London Historica or The HIstory of London

With 2,000 years of history,
It is a long and powerful story.
The City of London
The City Capital
Stands strong and tall.

Surviving plagues and fires
Civil wars, air raids and terror-risks,
The City of London stands
Growing more powerful,
Than even a city like Istanbul.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

THE LONDON LEGENDS

The Mighty Brutus of Troy
Defeated the giants Gog and Magog,
The creatures which rose from the bog.
According to Historia Regum Britanniae
Of Geoffrey of Monmouth
To create the land of London.

The legendary King Lud
The man was wise and he was good,
Renamed the town CaerLudein
After a bowl of sweet pudding.
London the name was thus derived
While the King ate on his royal plate.
The good king was buried at Ludgate.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

ROMAN LONDON

After the invasion of AD 43
It was time to build a city.
Londinium was established
Where the locals fished,
As a civilian settlement and town
With the people and the crown,
By the early Romans of the town.

Early Roman London
Was a very small patch,
Being roughly the size of Hyde Park.
Walking across Londinium in the dark,
Would have been a walk in the Park.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

ANGLO-SAXON LONDON

Mellitus was the first
Post-Roman Bishop,
Who ascended with peace and hope.
In 604 AD, when Saeberht
Of the East Saxons
Saw the light of Christ
This was the end of his tryst.
Now with peace and serenity
He converted to Christianity.

Lundenwic, the London settlement
Without much toil and cement,
Was built in the 7th century,
A mile to the west of Londinium
The thriving town, with a busy hum.

In 730 AD the new town
Was under Mercian control,
But this was a short lived role.
However the Mercian Lordship
Was replaced in 825 AD by Wessex,
Which made administration more complex.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

NORMAN AND MEDIEVAL LONDON

With the Norman invasion in 1066,
Began the start of the Mediaeval period
With its wars and its gory dead.
The long and fierce Battle of Hastings
Brought everything which a battle brings.
It saw the killing of the English
King Harold of Godwinson,
By William the Duke of Normandy,
Which now changed the course of history.

Westminster Hall was designed
And then masterfully constructed,
In 1097 by William Rufus,
The son of William the Conqueror,
Who was a ruler with more creative power.
William had a Master Plan,
To create a monument in the land.
This Hall was the royal residence
With all its beauty and its elegance,
And was the basis of the Palace of Westminster,
Where even the walls of beauty have to whisper.

The London Bridge came up in 1176,
Built of tar, mortar and brick
On the site of several old wooden bridges
Which had risen and fallen in time
Over the years, the water and the grime.
This bridge lasted for 600 years,
Witnessing toil, sweat and tears,
And was the only one at that time,
To span the Thames until 1739.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

TUDOR LONDON

Great changes came to London
From 1485 to 1603 with the arrival of
The Great and the Illustrious Tudor three,
Henry VII, Henry VIII and Elizabeth I,
Who would change London’s destiny first,
Building the land with passion and thirst
To raise it from a tiny European town
To the level of a powerful state in a burst,
With the power to dominate the world
And to change the course of history.

The weaving industry with its threads,
Wove its magic across the world,
And changed the grand economy.
By Royal Charter of the Queen,
At the heart of this commercial matter,
The Russia and the East India Company
Were established in London in serenity.
This was a great period of industry and prosperity,
Mercantilism, commerce and financial security.
With all this generation of wealth and resource
With the spinning of money, from purse to course,
The immigrant numbers in London swelled and rose
From all parts of England, Wales and distant shores.

The culture of London and its people
At this time was further enriched,
With Shakespeare writing and performing,
All his plays and cultural bastions storming.

Even with all the opposition
There was a heartfelt rendition
At every performance.

The Theatre still thrived
As natural talent arrived,
Thanks to the Royal patronage
Of Queen Elizabeth who loved plays,
With all their speeches and their lays,
And had them performed privately at her Court,
As the actors drank, sang, danced and spoke.
The Queen also approved all public performances,
And encouraged the actors with their artistic nuances.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

STUART LONDON

In the seventeenth century
London spilled over its boundaries.
The plague of London at this time
Killed thirty-thousand in this unhealthy clime.

