Our stop at St. Mary’s on Hill

Our guide Simon was very theatrical in his storytelling.  I read that many of the www.walks.com guides are actors in their other lives.

  The  reason for my returning to St. Mary’s on Hill was to learn more about the skull and crossbones over the alley entrance attached to the church.   Once St. Mary’s had included a grave yard.  (More about that later.)  But I thought Simon had said the skull and crossbones represented cemeteries where plague victims had been buried.    I still don’t know the whole answer.

St Mary at Hill on the street of the same name

The clock is the church clock and the alley way is closed off and filled with bags of construction materials.

“All that we have to remind us of this last of a series of plagues is the old burial grounds, over the entrance to which may be seen the sculptured representation of skull and cross-bones distinguishing the sites of the plague cemeteries . http://www.sacred-texts.com/etc/fcod/fcod13.htm (But this is the only reference I found to plague cemeteries and skull and crossbones.)

St Mary at Hill tower

Lovat Lane

London

EC3R 8EE 

A millennium of ministry

St Mary-at-Hill has served in the Parish of Billingsgate for nearly a thousand years.  An ‘ancient church’ on this site is mentioned in a legal document dated 1177, so we can conjecture with some certainty that a church dedicated to St Mary the Virgin has stood here since at least the end of the 11th Century. Billingsgate Quay was an important harbour in the 10th and 11th centuries. The route north into the old city would have led past the church. The steep rise of the way up from the river gave it the name of St Mary at or on the Hill. The original church was no doubt smaller than the present building which has been extended, altered and renovated throughout its history. The Churchwardens’ accounts from the C15th inform us that by then it had side chapels dedicated to St Stephen, St Katherine, St Ann and St Christopher.

     Ancient Graves

Burials within the Church and in the Chapels were for the wealthy, as they were charged at 16s 8d, while internment in the Great Churchyard to the North cost just 8d. This is now a pretty courtyard garden. It was closed for burials in May 1846 and all human remains were carefully removed to West Norwood cemetery. The church crypt and vaults were similarly emptied of human remains (some 3,000 in all) between 1892-94.  Some slabs and memorials remain, but there are no skeletons below. Museum of London excavations have found traces of much earlier graves on the site, confirming that the area was part of the Roman city as well as the later Anglo-Saxon settlement.

     16th & 17th Centuries

The Church Bells of the tower and steeple (replaced in 1787-9 by Gwilt’s square brick tower) were rung for the crowning of Henry VIII in 1509. During the later years of Henry’s reign, the English Church renounced the primacy of Rome. The Civil War raged between 1642-51 and six years after the Restoration of the Monarchy, with the City still reeling from losing 1 in 5 of its inhabitants to the Plague, the Great Fire of London (1666) started in Pudding Lane, a stone’s throw away from St Mary-at-Hill.

     Renovation after the Great Fire

The overall plans for restoring the City churches were famously orchestrated by Dr (later Sir) Christopher Wren, but it may have been the somewhat overlooked genius, Robert Hooke, who supervised the rebuilding of St Mary’s while Wren was concentrating on St Paul’s.  It is a matter of record that Hooke was responsible for building the internal wall under the tower, at the west end.  The Fire had consumed the interior of the church leaving only parts of the walls and the brick work of the tower. Utilizing the previous fabric as far as possible, the original north and south walls were reconstructed, but the building was extended a little to the east.  An ornate main frontage of exposed stone was built on St Mary at Hill. There were three windows – mullioned and transomed.  (The central window was blocked in 1767). The North and South windows were restored in Gothic style and doors retained in both walls. St Mary-at-Hill was one of the first churches rebuilt after the Fire, and was completed in 1677 at a cost of £3,980.

http://www.stmary-at-hill.org/

Church entrance and small garden

Notice of the closing of the cemetery in 1846. 

All human remains were removed from the cemetery and the vaults and crypts and were reinterred  in the West Norwood Cemetery.

“A carved bas-relief in stone of the Resurrection, formerly over the gateway in Love Lane, is now in the N.W. vestibule.” http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=120246

Fittings—All of late 17th-century date unless otherwise described, but much of the wood-work was altered and added to in 1848–9 by the woodcarver W. Gibbs Rogers, whose work is so like its original as to render the age of many of the fittings, in whole or in part, doubtful. Chairs:  two, partly repaired, with carved and pierced backs, enriched arms, carved legs, shaped stretchers, and twisted front posts. Clock-case: projecting from S.E. angle of church, square case with carved spandrels, moulded cornice and pediment, carved supporting beam with carved truss below. Communion Table: with five legs carved and twisted at the top, curved stretchers and moulded and enriched top. Communion Rails: with carved and twisted balusters and flat carved standards, quadrant-shaped angles and carved top rail. Doors: In centre of vestibule under gallery, panelled door to screen. In vestry—two panelled doors.  A carved bas-relief in stone of the Resurrection, formerly over the gateway in Love Lane, is now in the N.W. vestibule. Font: octagonal white marble bowl with reeded enrichment, baluster-stem with acanthus-enrichment, black marble base. Carved oak cover with cherub-heads and swags, ogee-shaped upper part with enriched angles and terminal. Gallery: Organgallery at W. end approached by a staircase from the N. vestibule, with turned and twisted balusters. The panels of the front have modern carving. It is brought forward in the centre for organist’s seat. Monuments and Floor-slabs. Monuments: On N. wall, (1) to John Woods, 1658, Anne (Burnet) his first wife, 1645, and John his son, 1670, marble tablet with Corinthian side columns, entablature, broken segmental pediment with cherubs supporting cartouche-of-arms. On S. wall, (2) to John Harvey, 1700, marble cartouche (Plate 26) with drapery, shield-of-arms and cherub head; (3) to Thomas Dovall and Anna (Potts) his wife, 1700, marble wall-monument (Plate 25) with Composite side-pilasters, draped segmental pediment, achievement-of-arms, etc.; (4) to Charles Vickars 1712–3, marble draped cartouche with cherub-heads and shield-of-arms. In N. vestibule —on N. wall, (5) to Isaac Milner, 1713, marble tablet with Composite side-columns, entablature, segmental pediment with urn and achievement-of-arms. In S. vestibule—on S. wall, formerly in St. George Botolph Lane, (6) to Daniel Wigfall, 1698–9, marble cartouche with drapery, cherub-head and shield-of-arms. Floor-slabs: In middle aisle— (1) to John Knapp, 1708, and Mary (Brownrigg) his wife, 1711, with shield-of-arms. In vestibule— (2) to Samuel Leadbeater, 1710. Panelling: panelled wainscot all round church, three panels high, with some modern work. The vestry has panelling two panels high and a moulded architrave and cornice to the fireplace. Plate: includes two cups and cover-patens, one of 1576 and inscribed Thomas Lorimar, the other of 1587, two tankards of 1637, a paten and dish both of 1684, and a sealhead spoon of the same date. Reredos: of three bays, middle bay flanked by Corinthian columns supporting an enriched cornice and round arch and enclosing two enriched round-headed panels, painted cherubs above heads of panels, and below panels a third panel carved with foliage, fruit, flowers and a crown; above arch, a segmental pediment with cherub-heads and a book in the tympanum; side bays each with enriched panels, the lower one carved with swag and crown, frieze carved with swags and wreath. Royal Arms: Stuart (Plate 16), in centre of gallery front, a second of same date at W. end, from St. George Botolph Lane. Screens: Under gallery, in middle of vestibule—with Corinthian pilasters flanking doorway and supporting an enriched entablature with cherub-heads on the frieze; E. side panelled and finished with a coved and enriched cornice. Under gallery, at N. and S. ends—panelled, that on N. with names of churchwardens, Thomas Beckford and Henry Loades and date 1672. Seating: Under gallery—churchwardens’ pews have four posts, with old carving in front, supporting the gallery.

