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Saturday, July 10, 2021

Walking Tudor St. Paul’s

St. Paul’s Cathedral was more than a London church. Much more. I am not sure that there is any equivalent among European cathedrals — any other half-cathedral, half-shopping-mall, generally both at the same time during London business hours.

De Winter tells us, in his 1905 edition of Ben Jonson’s The Staple of News, that St. Paul’s Walk — as the nave was called when used for secular purposes — was open

‘for the principall gentry, lords, courtiers, and men of all professions, not meerly mechanick, to meet in Pauls church by eleven, and walk in the middle ile till twelve, and after dinner from three to six; during which time some discoursed of businesse, others of newes. Now, in regard of the universall commerce, there happened little that did not first or last arrive here.’[1]

The literature of the time often refers to the Paul’s Walk so obliquely that a modern reader might miss the reference. It was so well known a part of London life that no explanations were needed.

The Walk was delightful fodder for playwrights. Most who attended were easy subjects for satire. Already I’ve mentioned Jonson’s Staple. Far more description is available in his Everyman Out of His Humour. One of many running insider jokes seems to have been to refer to the Paul’s steeple which actually did not exist. It was struck by lightning in 1561 and never replaced.

It is difficult to know how much Shakespeare’s reference to The Temple Walk in Henry IV, Part 2, was meant for laughs. Hal could as easily have arranged  to meet Falstaff at Paul’s to present his orders for the battle against Hotspur & co. He was certainly satisfied with worse anachronisms elsewhere in the plays.

As it is, The Temple Walk is every bit as much an anachronism. Its sudden appearance, during the reign of Elizabeth, interfered with Royal interests and it was brusquely quashed in order that Temple students and legal activities might proceed without distraction. 

Hal… Meet me to-morrow, Jack, i' the Temple-hall

At two o'clock in th' afternoon:

There shalt thou know thy charge; and there receive

Money and order for their furniture.

One of the common types at the walk was the soldier looking for new employment after the end of his previous obligations. The unemployed captain would carry his battle weapon by way of advertisement. Such rendezvous as that between Hal and Captain Falstaff were a common feature of the milieu.

Young gallants aiming at distinction wore the finest rapier they could afford, as their advertisement, over haberdashery they might have pawned or borrowed in order to buy. Reputations were made in such a way. At least until tested.

Most were sons of fathers, commoners who had succeeded financially in business and/or farming to an extent that was only becoming possible in the 1590s. The character Sogliardo, in Jonson’s Everyman Out, widely understood to be Shakspere of Stratford, is one such gallant. Even the Crown must get in on the new source of revenue. One way was to create lineages which might qualify the young man for a Coat of Arms. For a not inconsiderable price to be divided among the Heralds and the Crown.

Conveniently, Queen Mary had given the Heralds Derby House on nearby Paul’s Wharf, immediately to the south, for their College of Arms. It is here we find Sogliardo and learn of yet another advantage to be derived from walking Paul’s.

Puntavarlo…. when saw you Signior Sogliardo?

Carlo. I came from him but now, hee is at the Heraldes Office yonder: he requested me to go afore and take up a man or two for him in Paules, against his Cognisance was readie.

Punt. What? has he purchast armes then?

Car. I, and rare ones too: of as many Colours, as e're you saw any fooles coat in your life.

Carlo has been sent to Paul’s to recruit witnesses for Sogliardo’s lineage as prerequisite to sign for his Arms. Part of the joke here is that they need not know him. They only need agree to swear. Paul’s implies that such witnesses need be no problem.

For all that the playwrights and otherwise satirists pilloried the Walk at Paul’s, all levels of society regularly and eagerly participated. Paul’s was the rendezvous of all of male London. It was the post-graduate school for people watching.

Pauls Walke is the Lands Epitome, or you may call it the lesser Ile of Great Brittaine. It is more then this, the whole worlds Map, which you may here discerne in it's perfect'st motion justling and turning. It is a heape of stones and men, with a vast confusion of Languages and were the Steeple not sanctified nothing liker Babel. The noyse in it is like that of Bees, a strange humming or buzze-mixt of walking, tongues and feet: It is a kind of still roare or loud whisper. It is the great Exchange of all discourse, and no business whatsoever but is here stirring and afoot. It is the Synod of all pates politicke, joynted and laid together in most serious posture, and they are not halfe fo busie at the Parliament.[2]

Rumor and news stopped there first. Half the time it was made there. On top of which it was far and away the most entertaining available daily activity.

St. Paul’s Cathedral was so much that it will take many more than one brief article to describe it.


[1] 136. n.9. Cf. Osborne, Secret Hist. of King James, p. 209.

[2] Earle, John. Microcosmos (1628. Arber ed., 1868). 73.


Also at Virtual Grub Street:

  • Sir Robert Carey’s Account of the Death of Queen Elizabeth. March 23, 2021. “When I came to court I found the Queen ill disposed, and she kept her inner lodging; yet she, hearing of my arrival, sent for me.”
  • Sir Henry Bedingfeld’s Notes Regarding Princess Elizabeth in The Tower. February 7, 2021. “Itm, hir grace to have lib'tee to walke in the Gardeyn when so ever she doth comaunde, forenoone and afternoone,…”
  • A Most Curious Account of the Funeral of Queen Elizabeth I: April 28, 1603.  April 28, 2019.  “Once it was clear that James I would face no serious challenges, Cecil and the others could begin to give attention to the matter of the Queen’s funeral.”
  • Queen Elizabeth I’s Heart and the French Ambassador.  April 3, 2019.  “…the Queen of England, with the permission of her physicians, has been able to come out of her private chamber, she has permitted me… to see her…”
  • Hedingham Castle 1485-1562 with Virtual Tour Link.  January 29, 2019. “Mr. Sheffeld told me that afore the old Erle of Oxford tyme, that cam yn with King Henry the vii., the Castelle of Hengham was yn much ruine,…”
  • Check out the English Renaissance Article Index for many more articles and reviews about this fascinating time and about the Shakespeare Authorship Question.
  • Check out the English Renaissance Letter Index for many letters from this fascinating time, some related to the Shakespeare Authorship Question.
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