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Vetusta Monumenta: Ancient Monuments, a Digital Edition

Plate 1.63: Engraving of a Plan of the Tower Liberties, 1597

Plate 1.63 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduces William Hayward’s (or Haiward’s) and John Gascoyne’s 1597 survey of the Tower Liberties in London. Engraving by George Vertue after a copy of the survey that was in the collection of John Montagu, the 2nd Duke of Montagu. 413 x 546 mm (bifolium). Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1742. Current location: The original survey is now missing, but the pen and ink copy of the survey (likely by Vertue) is currently in the Society of Antiquaries of London (Prints & Drawings Collected Before 1750 [196h] fol. 66), London, UK.

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1. Plate 1.50: Engravings of Three Roman Pavements found at Wellow (1 of 3) Plates 1.50-1.52 of Vetusta Monumenta depict three mid fourth-century CE Roman mosaic pavements at Wellow, Somerset, UK, the first of which was found by John Aubrey c. 1685. Further investigations of the site were carried out in 1737 by Edmund Prideaux and James West, who found the second and third pavements, respectively. Engravings by George Vertue after James Vertue and James West. 365 x 529 mm, 360 x 469 mm, and 368 x 476 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1738. Current location: Mosaics I (Plate 1.50) and III (Plate 1.52) no longer survive; Mosaic II (Plate 1.51) was found in 1737, reopened and damaged in 1807, and is now thought to be lost.
2. Plate 1.51: Engravings of Three Roman Pavements found at Wellow (2 of 3) Plates 1.50-1.52 of Vetusta Monumenta depict three mid fourth-century CE Roman mosaic pavements at Wellow, Somerset, UK, the first of which was found by John Aubrey c. 1685. Further investigations of the site were carried out in 1737 by Edmund Prideaux and James West, who found the second and third pavements, respectively. Engravings by George Vertue after James Vertue and James West. 365 x 529 mm, 360 x 469 mm, and 368 x 476 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1738. Current location: Mosaics I (Plate 1.50) and III (Plate 1.52) no longer survive; Mosaic II (Plate 1.51) was found in 1737, reopened and damaged in 1807, and is now thought to be lost.
3. Plate 1.52: Engravings of Three Roman Pavements found at Wellow (3 of 3) Plates 1.50-1.52 of Vetusta Monumenta depict three mid fourth-century CE Roman mosaic pavements at Wellow, Somerset, UK, the first of which was found by John Aubrey c. 1685. Further investigations of the site were carried out in 1737 by Edmund Prideaux and James West, who found the second and third pavements, respectively. Engravings by George Vertue after James Vertue and James West. 365 x 529 mm, 360 x 469 mm, and 368 x 476 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1738. Current location: Mosaics I (Plate 1.50) and III (Plate 1.52) no longer survive; Mosaic II (Plate 1.51) was found in 1737, reopened and damaged in 1807, and is now thought to be lost.
4. Plate 1.53: Engravings of Lancaster Duchy Office Seals, Part A (1 of 2) Plates 1.53-1.54 of Vetusta Monumenta depict sixteen seals dating from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries. Most of the seals were held in the Office of the Duchy of Lancaster, but a few were held in the Augmentation Office at Westminster. Engravings by George Vertue after his own drawings. 427 x 252 mm and 426 x 253 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1738. Current locations: Most of the seals here depicted are in the National Archives, Kew, UK; a few may be in the Westminster Abbey Muniment Collection, London, UK.
5. Plate 1.54: Engravings of Lancaster Duchy Office Seals, Part A (2 of 2) Plates 1.53-1.54 of Vetusta Monumenta depict sixteen seals dating from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries. Most of the seals were held in the Office of the Duchy of Lancaster, but a few were held in the Augmentation Office at Westminster. Engravings by George Vertue after his own drawings. 427 x 252 mm and 426 x 253 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1738. Current locations: Most of the seals here depicted are in the National Archives, Kew, UK; a few may be in the Westminster Abbey Muniment Collection, London, UK.