http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=120246

I found this a very interesting corner…..

The large plaque to the left…..

John Crane died in 1823 at the age of 86.  His wife Elizabeth died in 1819 at the age of 91

John was interred in the south aisle of the church.  At his death the bulk of his estate went to his poor relations.  Elizabeth and their infant son who died in infancy were buried with John.

The plaque says that his executors erected this monument. 

(If I’ve read my photo correctly, John died at 86 and Elizabeth at 91.  So why is it we say we’re living longer?    It also, if I’ve done my math correctly tells us she was 19 years older than he when they married.)

Reference:   PROB 11/1668/305

Description:  Will of John Crane, Merchant of Croydon , Surrey

Date: 04 April 1823

Held by:  The National Archives, Kew

Legal status: Public Record

I might just have to go find this…..

The curved top plaque is in Latin so I give up..

Plaque beneath is in memory of a 16 year old boy

In memory of James Hogarth, son of George and Jane Hogarth, Aberdeen who died May 26^th, 1816; aged 16 years.  This tablet is inscribed by his disconsolate parents.    This is sadly very similar to the Roman stone memorial commissioned by the mother at the death of her 15 year old son that is in the All Hallows Undercroft.

Burial slabs indicating who had once been buried here.

Lunchtime Recitals  each week at 1.05pm : The piano is in the left hand corner where those people are seated.  But you can’t see the piano behind the pole.

     There was some type of production about to use the church so the altar was moved and that blue screen set up for filming. 

November 21  was Masachi Nishiyama  at the Piano  but I didn’t stay as I’d other places to visit and didn’t want to walk out mid performance.

November 28

INVERSION

Flute & Organ Duo

Ruth Stockdale & Robert Smith

     “Our lunchtime recitals are informal affairs. It is acceptable to come and go during the playing, and you are welcome to bring your sandwiches into the Church – a precedent set under Prebendary Wilson Carlile, founder of the Church Army* and Rector of St Mary’s at the turn of the 19th-20th century  (for working people who had brought food from home to eat and had no place else to go I was told by Kathy, the Church watcher.)

     Musicians from all over the world perform at St Mary-at-Hill. There is no charge for these events, but we suggest and appreciate a donation of perhaps £5.00

     Performances now include Monday and Friday recitals arranged by St Anne’s Lutheran Church and Music Society who brew and serve coffee, to enjoy with the music.“ 

http://www.stmary-at-hill.org/music.php

•Is a part of the ministry of the Anglican Church and is NOT affiliated with the Salvation Army or Jesus Army.  http://www.churcharmy.org.uk/pub/aboutus/FactsAndFigures.aspx

    “An amazing musical event took place at St. Anne and St. Agnes, the Lutheran church in the City of London, on July 28, 2004, the 254th anniversary of the death of Johann Sebastian Bach. “

http://www.nextreads.com/display2.aspx?recid=6943877&FC=1   fascinating reading for Bach lovers. 

“After a fire in 1848, the ceiling was renewed and the interior remodeled under James Savage, architect.

http://www.stmary-at-hill.org/gallery.php  gallery shows the church interior as it normally appears.

“Saint Mary-at-Hill boasts what has been described as one of the ten most important organs in the history of British organ building.”  Church leaflet

“On 10 May 1988, a disastrous fire in the church of St Mary at Hill in the City of London destroyed most of the roof of the building as well as much of the interior and parts of the organ. The picture below gives a good impression of the damage to both the building and the organ.”

http://www.mander-organs.com/portfolio/st-maryhill.html  tells the story the organ and its reconstruction which is really quite interesting. 

Church watchers Maryanne (L) and Kathy (R)

I had a lovely chat with Kathy who told me about the church but discovering we both grew up in New England was the most fun.  She was from Connecticut but had gone to college at Tufts in Boston.  I was duly impressed that she had graduated from Tufts and she was duly impressed that I lived at St Katharine Docks. 

Church sharing : Lutheran services in English and Swahilli

St Mary at Hill is and Anglican Church. 

Toilet Twinning

While reading the St Mary at Hill website I came across this note…………of all places for me to have missed when I usually know everyplace possible to use the loo while out and about.  I’ll have to go back, listen to a lunchtime concert and use the loo.

Do note the pictures in our toilets which are twinned with loos in the Congo. 

See website to read about sanitation.

If the loos are shut, just ask for them to be opened 

http://www.stmary-at-hill.org/

http://www.toilettwinning.org/what-is-toilet-twinning/   explains Toilet Twinning which brings sanitation to third world countries. 

Lovat Lane

   “Plague and fire did for medieval London, but the city that rose in its place was built on the old street patterns. The names, even the cobbles, remain – Lovat Lane, for example, where the old surface is barely the width of a plague cart’s wheelbase and the gutter still runs down the middle. “

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

Lovat Lane, EC3

An endearingly curving and cobbled lane between Monument Street and Great Tower Street, Lovat Lane contains the church of St Mary-At-Hill, known for its ornate gold and blue clock and which was feted by Sir John Betjeman, ‘This is the least spoiled and the most gorgeous interior in the City, all the more exciting by being hidden away among cobbled alleys, paved passages, brick walls, overhung by plane trees.’ Lovat Lane has that slightly Mediterranean feel to it and there are a couple of café restaurants with outside tables to capitalise on this, though we thought we’d wait for slightly more clement weather. Just across the road on the side of the Philpot Lane Café Nero building is the tiny carving of two mice eating a piece of cheese so grab the chance to go and have a look. (My next assignment is to see the twinned loo and find the mice eating cheese now I know where they are.)

http://londonist.com/2011/02/top-10-square-mile-alleyways.php

“…… Dickens saw the City of London change from being a place where people lived to one where people only worked, as it was gradually taken over by the banks, law firms and financial institutions.  The walk began in Billingsgate at the church of St Mary at Hill which is squeezed into a small site surrounded by Victorian office buildings.    There is a tiny churchyard with some gravestones – but no dead are buried here.  Parliament outlawed new burials in the City of London in Dickens’ day, forcing the closure of its churchyards to new burials.  It’s a symbol of the way in which the City was turning into ‘a city of the dead, with the living just coming in to work’.  As a child, Dickens experienced the City as a kind of village community; by the time he died, 80% of the population were gone, replaced by office blocks and warehouses. http://gerryco23.wordpress.com/

This painting was in the Undercroft but I should have included it in the email about the Main Church.

