“Writing the history of a vast city like London is like writing a history of the ocean – the area is so vast, its inhabitants are so multifarious, the treasures that lie in its depths so countless. … The houses of old London are encrusted as thick with anecdotes, legends and traditions as an old ship is with barnacles. Strange stories of strange men grow like moss in every crevice of the bricks … Old London is passing away even as we dip our pen in the ink…” – Walter Thornbury, Old and New London, 1873.
From Spitalfields Life, where you can find a fine selection of engravings from Thornbury's book of that old disappearing city.
One remnant of all this is the front of Sir Paul Pindar's house on Bishopsgate, which now lives at the V&A.
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