Ludgate Hill is a street and surrounding area, on a small hill in the
City of London
The City of London is a city, ceremonial county and local government district that contains the historic centre and constitutes, alongside Canary Wharf, the primary central business district (CBD) of London. It constituted most of London f ...
. The street passes through the former site of
Ludgate, a
city gate
A city gate is a gate which is, or was, set within a city wall. It is a type of fortified gateway.
Uses
City gates were traditionally built to provide a point of controlled access to and departure from a walled city for people, vehicles, goo ...
that was demolished – along with a
gaol
A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, corre ...
attached to it – in 1760.
The area includes
St Paul's Cathedral
St Paul's Cathedral is an Anglicanism, Anglican cathedral in London and is the seat of the Bishop of London. The cathedral serves as the mother church of the Diocese of London. It is on Ludgate Hill at the highest point of the City of London ...
. The modern cathedral, it has been claimed, was built on a site that – during the
Roman British era of the early
first millennium – was occupied by a major
Roman temple
Ancient Roman temples were among the most important buildings in Roman culture, and some of the richest buildings in Roman architecture, though only a few survive in any sort of complete state. Today they remain "the most obvious symbol of R ...
, dedicated to the goddess
Diana
Diana most commonly refers to:
* Diana (name), a given name (including a list of people with the name)
* Diana (mythology), ancient Roman goddess of the hunt and wild animals; later associated with the Moon
* Diana, Princess of Wales (1961–1997) ...
.
Ludgate Hill itself is traditionally regarded as one of a trio of hills in Central London, the others being
Tower Hill
Tower Hill is the area surrounding the Tower of London in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is infamous for the public execution of high status prisoners from the late 14th to the mid 18th century. The execution site on the higher gro ...
and
Cornhill. The highest point is just north of St Paul's, at above sea level.
The modern street named Ludgate Hill, which was previously a much narrower thoroughfare named Ludgate Street, runs between
St Paul's Churchyard and
Ludgate Circus
Ludgate Circus is a road junction in the City of London where Farringdon Street/New Bridge Street (the A201) crosses Fleet Street/Ludgate Hill. (Ludgate Hill is a gentle rise to St Paul's Cathedral.)
Fleet Street was the only direct road betwe ...
(built in 1864), at which point it becomes
Fleet Street
Fleet Street is a major street mostly in the City of London. It runs west to east from Temple Bar at the boundary with the City of Westminster to Ludgate Circus at the site of the London Wall and the River Fleet from which the street was n ...
.
Description
Many small alleys on Ludgate Hill were swept away in the mid 1860s to build
Ludgate Hill railway station between Water Lane and New Bridge Street, a station of the
London, Chatham and Dover Railway. It was closed to passengers in 1929 and the railway bridge and viaduct between
Holborn Viaduct and
Blackfriars station
Blackfriars, also known as London Blackfriars, is a central London railway station and connected London Underground station in the City of London. It provides Thameslink services: local (from North to South London), and regional (Bedford and ...
s was demolished in 1990 to enable the construction of the
City Thameslink railway station in a tunnel. This also involved the regrading of the slope of Ludgate Hill at the junction.
There is a
blue plaque
A blue plaque is a permanent sign installed in a public place in the United Kingdom and elsewhere to commemorate a link between that location and a famous person, event, or former building on the site, serving as a historical marker. The term i ...
near the bottom of the hill with these words: "In a house near this site was published in 1702 The ''
Daily Courant'' first London daily newspaper".
About halfway up Ludgate Hill is the church of
St Martin, Ludgate, once physically joined to the Ludgate.
Paternoster Square, home of the
London Stock Exchange
London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pa ...
since 2004, is on the hill, immediately to the north of St Paul's Cathedral.
Etymology
Ludgate is generally accepted to derive from the
Old English term ''"hlid-geat"''
[''Charters of Abingdon Abbey, Volume 2'',Susan E. Kelly, Published for the British Academy by Oxford University Press, 2001, , 9780197262214, pp.623–266][''Geographical Etymology'', Christina Blackie, pp.88][English Place-Name society, Volume 36, The University Press, 1962, pp.205][Middle English Dictionary, University of Michigan Press, 1998, pp. 972][''An encyclopaedia of London'', William Kent, Dent, 1951, pp.402] from ''"hlid"'' ("lid, cover, opening, gate") and ''"geat"'' or ''"gæt"'' ("gate,
[ opening, passage") and was a common Old English compound meaning "]postern
A postern is a secondary door or gate in a fortification such as a city wall or castle curtain wall. Posterns were often located in a concealed location which allowed the occupants to come and go inconspicuously. In the event of a siege, a poster ...
" or "swing gate"[ and survives in various place names across ]England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...
[ as well as in ]surnames
In some cultures, a surname, family name, or last name is the portion of one's personal name that indicates one's family, tribe or community.
Practices vary by culture. The family name may be placed at either the start of a person's full name ...
.
Ludgate is mentioned in Geoffrey of Monmouth
Geoffrey of Monmouth ( la, Galfridus Monemutensis, Galfridus Arturus, cy, Gruffudd ap Arthur, Sieffre o Fynwy; 1095 – 1155) was a British cleric from Monmouth, Wales and one of the major figures in the development of British historiograph ...
's ''Historia Regum Britanniae
''Historia regum Britanniae'' (''The History of the Kings of Britain''), originally called ''De gestis Britonum'' (''On the Deeds of the Britons''), is a pseudohistorical account of British history, written around 1136 by Geoffrey of Monmouth. ...
