, Membrane 7, page 412, column 1: and from the
Ward of John de Blakethorne, Membrane 9, page 414, column 2; where,
however, it is added, that ‘the Bridge of London, which was formerly
in the custody of the whole Commonalty to be repaired and re-edified,
is now under that of Brother Stephen de Foleborn for the Queen Mother.’
“The verdict of the twelve Jurors of the Ward of John Horn, also
testifies the Queen’s possession of London Bridge, see Membrane 11,
and page 416, column 2: but from Queenhithe Ward, or that of Simon
de Hadestok, Membrane 13, and page 419, column 1, we learn that the
Jurors ‘said that the Lord King Henry took the Bridge of London into
his own hands, presently after the Battle of Evesham, and delivered
it into the hands of the Lady the Queen, Mother of the Lord the King,
who hath it now; and that to the great detriment of the Bridge, and
the prejudice of all the people; it is also now nearly in a falling
state, through defect of support.’ On Membrane 14, and page 420, column
1, the Jurors of the Ward of John de Northampton,--which is, by the
way, the first Inquisition, so vaguely referred to by Stow, at page
60 of his ‘_Survey_,’--depose to the same effect; as do those of the
Ward of Thomas de Basing, Membrane 15, and page 421, column 1; the
latter adding only, that when the Bridge was held by the City, it was
delivered to two honest Citizens to keep, saving the rents of their
custody. The only information we gain from the Jurors of the Ward of
Dowgate, Membrane 16, and page 422, column 2, is, that Brother Stephen,
Bishop of Waterford, was custodier for Queen Eleanor, whilst their
evidence on the Bridge dilapidations is quite as full as that of the
other Wards.
“Such were the chief answers to the inquisitions concerning London
Bridge, in the reign of King Edward I.; I say the chief, for there
are yet several others, which, for the most part, are but abridged
repetitions of those already cited. Indeed, they are recorded upon a
different Roll, which is kept in the Chapter House, at West-Minster;
and you may see their contents in the printed copies of the ‘_Hundred
Rolls_’ to which I have so often referred you, volume i. pages 425-432.”
“Well, Master Postern,” said I, when my narrator came to this breathing
place, “and how did King Edward and his Commissioners act upon this
evidence against Queen Eleanor of Provence? Were they not of the mind
of _Dogberry_ as it regarded the answers of the Citizens; ‘’Fore God!
they are both in a tale,’ seeing that nearly all of them swore alike?”
“I cannot, now,” answered Mr. Postern, “call to mind any historical
proof that the custody of London Bridge was immediately restored to
the Mayor and Citizens, though Maitland states, at page 48 of his
‘_History_,’ but without quoting any authority, that the Citizens
did not cease to prosecute their suit by _Quo Warranto_, until they
regained their ancient rights and privileges. Now the fact is, it is
by no means certain that there was any such suit ever commenced as
it concerned the Bridge; for the inquisition was first commanded by
the King, and the Citizens had only to answer concerning the ancient
possession and present state of their property, part of which they
stated had been alienated by the King to the Queen Mother, adding also,
‘_et nesciunt quo Warranto_,’ they knew not by what warrant, or right.
This, probably, was the phrase which led Maitland astray; added to
which, he cites at page 104 the _Quo Warranto_ Bag of the 3rd year of
Edward I. No. 4, in the Exchequer, containing the complaints of the
Citizens concerning levies unjustly made.
“It was, however, not the City of London only that presented and
complained of alterations in the Bridge customs; for in Messrs. Manning
and Bray’s ‘_History and Antiquities of Surrey_,’ London, 1804-14,
folio, volume iii. page 548, there is the following entry. ‘At an
Assize at Guildford, in Surrey, in the Octave of St. Michael,’--that is
to say within the eight days succeeding the 29th of September,--‘in the
7th of Edward I. 1278--79, before John de Reygate and other Justices
Itinerant. There came twelve for the Burgesses of Southwark. They
present that a certain part of London Bridge, about the great gate of
the Bridge, with the houses and buildings standing on that part, used
to belong to the Burgh of the King, of Southwark, where the King used
to have of rents of Assize,’--namely, fixed rents which could never be
increased,--‘yearly 11_s._ 4_d._; and of the customs of things there
sold, 16_s._ and one halfpenny, till fourteen years ago, in the time
of King Henry III., when the Mayor and City of London appropriated it
to the City:--the King to be consulted. Also they present that the
Keeper of London Bridge holds a messuage which formerly belonged to
Reginald de Colemille, who then held the same in Chief,’ immediately
from the King, ‘by the rent of one penny farthing: and that Milo le
Mareschall holds in Chief of the King two messuages which were formerly
the property of Godefride de Marberer, and Henry le Mareschall,
and pays yearly two pence halfpenny.’ The ‘_Assize Pleadings_,’ or
Rolls, containing these particulars, were written in consequence of
inquisitions into the damages and alienations of the King’s property,
during the reign of King Henry III., as I have already remarked with
regard to the Hundred Rolls: the original pleadings are preserved in
the Tower of London, and in the Court of the Receipt of the Exchequer,
in the Chapter House at Westminster. Such were the ancient rents of the
houses on London Bridge; to which I may add, that a Fruiterer’s Shop,
two yards and a half and one thumb in length, and three yards and two
thumbs in depth, was let on a lease from the Bridge-master, at a rental
of twelve pence.