6. Plate 1.55: Engraving of Stuart Medals Plate 1.55 of Vetusta Monumenta depicts eight numismatic objects associated with the Stuarts: a gold coin of Mary, Queen of Scots (1555); a silver medal commemorating Mary’s marriage to Lord Darnely, featuring Darnley’s name before Mary’s (1565); a silver coronation medal (c. 1604) for Queen Anne; a silver medal for Prince Henry (1612); two milled gold proof pieces minted for Charles I (c. 1630 and c. 1631-32) and two gold medals based on the same (1639 and unknown). Engraving by George Vertue after his own drawings in at least four states between 1723 and 1739. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1739. Current location: The locations of the eight specific objects here engraved have not been identified, but examples of them can be found in the National Museum of Scotland (Edinburgh, UK), the British Museum (London, UK), and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, US).
7. Plate 1.56: Engraving of English Gold and Silver Coins Plate 1.56 of Vetusta Monumenta depicts thirteen coins minted by English monarchs between the fourteenth and the early-seventeenth centuries: a gold quarter florin of King Edward III (c. 1344), a gold escu of King Edward III (after 1337), a half groat of Edward III (before1369), a half groat of Edward the Black Prince (c. 1368-1372), a groat of Edward the Black Prince (c. 1362-72), a gold angel of Henry VI (c. 1470), a quadruple noble of Henry VII, Type 4 (c. 1503-04), a Tournay groat of Henry VIII (c. 1514), a George noble of Henry VIII (c. 1526-29), a sovereign in crown gold of Elizabeth I (c. 1565), a pattern piece for a gold crown of Edward VI (c. 1547), a pattern sixpence of Elizabeth I (1575), and a Portcullis crown of Elizabeth I (c. 1601). Engraving by George Vertue after his own drawings. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1739. Current locations: The locations of the thirteen specific coins here engraved have not been identified, but examples of them can be found in the British Museum (London, UK), the Royal Mint Museum (London, UK), the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford, UK), and the Museums Victoria (Melbourne, Australia).
8. Plate 1.57: Engraving of a Roman Hypocaust Found at Lincoln Plate 1.57 of Vetusta Monumenta depicts a Roman hypocaust found beneath the subdeanery near the west side of Lincoln Cathedral and first identified by Thomas Sympson on 10 February 1740. The print incorporates material from Sympson’s original letter and plan documenting the discovery. Engraving by George Vertue after his own drawings. 327 x 480 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1740. Current location: The structure was discovered thirteen feet underground and belongs to the only remaining private Roman town house in Lincoln, UK.
9. Plate 1.58: Engravings of Lancaster Duchy Office Seals, Part B (1 of 3) Plates 1.58-1.60 of Vetusta Monumenta depict twenty-seven seals dating from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries. The seals were held in the Duchy Office of Lancaster and in the Augmentation Office at Westminster. Engravings by George Vertue after his own drawings. 420 x 255 mm, 420 x 257 mm, and 419 x 254 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1741. Current locations: Most of the seals here depicted are in the National Archives, Kew, UK; a few may be in the Westminster Abbey Muniment Collection, London, UK.
10. Plate 1.59: Engravings of Lancaster Duchy Office Seals, Part B (2 of 3) Plates 1.58-1.60 of Vetusta Monumenta depict twenty-seven seals dating from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries. The seals were held in the Duchy Office of Lancaster and in the Augmentation Office at Westminster. Engravings by George Vertue after his own drawings. 420 x 255 mm, 420 x 257 mm, and 419 x 254 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1741. Current locations: Most of the seals here depicted are in the National Archives, Kew, UK; a few may be in the Westminster Abbey Muniment Collection, London, UK.
11. Plate 1.60: Engravings of Lancaster Duchy Office Seals, Part B (3 of 3) Plates 1.58-1.60 of Vetusta Monumenta depict twenty-seven seals dating from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries. The seals were held in the Duchy Office of Lancaster and in the Augmentation Office at Westminster. Engravings by George Vertue after his own drawings. 420 x 255 mm, 420 x 257 mm, and 419 x 254 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1741. Current locations: Most of the seals here depicted are in the National Archives, Kew, UK; a few may be in the Westminster Abbey Muniment Collection, London, UK.