'', written around 1136. According to the pseudohistorical work the name comes from the mythic Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peopl ...
king Lud son of Heli whom he claims also gave his name to London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
. '' The Cronycullys of Englonde'' tell us of an early king of Britain: "he lete make a fayre gate and called hit Lud Gate after his name" in the year 66 BC, but it is more likely that the Romans were the first to build it, and that it is simply named after him. One proposed derivation, entirely prosaic, is that the name is a variation on "Fleodgaet", or "Fleet-gate".
Literary associations
At the bottom of Ludgate Hill, on the north side, is Limeburner Lane. This may sound like a quaint survival from medieval times, but it was actually constructed in the 1990s, where Seacoal Lane used to be. This was the location of the Bell Savage Inn
The Bell Savage Inn was a public house in London, England, from the 15th century to 1873, originally located on the north side of what is now Ludgate Hill, in the City of London. It was a playhouse during the Elizabethan Era, as well as a ...
, first mentioned in 1452 where plays were performed. According to surveyor John Stow
John Stow (''also'' Stowe; 1524/25 – 5 April 1605) was an English historian and antiquarian. He wrote a series of chronicles of English history, published from 1565 onwards under such titles as ''The Summarie of Englyshe Chronicles'', ''The ...
the name was derived from Isabella Savage, but Addison claimed it was "La belle Sauvage", a woman in the wilderness. The clown Richard Tarlton used to perform here. It is mentioned in Thomas Hughes' '' Tom Brown's Schooldays'' and Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian e ...
' ''The Pickwick Papers
''The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club'' (also known as ''The Pickwick Papers'') was Charles Dickens's first novel. Because of his success with '' Sketches by Boz'' published in 1836, Dickens was asked by the publisher Chapman & Hall to ...
''. In October 1684, a "Rynoceros lately brought from the East Indies" was put on show there. The inn was demolished in 1873. In 1851, part of it was rented out to John Cassell (1817–1865), a notable publisher. At this time it was still called La Belle Sauvage Yard and the firm of Cassell used "la Belle Sauvage" in some of their imprints.
The prison is mentioned in Daniel Defoe's '' Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress''.
From 1731, the "London Coffee House" was next to St Martin's, Ludgate, at 24–26 Ludgate Hill. It was frequented by Joseph Priestley
Joseph Priestley (; 24 March 1733 – 6 February 1804) was an English chemist, natural philosopher, separatist theologian, grammarian, multi-subject educator, and liberal political theorist. He published over 150 works, and conducted e ...
and Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin ( April 17, 1790) was an American polymath who was active as a writer, scientist, inventor
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a m ...
. When the juries at the Old Bailey failed to reach a verdict, they were housed here overnight. In 1806, a Roman hexagonal altar dedicated to Claudia Martina by her husband, now in the Guildhall, was found here together with a statue of Hercules. The London Coffee House was closed in 1867, and is now occupied by a pub called "Ye Olde London".
Edmund Spenser's "Shepheardes Calender" was printed by Hugh Singleton at the sign of the "Gylden tunne" in Creed Lane in 1579. John Evelyn
John Evelyn (31 October 162027 February 1706) was an English writer, landowner, gardener, courtier and minor government official, who is now best known as a diarist. He was a founding Fellow of the Royal Society.
John Evelyn's diary, or ...
lived in the Hawk and Pheasant on Ludgate Hill in 1658–59.
The Blackfriars, or Dominicans, first came to London in 1221. In 1278, they moved from Holborn
Holborn ( or ) is a district in central London, which covers the south-eastern part of the London Borough of Camden and a part (St Andrew Holborn (parish), St Andrew Holborn Below the Bars) of the Wards of the City of London, Ward of Farringdon ...
to an area south of Ludgate, where they built a friary. By 1320, they had demolished the Roman wall to build a new wall for the friary. This was demolished at the Reformation, but the name persisted – in 1596 James Burbage, the manager of Shakespeare's acting company, The Lord Chamberlain's Men, acquired the lease to a part of the property that was already being used as a theatre. His intention appears to have been to have the Lord Chamberlain's Men act here. However, local opposition meant that the more fashionable children's acting companies who were already performing here continued to act here for some years instead. It wasn't until 1609 that Shakespeare's company of actors (by then called The King's Men) was able to act at the Blackfriars Theatre. In 1613, Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...
bought the Blackfriars gate-house.
Pageantmaster Court is almost opposite St. Martin's. The name is not medieval but dates from 1993. However, to the west is King's Arms Court, which existed until recently. Grinling Gibbons lived there. According to Stow, the gate acquired statues in 1260. In the reign of Edward VI
Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and King of Ireland, Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. Edward was the son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour ...
the heads were "smitten off" and a few years later " Queen Mary did set new heads upon their old bodies again".[ Brewer, Ebenezer Cobham. '' Dictionary of Phrase and Fable''. London: Cassell and Company, 1905]
Page 780.
/ref>
William Hone, journalist and publisher had an office near Ludgate Hill and the Old Bailey during the mid 1800s.
Notable residents
* Samuel Birch (military officer)
* William Harvey
William Harvey (1 April 1578 – 3 June 1657) was an English physician who made influential contributions in anatomy and physiology. He was the first known physician to describe completely, and in detail, the systemic circulation and prope ...
(1578–1657) – discovered the circulation of the blood, 1628. From 1604–1639 Harvey held a residence in the precincts of St Martin's Church, Ludgate.
References
External links
Hercules statue ref (1)
Ludgate hill in ''Dictionary of London'' (1918)
British History Online
Gazetteer
David Nash Ford, "Roman London"
Ludgate Hill pubs & City of London pubs
{{City of London
Streets in the City of London
Landforms of the City of London
Hills of London