Beneath the present nave is the undercroft of the Saxon church containing three chapels: the Undercroft Chapel, the Chapel of St Francis of Assisi and the Chapel of St Clare.

Chapel of St Clare

“Clare of Assisi was born into a wealthy Italian family but soon shunned her luxurious upbringing to embrace the life of piety and poverty.  Inspired by the words of Francis of Assisi, Clare fled her home and joined Francis, establishing her own religious order. The group became known for their austere and devout lifestyle and for the power of their prayer, which is credited with saving Assisi from invaders twice. After Francis’ death, Clare continued his work and broadened her own influence. Clare died in 1253 and was canonized two years later by Pope Alexander IV. http://www.biography.com/people/st-clare-of-assisi-9249093

“The misshapen piece of lead is left as

a reminder of the destruction that

All Hallows suffered in the bombings of WW2.                                                                          

On December 29^th 1940 a bomb came right

through the east window destroying

much of the centre of the church.

Three weeks later the ruined church also

suffered from fire bombs.  The heat from

those fires was so intense that the roofing

lead melted and ran down the walls. 

St Francis Chapel  just next to the Chapel of St. Clare

( I have a soft spot in my heart for St. Francis who loved animals.)

St Francis organizations  now train wonderful services dogs!

“The Crypt Museum leads you on a fascinating journey through time, beginning with the Roman tesselated floor of a domestic house in the late 2nd Century and charting the history of the church, its people and the City of London.   The museum is in part of the original Saxon church and contains a collection of Roman and Saxon artefacts, church plate and ancient registers dating back to the 16th century. Their entries record the baptism of William Penn, the marriage of John Quincy-Adams and the burial of Archbishop William Laud amongst many other historic events on Tower Hill.” http://www.allhallowsbythetower.org.uk/visiting/crypt-museum/

The Undercroft Chapel is constructed out of the former ‘Vicars’ Vault’, and is now a columbarium for the interment of ashes of former parishioners and those closely associated with the church.

This site was formerly outside the main building and part of the burial ground adjacent to the apse of the Saxon church. Here lie at least three Saxon coffins, buried in the pre-Norman period. The rough rear wall is part of the 14th century church.

Standing below the present High Altar are altar stones brought back to All Hallows from Castle Athlit in present-day Israel. It is thought that the altar comes from the Chapel of Richard Coeur de Lion in the Templar Church of Athlit. This has great significance for All Hallows in view of the connection with the inquisition of Knights Templar in the earlier Chapel of St Mary.

It was in a vault in this chapel that Archbishop William Laud lay buried for over twenty years after his beheading on 10th January 1644, and a memorial plaque commemorates this.

Memorial to those who died for their country

I can’t imagine climbing rope ladders and then crawling into and out of this thing…in the Antarctic!

Plaque for William Penn whose father saved All Hallows from the Great Fire

A very human bit of history

Donations from various guilds and the big donation from Lord Wakefield of Hythe

Looking down Tower Street towards All Hallows Church and the original White Tower of The Tower of London.

http://www.allhallowsbythetower.org.uk/visiting/virtual-tour/ is a wonderful online tour talking about things I saw but much that I missed.

The Nave I think is the correct term?

Phoenix Altar Frontal not explained on the All Hallows site but the painting is described in the virtual tour.

For Sharon and Asher

Organ concerts are given in the afternoons and one day I will go listen

Croke Altar

     Standing in the Lady Chapel is the altar tomb of Alderman John Croke (1477) which was destroyed by the air-raid of 1940. It has since been completely restored from over 150 fragments.

     The tomb is made of Purbeck marble, and fine brass memorials at the back of the tomb record the effigies of the Alderman and his eight sons, Margaret his wife and his five daughters.

     The casket containing the Toc H lamp, given to the movement in 1922 by Edward, Prince of Wales, also contains stained glass shields depicting the arms of places where branches of the Toc H were founded between 1919 and 1929.

http://www.allhallowsbythetower.org.uk/visiting/virtual-tour/b–croke-altar/

Prayer messages

I took the photo because of the images of London, but since then learned a bit about “Tubby” Clayton

The effigy of the Rev’d Philip Thomas Byard Clayton (popularly known as ‘Tubby’) is one of the last works by Cecil Thomas, the ‘soldier sculptor’, who also made the Forster Memorial in the south aisle of the church. Tubby’s dog sits on a tasselled cushion at his feet and the effigy is supported by four lion cubs, one at each corner.

     Tubby was the founder Padre of Toc H. Assisted by fellow army chaplain Neville Talbot, he established Talbot House (‘Toc H’ in signaller’s jargon), a unique rest house in Poperinge for serving soldiers near the fierce battleground of Ypres in Flanders during the First World War.

     Tubby became Vicar of All Hallows in 1922 and remained here for forty years, until his retirement in 1962. http://www.allhallowsbythetower.org.uk/

Destruction during WW 2

Stained glass windows show London’s connection with the Thames

London Bridge, the Walkie Talkie and the Gherkin.

Tower Bridge and the curve of the Thames around the Isle of Dogs with the talk buildings that are Canary Wharf.

http://www.islandhistory.org.uk/index.php?p=2

St. Paul’s Cathedral

The Tower of London

Looking down on the golden top of The Monument

Sue Ed and Randal with the Gherkin in the distance across the river

Glass half full…..actually totally full if full is defined as what you get for your £4.50.  But there was no charge for the great view.

Empty glass still full of Canary Wharf

View from the Ladies’ Loo with its floor to ceiling window. 

The west basin of SKD Marina is located in the center of the square of buildings just beyond the Tower Bridge.  If you find the clock tower that’s where DoraMac is located. 

