The Story of LondonWheatley, Henry B. (Henry Benjamin)
History
The Story of London
Wheatley, Henry B. (Henry Benjamin)
London (England) -- History
St. Paul's had its enclosed churchyard, so that the main thoroughfare
for centuries passed round it from Newgate Street to Cheapside. The name
of Cheap tells of the general market held there, and the names of
several of the streets out of Cheapside tell of the particular
merchandise appropriated to them, as Friday Street (Friday's market for
fish), Milk Street and Bread Street. At the west end of Cheapside was
the Church of St. Michael le Querne (or at the Corn), which marked the
site of the Corn Market. It was destroyed in the Great Fire. At the east
end of this church stood the Old Cross, which was taken down in the year
1390, and replaced by the Little Conduit, which is described as standing
by Paul's gate. There is an engraving of this church and the conduit,
with the water-pots of the water-carriers dotted about.
The wall passed north along the side of St. Martin's-le-Grand till it
came to Aldersgate, close by the Church of St. Botolph. The exact spot
is marked by No. 62 on the east side of the street. Stow's etymologies
of London names are seldom very satisfactory, but he never blundered
worse than when he explained Aldgate as old gate and Aldersgate as the
older gate; but his explanation has been followed by many successive
writers, who do not seem to have seen the impossibility of the
suggestion. One of the earliest forms of the name is Aldredesgate,
showing pretty conclusively that it was a proper name.
The wall proceeds east to Cripplegate, with an outpost--the Watch-Tower
or Barbican. The Rev. W. Denton has explained the name of Cripplegate as
due to the covered way between the postern and the Barbican or
Burgh-kenning (A.S., _crepel_, _cryfle_ or _crypele_, a burrow or
passage under ground). The name occurs also in the Domesday of
Wiltshire, where we read: 'To Wansdyke, thence forth by the dyke to
Crypelgeat.'[19] If this etymology be accepted, we have here the use of
the word gate as a way. In the north this distinction is kept up, and
the road is the gate, while what we in the south call the gate is the
bar. For instance, at York, Micklegate is the road, and the entrance to
the wall is Micklegate bar.
It may be noted that St. Giles was the patron saint of Cripples, but the
first church was not built until about 1090 by Alfune, the first
Hospitaller of St. Bartholomew's, so that the dedication may have been
owing to a mistaken etymology at that early date. In the churchyard is
an interesting piece of the old wall still in position. The course of
the wall to the east is marked by the street named London Wall, from
Cripplegate to Bishopsgate Street. Here it bore south to Camomile and
Wormwood Streets, where stood till 1731 the gate.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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