London at the Folger Library

After living in Washington D.C. for almost 28 years, I finally made it to the Folger Shakespeare Library last Saturday afternoon.  Jane, Paul and I went to see Open City: London 1500-1700, a look at two centuries of London's history through a display of rare books, manuscripts, maps, deeds, diaries, paintings and prints.

In 1500, London was home to about 50,000 people and Henry VII was on the throne.  By 1700, with a little help from the likes of Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, Charles I and II, William and Mary etc, it was a sprawling metropolis with some 500,000 people.  In essence, it had become a center for international trade and the hub of an emerging empire.  Once dominated by old St. Paul's cathedral, London's skyline was dominated in 1700 by Christopher Wren's domed design after the Great Fire in 1666.

The many documents on display tell the story of London's transition through three constantly changing public institutions--the church, the theater and the market.

During this period, the church in England experienced tumultuous changes which had consequences not only for the immortal soul but for more mundane matters like the division of real estate and expanding ownership.

As part of his break with Rome (nicely captured in a print that is entitled "The Pope Suppressed by K. Henry the eight"), Henry began seizing religious properties in 1536.  This led to huge changes in land ownership, especially in London, where many religious orders had their headquarters.

(One of the private letters contained in the exhibition mentions that Thomas Cromwell is the "mastermind" behind Henry's dissolution of the monasteries and other religious properties.  It reminded me to read Hillary Mantel's second novel on Master Cromwell, Bring Up the Bodies after her stunning Wolf Hall which won the Booker Prize in 2009).

One example of a significant change in land ownership is provided by land once occupied by Blackfriars, a Dominican monastery.  After its dissolution, it became a warehouse, a staging area and, much later, a new indoor theater.

The Indenture (to the right) shows that William Shakespeare, in retirement, bought a townhouse in the Blackfriars district from a Mr Henry Walker who is described as a "citizen and minstrel".  It was quite easy to read the Indenture and you could clearly see the names of the parties and the various terms and conditions relating to the sale.

If there was just one document in the whole exhibition that told the story of church, market and theater in a rapidly changing world, this was it.

As trade grew, markets and other places of exchange sprang up--Cheapeside, Covent Garden and, later, the Royal Exchange (with its rather heavy Dutch architecture) were the principal examples illustrated in the exhibition. 

One book describes Cheapeside Market, its merchants and the multiple regulations that would have had our Republican friends gagging--especially the complex rules on the weight, ingredients and price of bread that could be sold at Cheapeside.  Maybe this was taking regulation a bit too far?

The rise of Covent Garden, a former convent garden that supplied the needs of Westminster Abbey, also became an area for theaters, an open market and a place where the gentry took up residence to escape the stink and squalor of the city.  An early example of a suburb?

There is a copy of a bawdy play called "Covent Garden Weeded" which includes a pompous Justice of the Peace called Cockbrain.  Why do lawyers get no respect--even in those far off days?  Must have been Shakespeare's corrupting influence with his "let's kill all the lawyers" dig in Henry VI.

Across from the city proper, on the south bank of the Thames, new theaters were built at Bankside.  In the print to the right, you can see the Globe Theatre where many of Shakespeare's plays, like Pericles, were first performed.

"To the north, at Smithfield, the annual Bartholomew Fair was memorialized in Ben Jonson's festive play of the same name".

"And to the west, the Cockpit Theatre on Drury Lane became, in effect, the first theater in what would become known as the West End".  (Quotes are from the Folger's notes on the exhibition).

Two of the most interesting documents for me were, ironically, connected with the two most frightful years experienced by London during this period--the Great Plague in 1665 and the Great Fire of London in 1666.  

The early "cookbook" (left) by Penelope Jephson contains medical cures and many delicious-sounding recipes.  It is interesting that she equated food with medicine--a concept that still eludes many in this country today (except Mayor Bloomberg, of course).

This particular page describes the "Eddington Plague Water," a distilled mixture of herbs to be taken by the spoonful. "Warme with a Litle sugar it is good for the plaugue small pox Measles Feavors & any distempers".

With deaths in London reaching 7,000 per week in September 1665, I am not sure that Ms. Jephson's Plague Water was all that effective.  Maybe if served in 64oz containers, it might have stopped the Plague dead?

"On the dreadfull fire of London the 2 of sep (1666), Saturday night" is the heading of this account of the Great Fire of London by 17 year-old Samuel Wiseman (right).  In his eyes, the fire seemed like the "approaching Day of Doome".

Wikipedia tells us that the fire gutted the medieval city of London inside the old Roman Wall.  It threatened but did not reach the aristocratic district of Westminster, Charles II's palace or most of the suburban slums.  

It consumed 13,200 houses, 87 parishes and St. Paul's Cathedral.  It is estimated to have destroyed the homes of 70,000 of the City's 80,000 inhabitants. 

Wikipedia concludes as follows: "The death toll is unknown but traditionally thought to have been small, as only six verified deaths were recorded.  This reasoning has recently been challenged on the grounds that the deaths of poor and middle-class people were not recorded......"  So, even London had its 47% in those days. 

In spite of all this, "shaken but resilient, London mourned, rebuilt--and kept growing," according to the accompanying Folger notes.  

Through books such as John Stow's A Survay of London (1598) and Wenceslaus Hollar's amazing "Long View" of London along the Thames, you get a sense of the way London grew--sometimes gradually; sometimes in great bursts of mercantile activity and innovation; and sometimes as a result of disasters and devastation.  

While we may have access to a wealth of information about London's history online, it is fascinating to see the original records, maps, paintings and prints produced by Londoners and others as part of their everyday life--a life which was very much a mix of old and new--and not without incident.  

I was amazed that I could actually read (or, at least, decipher) the handwritten English in many of the exhibition's letters, diaries and other documents, most of which were well over 400 years old.  It makes William Shakespeare, Samuel Wiseman and Penelope Jephson feel very close.  Thank you, Mr. Folger.