The nave of Old St. Paul’s Cathedral
Was the meeting place of Londoners,
And all those inspired artists and adventurers,
And tenacious Merchants during this time,
Making it the renaissance of marketing prime.
Lawyers received Clients
And a floodtide of finance
The unemployed looked for work,
Wherever it did slyly lurk.

The book trade flourished
In St. Paul’s Churchyard
With freshly printed paper
And binders by the dozen,
And engravers by the score,
Which made readers hunger for more.
While Fleet Street was filled with adornment
Being christened the home of public entertainment.

Charles I in 1625,
Acceded to the Throne,
To make it his own.
While the aristocracy,
With the wealthy set a fashionable trend,
Setting up their homes in the West End.

At this time the country folk
Visited London for their social life,
With the children and the wife,
For a part of the year they would live in
Thus, beginning the popular London Season.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

18TH CENTURY LONDON

During the 18th century,
The British Empire began to soar
The Lion of Industry started to roar,
The Industrial Revolution had begun
The Capital was with Merchants over-run.

The national population increased
The profits of the nation increased.
The Scottish and the English Parliament
United in 1707 by an Act of Union,
Giving rise to the Kingdom of Great Britain.

St. Paul’s Cathedral was built in 1708,
A Masterpiece of architecture,
By that genius Christopher Wren,
With his inspiration from Heaven,
As the Clock ticked on its high Clock tower,
Marking the quick progress of the city’s hour.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

19TH CENTURY LONDON

With a population of 6.7 million
The city of London, was growing fast,
It was now the largest city in the world
The Capital it became, as its flag unfurled
Over the extensive British Empire,
From Ancient Castle to towering spire.

However, as the city grew in wealth
London was also the city of poverty and squalor,
With the poor being the forgotten souls
Who were given a voice and a heart
By Charles Dickens in his classic tales,
Which are engraved in literary art.

The Prime Minister Robert Peel in 1829
Established the Metropolitan Police,
Who were nicknamed “Bobbies” or “Peelers”
After the founder Robert Peel.
All the temptation and the crime
Was now being stopped in time.
The Bobbies now made life more difficult
Under the hand of Bobby Peel,
For people prone to rob and steal.

The tentacles of the railway
Entered the city of London
Bringing progress and an able workforce,
Into this new bustling economic course.

As the poorer moved into the city
To find work and make a life,
The richer classes of British society
Moved to the suburbs, away from the city
Away from the common classes,
Who filled the pubs with beer glasses?

The first railway line in 1836
Was built from London Bridge to Greenwich
This was followed by the great terminal,
Which now linked London to the universal world,
And to every part of Britain as the City now grew.
From 1863 the first lines of the Underground
Were constructed and developed within no time
The network of commerce came into existence,
With the seeds of prosperity and persistence.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?

20TH CENTURY LONDON

London was now the capital city
For one of the largest Empire’s in History.
The LLC Tramways made their rails
For a large tram network of steel and nails.

In the 1900’s the first motorbus
Wound its way down the streets,
As the motor bus service began
And the first automobile ran.

Now everything was getting faster,
Brighter, steelier and electrified too,
In the complex network of steel,
Of the over-ground railways,
And the underground railways too.

Those engines of metal and steel
Thundered off into the sunniest day
And rumbled through the darkest night.

Those glistening beauties of shiny steel
Were all bright and electrified,
Serving London night and day
Bringing life and money every day.

700 people lost their fragile lives
In the bombings of the First World War,
As German zeppelins dropped in dives,
Their murderous loads of death and sorrow
People lost their lives, their homes and their tomorrow.
There was death and destruction everywhere
Nowhere was safe, death was everywhere.

Then it was the celebration of Sports
With the Summer Olympics of 1948,
The Spirit of Britain was indeed great
Swifter, Faster and Stronger, it was true
For now the city of London grew.

Swinging London was born in the 1960’s
With the music culture of the Beatles
And the Rocking Rolling Stones,
While Carnaby street was now to become,
The centre of the youthful buzz and hum.

In the 1950’s the immigrants came
From all the corners of the globe
From Jamaica and India
And from Bangladesh and Pakistan,
Creating a multicultural universe,
Making the great land more diverse.
With everyone now being a part,
Of the ever growing vibrant London heart,
That wonderful panorama of many hues
In all its splendour of greens and blues.

The City of London
Grows stronger by the minute
Do you happen to live in it?