Cheapside, London, in the 1300s

Cheapside is the broad market-street that runs east of St Paul's, and it is the loudest, brightest, rudest place in all Christendom — or so I am told by those who have travelled further than I.

Here the mercers keep their silks and the goldsmiths their plate. Here the Great Conduit runs sweet water for any who carry a bucket. Here the King's jousts clatter by on feast-days, and here the pillories stand on ordinary ones.

More to come — of the Eleanor Cross, of Bow Bells, of the goldsmiths' row, and the narrow lanes that lead north to my own door.