“

Here by permission of heaven, hell broke loose upon this Protestant city…..the most dreadful Burning of this City; begun and carried on by the treachery and malice of the Popish faction…Popish frenzy which wrought such horrors, is not yet quenched…

”

Only at a distance could I get a “top to bottom” photo of The Monument

“The column stands on a plinth, three faces of which carry Latin texts with translations. “

North face – Translation of the Latin inscription:

In the year of Christ 1666, on the 2nd September, at a distance eastward from this place of 202 feet, which is the height of this column, a fire broke out in the dead of night, which, the wind blowing, devoured even distant buildings, and rushed devastating through every quarter with astonishing swiftness and noise.  It consumed 89 churches, gates, the Guildhall, public edifices, hospitals, schools, libraries, a great number of blocks of buildings, 13,200 houses, 400 streets.  Of the 26 wards, it utterly destroyed 15, and left 8 mutilated and half-burnt.  The ashes of the City, covering as many as 436 acres, extended on one side from the Tower along the bank of the Thames to the church of the Templars, on the other side from the north-east gate along the walls to the head of Fleet-ditch.  Merciless to the wealth and estates of the citizens, it was harmless to their lives, so as throughout to remind us of the final destruction of the world by fire. The havoc was swift.  A little space of time saw the same city most prosperous and no longer in being.  On the third day, when it had now altogether vanquished all human counsel and resource, at the bidding, as we may well believe, of heaven, the fatal fire stayed its course and everywhere died out. *[But Popish frenzy, which wrought such horrors, is not yet quenched.]

* These last words were added in 1681 and finally deleted in 1830.

http://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/the-monument-west-and-north

The bas relief on the front of The Monument

“The bas relief by Cibber is worthy of close examination.  It shows a woman on the left (representing the City) languishing on some ruins. Winged Time supports her and a female figure points with a winged sceptre at the clouds which contain two more bare-breasted lovelies, one with a cornucopia (Plenty) and one with a laurel branch (Praise).  Behind the group on the left are some figures waving their hands in distress and behind them, the cause, buildings with smoke and flames pouring forth.  To the right of this group can be seen a beehive, symbol of industry.  And is that the City dragon/griffon we see at the bottom left creeping out from under the ruins?  The main figure in the group to the right is King Charles II standing at the top of some steps. He directs three more scantily-clad women down the steps towards poor City.  They represent:  Science brandishing a figure of many-breasted Nature and with a very strange headdress; Architecture clutching some plans and a pair of compasses, and Liberty waving her cowboy hat in the air.  To the right of the Kings stands his brother, the Duke of York (the future King James II) clutching a garland, presumably destined for the City.  Behind James are two more female allegorical figures:  to the left Justice wearing a coronet and to the right Fortitude brandishing a sword in one hand while the other controls the leashed lion at her feet.  Behind this group the reconstruction of the City progresses, with workmen scrambling over scaffolding.  Below the steps on which this group stands, squeezed into an arched cavern is an ugly female figure, Envy eating her own heart.”

http://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/the-monument-west-and-north

When I enlarge the photo Envy looks like a well-muscled man to me.

Dragons and crosses are the symbols of Saint George the patron saint of The City of London.  http://www.seiryu.org.uk/ppp/city-dragon.html

“ Caius Gabriel Cibber executed the sculpture on the west panel, and the four dragons at the base were the work of Edward Pierce, Jnr., a sculptor and architect frequently employed by Wren. “

http://www.themonument.info/history/construction.html

“…on the abacus is a balcony encompassing a moulded cylinder, which supports a flaming urn or vase of gilt bronze, symbolizing the Fire. Defoe quaintly describes the Monument as “built in the form of a candle”. the top making a “handsome gilt flame like that of a candle”.  http://www.themonument.info/history/construction.html

The wire cage isn’t visible so I wondered if I would have the nerve to actually walk out onto the balcony.

“Within is a spiral staircase with a total of 345 steps; after climbing 311 the staircase opens to a public balcony providing a fine view of the metropolis..”  http://www.themonument.info/history/construction.html

“Each step is exactly 6 inches high. The very top of the edifice has a hinged lid and the spiral staircase surrounds a void (rather than a solid shaft) so the whole height can be used by a giant pendulum, or as a telescope, or (and who doesn’t want to do this?) for dropping things. “

http://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/the-monument-west-and-north

Actually walking up was so bad.  Randal and I had been out doing chores so I had already stretched my legs by the time I had to climb the stairs.  They are small steps making climbing up less strenuous, but coming down, I really had to watch my step as the rise wasn’t as I’m used to in standard American architecture. 

The Shard off in the distance

The Gherkin and the  “Walkie-Talkie” building whose curved façade, during hot summer days,  melted cars on the street below.

“A London skyscraper dubbed the Walkie-Talkie has been blamed for reflecting light which melted parts of a car parked on a nearby street. What happened?

It’s like starting a fire with a parabolic mirror.  "Fundamentally it’s reflection. If a building creates enough of a curve with a series of flat windows, which act like mirrors, the reflections all converge at one point, focusing and concentrating the light," says Chris Shepherd, from the Institute of Physics.

    The half-finished 37-storey "Walkie Talkie"- nicknamed such because of its tapering rectangular design – is indeed a curvy building. Its design, which has also been compared to a brimming pint glass, has provoked controversy before.

     It transpires the car, a Jaguar on Eastcheap in the City of London, was parked at just the spot where the focused light landed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23944679

Our guide said the design was supposed to have been a “money saving design modified from a more expensive plan” but now it’s costing them a fortune to fix the mess   They should have followed  the old British maxim, Penny wise, pound foolish.”

The Thames and the Tower Bridge

The ticket-taker was chilled but walking up and then down 311 stairs warmed me up.

Randal held my new Daunt Book Shop bag while I climbed the Monument.

Here I am back on DoraMac with my “I climbed The Monument” certificate which you receive as you leave.

This is a great book shop!

The Sunday Telegraph magazine had run a story about Elizabeth Jane Howard, who at 90, had just written the 5^th book in her Cazalet Chronicles.  The local libraries didn’t seem to have a copy on the shelves when I checked online so while we were out and about today, I bought Book One: The Light Years.  And I also bought Ann Patchett’s small pamphlet The Bookshop Strikes Back about her own bookshop in Nashville and why she started it.  My purchases were handed to me in this lovely Daunt Books cloth bag.  The shop had a great collection and the guys who worked there were helpful and really well read.  Super! 

Remains of the Roman wall at Cooper’s Row our first stop of the walk just near our marina. 

COOPER’S ROW   “In 1282 and up to 1750 known as Woodroffe Lane, from the old English word wuderofe = modern woodruff, a woodland flower. It commemorates the family of Woodroffe. David W. was Sheriff in 1554. Present name from owner of property.”  http://www.maps.thehunthouse.com/eBooks/City_Street_Names.htm

At this stop our guide Judy began to tell the history of Jews in England.

“How did the history of Jews in Britain start?

It is a very long history. The first substantial Jewish community arrived in England after the Norman Conquest of 1066, although some historians suggest there was a presence in even earlier times.