“We well know, Mr. Barbican, that in the olden time, Bridges were
applied to many purposes which now seem altogether foreign to such
edifices. The celebrated Du Cange, you will recollect, in his
‘_Glossarium ad Scriptores Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis_,’ Paris,
1733-36, folio, volume ii. page 67, tells us, that Philip the Fair,
King of France, ordained in 1304, that the public Exchange, or
Bankers’ Money Table for Paris, should be held upon the Great Bridge
there, between the Church of St. Leufred and the Great Arch, as it
was anciently accustomed to be. You may remember, also, that Bridges
were once considered as Funeral Monuments, for Olaus Wormius, in his
‘_Monumentum Danicorum_,’ Hafnia, 1643, folio, page 523, when speaking
of the Island of Foesoe, observes, that there was erected a Bridge
at the costs of two or three persons, as well to preserve their own
names to posterity, as to commemorate that of Jotheimnt who converted
them to Christianity. He adds also, that the word _Bru_, which is
unquestionably the most ancient etymon of the term Bridge, signifies
that coronal of stone with which the large burial-places, or _tumuli_,
in fields, were encircled. With what great propriety then, did the
blessed Peter of Colechurch confide his fame to, and rest his most
excellent bones, in London Bridge!
“Such, then, being the purposes to which Bridges were once
appropriated, we are not to wonder that a Market formerly existed
upon that of London; although the circumstance is marked only by the
order for its removal, which we find mentioned by Maitland in his
‘_History_,’ volume i. page 104, in the following terms. ‘In the fifth
year of this King’s reign,’ that is to say Edward I. 1276,--‘it was
ordained, that there should not be kept a Market on London Bridge,
nor in any other place, except those appointed for that purpose: also
that no person should go out of the City to Southwark to buy cattle,
or any wares which might be bought in the City, under the penalty of
the forfeiture of the thing bought. This is the first Ordinance of
the Common Council we find on record, concerning the regulation and
appointment of Markets in this City.’ The margin of Maitland’s work
states that he derived this information from the book entitled ‘_Liber
Albus_,’ preserved in the Record Chamber of the City of London, folio,
130 a. Now this same White Book, which I imagine to have been so called
from its having once had a cover of cream-coloured calf, was a most
curious and elaborate work, compiled, as it is supposed by Strype, by
one J. Carpenter, who was Town Clerk in the reign of Henry V., and a
great benefactor to the City. It is dated November 5th, 1419, in the
Mayoralty of Master Richard Whyttington, and the 7th year of the Reign
of Henry V. and ‘it contains laudable customs not written, wont to be
observed in the City, and other notable things worthy of remembrance
here and there scatteringly, not in any order written.’ Some of these
memoranda, as the Latin Prologue to the volume sets forth, are short
indexes to the contents of other City Books, Rolls, and Charters,
which are cited by their names, or marks; and in the 4th Book, folio
70 a, there is a reference to another record marked A, page cxxx.,
concerning the market on London Bridge, which was probably the occasion
of Maitland’s marginal note, as the ‘_Liber Albus Transcriptum_,’
itself, has not in any part of it a page numbered 130. The volume then,
in which this very ancient order of the Common Council is really
contained, is a small folio of a moderate thickness, cased in boards,
covered with white leather, having a coating of rough calf over it.
The outside is garnished with bosses and clasps, now black with age;
and in the centre, a metal border holds down a piece of parchment, on
which is written in Latin the title of the volume, in a clear black
letter, guarded by a plate of horn: informing us that it was begun in
the 4th year of the reign of Edward I. 1275, and finished in his 22nd
year, 1293. The leaves are of parchment, with the contents written in
a small Court-hand in Latin; and on folio 130 a, is this entry. ‘Also
that no Market place shall be kept upon London Bridge, nor in any other
place excepting the appointed stations.’ On the preceding folio, namely
129 b, there is also this farther order concerning the Bridge: ‘Item,
that no regraters,’--that is to say those who both bought and sold in
the same market or fai
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