PREFACE THE importance of the History of London has led to a departure from the original plan of the Victoria County History by the addition of volumes treating London as a county apart from Middlesex, In these it is proposed to include the district within the Bars of London, the borough of Southwark, and the ancient parish of Westminster. Although the history of London has already received full attention from various w^riters, it is nevertheless thought that the great interest of the subject w^arrants a separate treatment in this series, especially when we consider the advance that has been made during the last few years in the study of archaeology and municipal history and the recent facilities afforded for consulting the stores of manuscript material bearing upon the subject, not hitherto accessible. The first to compile a topographical description of London was William Fitzstephen, the biographer of Becket, who died in 1190. His work, entitled ' Descriptio nobilissimae civitatis Londoniae,' gives a valuable and graphic account of London in the 12th century. The most important history of London, however, and that to which historians of London must for all time refer, is John Stow's Survey of Londo?t contayn- ing the original antiquity and increase^ modern estates and description of that citie. This work first appeared in 1598, and was re-issued with additions in 1603. Many later editions have been published, the best of which is that by Mr. C. L. Kingsford, M.A., published in 1908. Anthony Munday continued Stow's Survey down to 1633, and John Strype to 1720. Stow was a tailor by trade, and devoted the latter part of his liife to the study of history and antiquities, with considerable prejudice to his worldly prospects. He, however, cheerfully ' suffered the pinch of poverty' in the cause of history till his death in 1605, and will perhaps be remembered as the most careful and painstaking of English historians of the 1 6th century. Stow happily compiled his Survey at a time of great change in the political, ecclesiastical, and social history of Europe, which strongly influenced the topography of London, hence the extraordinary interest and value of his work. After Stow the number of writers who deal with the history of London is so great that it will be impossible to do more here than mention the more important. None has as yet equalled him, although some occasionally record contemporary details which are of considerable value. In chronological order the first of these is William Maitland, who published The History of London from its foundation by the Romans to XXI