      The Jews who arrived with William the Conqueror were merchants and bankers – they became an integral part of the early Norman period because Christians (much like Muslims today) were forbidden from lending money at interest.   According to our guide Judy, interest rates were very high running up to 40% or even 60%.   Lending money must have been a risky business but also lucrative as many Jews of these early years were quite wealthy.

     By the middle of the 13th century, there were substantial Jewish communities in London, Lincoln and York.”  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/5076900.stm

In 1290 Jews were “expelled” from England by King Edward I but were allowed to return in 1856 by Thomas Cromwell. 

{…the guide mentioned in the article} “launches into the story of the coronation of Richard I in 1189. Richard had issued an edict that there were to be "no women and no Jews" at his coronation, but a number of wealthy Jewish merchants turned up anyway. When they were recognized, they were beaten, many were killed, and this sparked a massacre of Jews in London and elsewhere. "Some Jewish usurers sought refuge in the Tower and the King said: OK, as long as the money keeps rolling in. Like a Mafia boss, he made them pay for protection. A century later, in 1290, King Edward I expelled the Jews from England."

   …..walking along Jewry Street (named after the Jewish community which settled in this area on their readmission to the country in 1656) and then on to Duke’s Place, where a plaque reminds us that the Great Synagogue once stood there. For centuries, this was the heart of Ashkenazi life in London, until the synagogue’s destruction in the Blitz.  http://www.thejc.com/

There were no ruins to photograph and I didn’t even see the plaque.    Our guide made the point of saying that the Sephardic synagogue we were to visit just down the street, Bevis Marks,  miraculously survived intact!

The oldest surviving synagogue in England opened in 1701

http://www.bevismarks.org.uk/ no photos allowed inside but the website is an excellent tour.

I believe our guide Judy told us the real name of the synagogue was Gates of Heaven  pointing to the Hebrew over the door  which was “Saar ha-Samayim “    Bevis Marks is the name of the road where the synagogue is located and is the name everyone uses for the Synagogue.    Out on a walk when we first arrived in London I had attempted to find the synagogue but all I could think of was Mavis Beacon, the typing lessons that I’d used during a summer typing course in 1967

“There is some confusion regarding the origin of the name of Bevis Marks, which dates back at least to 1407 in the form of "Bewes merkes." The name appears to have been derived from the Abbey of Bury St. Edmunds who possessed the property prior to 1156” http://www.cryptojews.com/england_and_bevis_marks_synagogu.htm

And merks meant marks as in boundary markings.

BEVIS MARKS SYNAGOGUE  (known officially as the Synagogue Saar ha-Samayim)

     The oldest Jewish house of worship in London; established by the Sephardic Jews in 1698, when Rabbi David Nieto took spiritual charge of the congregation. At that time the worshipers met in a small synagogue in Cree Church lane; but the considerable influx of Jews made it necessary to obtain other and commodious quarters. Accordingly a committee was appointed, consisting of Antonio Gomes Serra, Menasseh Mendes, Alfonso Rodrigues, Manuel Nunez Miranda, Andrea Lopez, and Pontaleao Rodriguez. It investigated matters for nearly a year, and on Feb. 12, 1699, signed a contract with Joseph Avis, a Quaker, for the construction of a building to cost £2,750 ($13,335). On June 24 of the same year, the committee leased from Lady Ann Pointz (alias Littleton) and Sir Thomas Pointz (alias Littleton) a tract of land at Plough Yard, in Bevis Marks, for sixty-one years, with the option of renewal for another thirty-eight years, at £120 a year. http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/3236-bevis-marks-synagogue

To avoid drawing attention to itself, the synagogue was designed to be similar architecturally to churches.  It is also said to be very similar to the Great Synagogue in Amsterdam which Randal and I visited back in 2000.  Maybe I remember.  There are seven chandeliers in this synagogue, one for each day or the week and the large one in the center for the Sabbath.  The chandeliers are lit with huge candles and on many occasions they are the only lighting which must be beautiful!

     Growing up in New Bedford with its large Portuguese population, I had many classmates with names like Mendes,  Rodriques, Lopez etc but they weren’t the Jewish kids.  They were the “Portuguese” kids.  It’s what made New Bedford such a great place to grow up.  All the variety of people.

A group of school kids was just finishing a tour as we arrived.  Many were Muslim kids and Maurice told us his favorite part of any tour was showing the school kids what all religions had in common.  He believed that was one of the most important aspects of offering the synagogue tours.  He said the kids had asked great questions and all of us were sorry we hadn’t been there to hear them. 

    You can see the gate leading into the courtyard where the synagogue is located.  Jews were forbidden to build synagogues on the street. 

“Maurice Bitton, the shamash of Bevis Marks, welcomes { us } into the beautiful building, which dates from 1701. Tucked away in a courtyard, because Jews were not allowed to build on public thoroughfares at the time, it is virtually unchanged since it was built. The great brass hanging candelabra, austere dark oak benches, magnificent ark – everything is original.  (sorry but you have to go to their website to see as no photos were allowed inside the synagogue.)

Bitton recounts with relish the history of the Sephardi synagogue, and regales us with tales of the congregation’s most famous son, the 19th-century philanthropist Sir Moses Montefiore.  He shows us the great man’s seat, now roped off. The congregation has shrunk since then, but Bitton says it is starting to grow again, as young Jews move back into the area.  (Honored guests such as Prince Charles and Prince Philip are allowed to sit in Sir Moses’ chair.  But the current Lord Mayor of London Fiona Woolf,  would not be allowed to sit there.  Sir Moses’ chair is downstairs in the men’s section of the synagogue.  Fiona would have to sit upstairs.  It will be interesting to see if this dilemma will ever have to be dealt with, either for Fiona or a future female Lord Mayor.  I guess even the Queen would be refused Sir Moses’ seat though I’m sure everyone who deals with the Queen’s schedule would already know of this so the problem would never arise.  During the tour women could sit downstairs, but not during a service.)

For me, ( me being the author of the Jewish Chronicle article) the visit brings back memories.  In the 1970s, long before the City was redeveloped, I worked for a magazine whose creaky Dickensian offices overlooked this synagogue. On dusky winter evenings, I peered down through its windows into the warm, candlelit glow, mesmerized by the sound of chanting.

.  http://www.thejc.com/

Moses Montefiore was married to Judith Barent-Cohen.  Before we could ask, Maurice told us that “Borat” Sasha Baron Cohen was a relative of Judith’s.    (I can’t prove that to be true from Internet research, but one would think Maurice would know.  Perhaps a more distant relative than I initially thought.) http://www.thefreelibrary.com is a really interesting article about the Baron-Cohen family  and life for Jews in England as well as telling about this extraordinary family.  No mention was made of Judith Barent-Cohen or Moses Montefiore. 

A plaque of Jewish war dead who were members of the congregation, many with Portuguese/Spanish sounding names as this is a Sephardic Synagogue. 

Looking back towards the synagogue and kosher Restaurant 1701, the low roofed building next door.  Originally there were other building here that supported the Jewish community but those are now gone.

http://www.restaurant1701.co.uk/

http://www.independent.co.uk/.  The reviewer and his pal each paid £80 for their full meal with wine.  It would take a hugely important occasion to get Randal and me there.  We’d rather spend it on books, more   or www.walks.com .

Jewish soup kitchen for the poor; not a 70s psychedelic restaurant.  But then that would probably be “far out” rather than “way out.”  It just struck me funny: Way Out Soup Kitchen.  

A sign of the changing population ; though Jewish women in 1902 may well have covered their heads as it was an orthodox custom for married women to cover their heads with a shawl or even a wig. 

Over the door is the image of a soup pot for people who spoke and read Yiddish but couldn’t read English.  The date is written for both the Jewish calendar and the western calendar. 

Brune Street

   @www.ravishlondon.com

“Brune Street is a small street in Spitalfields, interesting just because of the way it captures the Jewish past of Spitalfields, with the Bengali present. On one side of the road you’ve got the old Jewish soup kitchen for the poor and then on the right you’ve got the Brune Street Estate, where all the signs are written in English and Bengali…….

   The building remained empty for years. Now, whilst the sandstone facade remains faithful to its origins, the building itself has been converted into luxury apartments.”

To the left of the soup kitchen was the Jewish Free School. http://www.jfsalumni.com/history/?disp_feature=llaOdp tells you all about it and its connection with the Rothschild family.  According to my Jewish London book, this school, by the early 1900s, was the largest in Europe with over 4,000 pupils.  It still exists today.  

     But, more interesting is one school that I believe was near the Bevis Marks Synagogue run by nuns.   There being so many Jewish students,  those amazing nuns learned Yiddish  so they could teach the children in the only language they knew. 

This scene just grabbed my attention.  The skinny building looks like it should be in a Harry Potter movie.  Sunday, during another walks.com tour we actually did walk through the setting used for the shops where Harry buys his magic wand and other “school supplies.”

The Victorian Market 

From its small beginnings in the 17th Century, Spitalfields Market blossomed. Traders working from a collection of sheds and stalls did their best to meet the needs of London’s rapidly growing population and their appetite for fresh fruit and vegetables. Their success made Spitalfields Market a major centre for the sale of fresh produce, trading six days a week.

Spitalfields fell into decline after the 1820’s and gained a reputation as cheap area in which to live, proving a magnet to numerous waves of immigrants.

By 1876 the market had fallen into decline. Recognizing the need to update the market, a former market porter called Robert Horner bought a short lease on the market and started work on a new market building which was completed in 1893 at a cost of £80,000.

In 1920 the City of London acquired direct control of the market, extending the original buildings eight years later. For the next 60 years, Spitalfields’ nationwide reputation grew, as did the traffic congestion in the narrow streets around it. With no room for the expansion it so badly needed, the market was forced to move and in May 1991 it opened its doors at its new location in Leyton, east London.

At the end of 2005, after 18 years of sensitive preparation, the Spitalfields regeneration programme was completed. This regeneration has resulted in the creation of two new public spaces, Bishops Square and Crispin Place, a public art programme, an events programme, the restoration of several historic streets in E1 and a selection of carefully selected independent retailers and restaurants. A visitor to the market today will find designers / makers and artists selling fashions, homewares and accessories or a treasure trove of vintage and antique clothing, furniture and other wondrous oddments!

Spitalfields is no longer considered just a Sunday destination it has evolved into one of London’s favourite and most vibrant areas.   http://www.spitalfields.co.uk/about_history.php#.UoEgi0rFJdg

“Brune Street Estate takes its name from Walter Brune, who in 1197, founded a hospital in the local area on what was then fields, which became to be known as hospital fields and then Spitalfields.”

http://www.ravishlondon.com/items/(194).html

“Christ Church was built between the years 1714 and 1729 as part of the church building programme initiated by the Fifty New Churches act of 1711, backed by Queen Anne, which was implemented by four different Commissions.

At the time, there were fears that ‘godless thousands’ outside the City of London had no adequate church provision, and that non-conformists – including large numbers of French Huguenot silk weavers – were moving into Spitalfields and bringing their non-conformist worshipping ways with them.

The Commission appointed to build the 50 new churches stipulated that the new buildings should have tall spires so that they would tower above the smaller, non-conformist chapels! The idea was to fund the work through taxes on coal coming into London, although monies ran low in about 1719 and building progressed fitfully.

One of the two surveyors employed by the first Commission, at an initial rate of £200 per year, was Nicholas Hawksmoor – a Nottinghamshire-born architect who had worked with Sir Christopher Wren since his late teens. Of the 12 churches completed (out of the projected 50), six were the work of Hawksmoor, and Christ Church was his masterpiece. “  http://ccspitalfields.org/history/

Christ Church towering over the homes of the French Huguenots.

Immigration and Emigration  The world in a city  http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/immig_emig/england/london/article_1.shtml

Tells the story of the how these streets changed with each wave of immigration: Hugeunots to Jews to Banladeshis to Somalies

Silk weaving was done in the attic rooms located in the recessed windows topping the buildings.

“The wooden spools that you see hanging in the streets of Spitalfields indicate houses where Huguenots once resided. These symbols were put there in 1985, commemorating the tercentenary of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes which brought the Huguenots to London and introduced the word ‘refugee’ to the English language. “   http://spitalfieldslife.com/2013/04/14/the-huguenots-of-spitalfields/

Wooden spool between two windows

Many buildings now retain the names of the original businesses housed here.  At number 92 Brick Lane you can see the CH N. Katz shop that had sold paper bags and string until sometime in the 1990s.  Now it’s an art gallery.

Umbra Sumus  We are under the shadows, the sundial dated 1743, place there when the Huguenots erected this building as their church, now the Brick Lane Jamme Masjid (mosque.)

   “The Jamme Masjid or Great London Mosque on the corner of Brick Lane and Fournier Street. This building is a perfect illustration of the East End’s role as the point of entry for immigrant groups. It was originally founded as a church for Hugenots – French protestants who fled to London to avoid persecution at home. The chapel was later used by Methodists. In the late 19th century, when Whitechapel became the centre of the Jewish East End, it became the Machzike Adass, also known as the Spitalfields Great Synagogue. With the dispersal of the Jewish community and a new influx of Bengali immigrants, it became the Jamme Masjid or Great London Mosque in 1976. “

http://www.portcities.org.uk/

Creator: Andrew Holt    Credit line: National Maritime Museum

    “It is often said that Spitalfields, like much of Tower Hamlets, is overcrowded, one of the reasons being the mismatch between the size of Bangladeshi families and the size of family the apartments they live in were designed for.

There are a number of mosques in Spitalfields. One of a particular note is the ‘Jamme Masjid’, the history of which mirrors immigration into Spitalfields perfectly, having been previously a synagogue and originally a French Protestant chapel. It is, and could be used for, a metaphor for how religious communities can get on side-by-side in a pragmatic way. The building has been a mosque for the last thirty years.

The Brune Street Estate, at least on a Wednesday afternoon in winder, is a sleepy peaceful estate, populated it seems mainly by Bengalis who make up 60% of the Spitalfields suburb. A lot of the signs around the estate are written in English and Bengali.

Although the Bengalis arrived in London in the 1970s and 1980s unemployment in their community still runs high, with one source quoting it as high as 30%.

For this reason some of the men have quite a lot of time on their hands, and you can see a number at the local mosque located in the community centre on the east side of the Brune Street estate.”

http://www.ravishlondon.com/items/(194).html

Our guide Judith wearing a poppy to commemorate Remembrance Month

“The eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month marks the signing of the Armistice, on 11th November 1918, to signal the end of World War One.

At 11 am on 11 November 1918 the guns of the Western Front fell silent after more than four years continuous warfare.

    Remembrance Day is on 11 November. It is a special day set aside to remember all those men and women who were killed during the two World Wars and other conflicts. At one time the day was known as Armistice Day and was renamed Remembrance Day after the Second World War.

     Remembrance Sunday is held on the second Sunday in November, which is usually the Sunday nearest to 11 November. Special services are held at war memorials and churches all over Britain.”

http://resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/Remembrance.html#last

There is no disputing that London’s West End reins supreme in Britain’s theater world. However, there was a time when the East End was renowned for its Yiddish theatrical productions. East London’s first theater group was called the Hebrew Dramatic Club. Located at 6 Princelet Street, this drama club began operating in 1887 under the auspices of David Smith, a kosher butcher. "But in 1888," says Bettington, "17 people died when someone wrongly shouted ‘fire,’ and the audience stampeded for the exit. It closed shortly afterwards." However, if you walk down the street you’ll know you found it when "you see a coal hole cover with a viola on it," http://www.jpost.com/Travel/Around-Israel/Jewish-East-Enders

Our guide connected this address to Norman Adler who helped bring Yiddish Theatre to London. Norman Adler was the father of Stella Adler, acting teacher of  such well known actors as Marlon Brando, Robert De Niro, Warren Beatty, and Candice Bergen.

http://www.pbs.org/

Judith pointed this out as one of her favorite building and one of the few buildings on Princelet Street that hasn’t been refurbished on the exterior though the interior is in excellent enough condition.  Because of both exterior and interior it is a favorite location of the film industry. 

The Shard and the Gherkin not far from Bevis Marks Synagogue

A “Jewish Joke”  http://www.thejc.com/

    “From here, we head for the highlight of the tour, a visit to the country’s oldest surviving synagogue at Bevis Marks. The vaguely phallic-shaped office block known as the Gherkin, towers above us and Shaughan recalls an elderly Jewish lady on an earlier tour who bemoaned the fact that it was built so near the historic synagogue. "It’s all right, dear," Shaughan told her, "it’s been circumcised."

Our first stop, the Tea Pot for scones, clotted cream and tea!  Singkey, Sue and Randal, Ed was also taking photos.

Stretched out panorama of the tea shop with the 4 minute green clock.

Your tea is brought to the table and you’re told to watch the clock.  Only after 4 minutes should you drink it.  Does it work?  I actually hadn’t heard the waitress so was unsure when my 4 minutes began.  But now that I’ve a small tea pot on the boat, I do wait longer before I actually pour the tea.  Interestingly, the shop uses tea bags rather than loose tea. 

http://designmuseum.org/  founded by among others, Terence Conran

We stopped in to look at the Design Museum museum shop.  Lots of interesting things.

“Human” book ends but they do take up shelf space

Pop-up books.

On my later wharf walk I came across Conran Designs totally new to me.

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/house-and-homes-blog/2011/nov/15/terence-conran-brief-history-design-legend

Mass production doesn’t have to = ugly.

Not such a new idea really  : I ’ll have to look at Penney.  Hopefully they’ve changed  the stores back to what they once were.  The new layout was awful. 

I once read something that said mass production introduced ugliness because prior to that, each hand-made product met the specific needs of an individual.  Mass produced goods met no individual needs; individuals had to adapt to the product, no matter its color, shape or design.  Today, because people are encouraged to want lots of stuff, only mass produced products are affordable.  And today, most work/life styles don’t match with wardrobes of expensive clothes or handcrafted everyday household items.  I’m certainly not careful enough with stuff though I now think “ fewer and better” because “more” takes up too much space.

This is an abstract from : The Atlantic Monthly | August 1927
Beauty the New Business Tool

"The appeal of efficiency alone is nearly ended. Beauty is the natural and logical next step"
by Earnest Elmo Calkins
………………………………………………………………………………………………..

……….”Up to the beginning of the great industrial era of machine-made things, mass production, nation-wide distribution and advertising, most of the implements and furniture with which we performed the act of living were made by hand, and things made by hand unconsciously acquire a certain element of beauty.

     Consider how satisfying are the shapes of some of these old things—a coach, for instance, or a spinet; a sickle or a ladle. The humblest utensils of our grandfathers are preserved in museums to-day, partly, of course, for the historic associations, but mainly because they have a certain charm. And gradually all that charm vanished. The hand worker who controlled every step of the thing he was making was replaced by a machine minder who had nothing to do with the design. The directing minds, absorbed in the new wonder of so many things made so easily, ignored the fact that it was just as easy for a machine to stamp or print a good pattern as a bad one, and by some perversity nearly always chose the bad one, and aggravated that fact by producing the bad design in incredible quantities. The public, tickled to get so many things so cheaply, accepted them without question, and thus, we had a depressing period when, in New York City, brownstone houses were built literally by the mile, and country houses were of two stories, mansard roof, and cupola, with cast-iron dogs and deer on the lawns, and furnished with horsehair sofas, flowered Brussels carpets, gilt-embossed wall paper, and ormolu clocks under glass bells on the mantelpieces above imitation fireplaces.

     We passed from the hand to the machine, we enjoyed our era of the triumph of the machine, we acquired wealth, and with wealth education, travel, sophistication, a sense of beauty; and then we began to miss something in our cheap but ugly products. Efficiency was not enough. The machine did not satisfy the soul. Man could not live by bread alone. And thus it came about that beauty, or what one conceived as beauty, became a factor in the production and marketing of goods.

http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/27aug/calkins.htm

A commercial for was being filmed.

No issues with fur in this neighborhood, once the poorest of the poor!

The River Neckinger 

     The Neckinger is one of the ‘lost’ rivers of London which now runs entirely underground, probably merging into the present drain or sewer systems.  It rises in Southwark and originally entered the Thames at the tidal inlet now called St Saviour’s Dock ("Savory Dock" on older maps).

     The river is believed to have got its name from the term "Devil’s neckcloth", a hangman’s noose.  Until the 18th century, Thames pirates were executed at Neckinger Wharf, near the mouth of the inlet.  The corpses were placed on display as a deterrent further downstream on the Thames.

St Saviour’s Dock was created in the 13th century by the Cluniac monks of Bermondsey Abbey (founded 1082, ¾ mile to the south-west, Figs 7 and 8) who enlarged and embanked the inlet, naming the dock after the abbey’s patron, and built and ran a windmill on its East bank, The Mill of St Saviour.  Around 1536 (after the dissolution of the monasteries) the windmill was converted into a water mill and "water machine" to supply local inhabitants with water.  It later became the first gunpowder factory in England to be powered by water, and later still it was rebuilt as a paper mill, becoming one of the first mills in England to make paper from straw.  By Dickens’ time, lead mills occupied the site.

     It was a tidal mill, and the flow of water was two-way.  At 12-hourly high tides (the Thames could rise as much as 12′ at this point) water, controlled by slice gates, flowed into the mill pond south of the mill.  The sluices were closed and re-opened at low tide to allow the water to flow out again via the mill races and drive the mill wheels.  http://www.hsomerville.com/meccano/Articles/JacobsIsland.htm

\

Jacob’s Island : "The Venice of Drains", "The Capital of Cholera" and "The Jessore of England". 

It first came to fame when immortalized as the location of Bill Sikes’ last refuge in "Oliver Twist".  Dickens wrote, in 1837:

     "Near to that part of the Thames on which the church at Rotherhithe abuts, where the buildings on the banks are dirtiest and the vessels on the river blackest with the dust of colliers and the smoke of close-built low-roofed houses, there exists the filthiest, the strangest, the most extraordinary of the many localities that are hidden in London, wholly unknown, even by name, to the great mass of its inhabitants.

‘Beyond Dockhead, in the Borough of Southwark, stands Jacob’s Island, surrounded by a muddy ditch, six or eight feet deep and fifteen or twenty wide when the tide is in, once called Mill Pond, but known in the days of this story as Folly Ditch.  It is a creek or inlet from the Thames, and can always be filled at high water by opening the sluices at the Lead Mills from which it took its old name.  At such times, a stranger, looking from one of the wooden bridges thrown across it at Mill Lane, will see the inhabitants of the houses on either side lowering from their back doors and windows, buckets, pails, domestic utensils of all kinds, in which to haul the water up; and when his eye is turned from these operations to the houses themselves, his utmost astonishment will be excited by the scene before him.  Crazy wooden galleries common to the backs of half a dozen houses, with holes from which to look upon the slime beneath; windows, broken and patched, with poles thrust out, on which to dry the linen that is never there; rooms so small, so filthy, so confined, that the air would seem too tainted even for the dirt and squalor which they shelter; wooden chambers thrusting themselves out above the mud, and  threatening to fall into it, as some have done; dirt-besmeared walls and decaying foundations; every repulsive lineament of poverty, every loathsome indication of filth, rot, and garbage; all these ornament the banks of Folly Ditch.

      ‘In Jacob’s Island, the warehouses are roofless and empty; the walls are crumbling down; the windows are windows no more; the doors are falling into the streets; the chimneys are blackened, but they yield no smoke.  Thirty or forty years ago, before losses and chancery suits came upon it, it was a thriving place; but now it is a desolate island indeed.  The houses have no owners; they are broken open, and entered upon by those who have the courage; and there they live, and there they die.  They must have powerful motives for a secret residence, or be reduced to a destitute condition indeed, who seek a refuge in Jacob’s Island." 

http://www.hsomerville.com/meccano/Articles/JacobsIsland.htm

http://www.archaeology.co.uk/articles/news/digging-jacobs-island.htm  a more scholarly article from the UK’s “current archeology” magazine

http://www.infed.org/socialaction/charles_booth_jacobs_island.htm

Dickensian

The world around us has become more Dickensian lately. At least that’s how it seems by the way the word circulates.

Put it into a Google news search, and you’ll see a sampling. Here’s what I got when I did:

Dickensian waif

Dickensian melodrama

Dickensian boarding school

Dickensian evening

Dickensian Christmases

Dickensian schemes

Dickensian arm-loss (!)

Dickensian nightmare (of American health care)

You might even be Dickensian without having realized it.

The Oxford English Dictionary tells us the word came into use in the 1880s and defines it as: "of or pertaining to Charles Dickens or his style."

Recently it could also have been defined as "of or pertaining to The Wire or Bernie Madoff," both of which were pasted to the word for the last few years.

I wonder who uses the word more, Americans or the British. I’d guess Americans. The word may be the equivalent of an English accent, which we Americans tend to think raises IQ points, a tendency that in turn makes the British question our IQs. Surprisingly, it was not an American but a British company that opened an amusement park in 2007 called Dickens World, located in the English county of Kent, complete with an Ebenezer Scrooge Haunted House, a Great Expectations Boat Ride and the as-advertised "costumed Dickensian characters." Seriously.

Alongside "Dickensian," the OED lists "Dickensy" as one of the original words used for the same meaning, but now in disuse. That word would probably be less tempting to use so often because it doesn’t make you sound as smart. "Yes, I agree this movie is very Dickensy."

When it comes to referring to Dickens’s life, performing plays with your nine children for friends and family during Christmas is Dickensian. Banishing your wife from the family estate while beginning a romance with an eighteen-year-old actress also counts as Dickensian.

Considering what a prolific writer Dickens was, the word Dickensian could legitimately cover a vast thematic territory, explaining at least some of the variety of its applications. It’s probably most often used for social issues, as in some of the Googled examples. Yet we don’t tend to read Dickens’s pure social novels that much anymore, such as Hard Times, at least not voluntarily.

Dickens’s final book, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, forms the jumping-off point for my new novel, The Last Dickens. This last work by Dickens has very little social commentary, and a pretty tightly efficient storyline and cast of characters. Not necessarily what we think of when we think what characterizes Dickens.

He died while the novel was still being serialized and it remains incomplete, so we don’t know how it would have ended. Thousands of articles and hundreds of books have been written speculating on the ending, with different camps heatedly arguing over it. After years of making a study of his final novel, I can state one thing with certainty about how it would have ended: it would have been really really Dickensian.

Make a point of using the word Dickensian in a sentence today. See how people respond, and whether they take its meaning for granted.

Matthew Pearl.

Author of The Dante Club, The Poe Shadow and The Last Dickens.

Posted: November 24, 2009 11:32 AM

Are You Dickensian?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/