12. Plate 1.61: Engraving of Winchester Cross Plate 1.61 of Vetusta Monumenta depicts the Winchester Cross, popularly called the “High,” “Market,” or “Butter” Cross, with three pairs of human figures gathered around its base. These figures recall the transactions which give the Cross its colloquial names and exemplify its ongoing social and commercial functions. One of the two figures on the right displays a plan view of the same monument. Engraving by George Vertue, likely after Augustin Ménageot. 491 x 315 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1741. Current location: 106a High St, Winchester, UK.
13. Plate 1.62: Engraving of the Oxford Decree Against Papal Jurisdiction, 1534 Plate 1.62 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduces Oxford University's 1534 decree against the Papal supremacy with added engravings of the shields of the twelve Oxford colleges then extant, the university’s thirteenth-century common seal, and Henry VIII’s portrait medal as Fidei Defensor (1545). Engraving by George Vertue after his own drawings and a copy of the decree then in the Harleian Library. 418 x 543 mm (bifolium). Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1741. Current locations: The oldest surviving version of the decree is in the Bodleian Library (MS Bodl. 282, fol. 129), Oxford University, UK; the medal of Henry VIII is currently held in the British Museum (M.6802), London, UK.
14. Plate 1.63: Engraving of a Plan of the Tower Liberties, 1597 Plate 1.63 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduces William Hayward’s (or Haiward’s) and John Gascoyne’s 1597 survey of the Tower Liberties in London. Engraving by George Vertue after a copy of the survey that was in the collection of John Montagu, the 2nd Duke of Montagu. 413 x 546 mm (bifolium). Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1742. Current location: The original survey is now missing, but the pen and ink copy of the survey (likely by Vertue) is currently in the Society of Antiquaries of London (Prints & Drawings Collected Before 1750 [196h] fol. 66), London, UK.
15. Plate 1.64: Engraving of Chichester Cross Plate 1.64 of Vetusta Monumenta presents a variorum view of Chichester Cross as it appeared (or might have appeared) at several times in the previous half-century, including the west front of the cross, a plan view of the cross, and an elevation of the highest part of the cross. The print also includes a human figure in the lower left, selling produce; a spaniel stands expectantly nearby. Inside the cross, a boy plays. In the background and to the east of the monument are some houses. Engraving by George Vertue after Augustin Ménageot. 472 x 279 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1743. Current location: South St, Chichester, West Sussex, UK.
16. Plate 1.65: Engraving of Roman Net-Fighters Plate 1.65 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduces two works of art in different media that depict the type of Roman gladiator known as a retiarius or net-fighter. The upper half reproduces a seventeenth-century drawing by Pietro Santi Bartoli of a late-third or early-fourth-century CE Roman mosaic uncovered in Rome in 1670. The lower half depicts the sculptured fragment of a second-century Romano-British stone frieze, possibly from a tomb, that was found during construction work in Chester, UK in 1738. Engraving by George Vertue after Pietro Santi Bartoli (upper half) and his own drawing (lower half). 416 x 288 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1743. Current locations: The mosaic is in the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid, Spain; the relief is in the collection of the Saffron Walden Museum, Saffron Walden, Essex, UK. The Bartoli drawing is preserved in a manuscript associated with the owner of the Chester gladiator, Richard Mead (Glasgow University Library MS Gen. 1496), Glasgow, Scotland.
17. Plate 1.66: Engravings of a Portrait of Robert Cotton with Genesis Fragments (1 of 3) Plates 1.66-1.68 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduce a c. 1626 portrait of Robert Cotton and fragments of the Cotton Genesis manuscript. The portrait shown on Plate 1.66 is now attributed to Cornelius Johnson. Plates 1.67-1.68 depict twenty-one fragments from eighteen folio pages of the Cotton Genesis collated with transcriptions from the Codex Vaticanus. Two additional pages from the Cotton Genesis are also depicted on the portrait. Engravings by George Vertue after the original portrait and his own watercolors of the Cotton Genesis fragments. 372 x 245 mm, 384 x 255 mm, and 387 x 259 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1744. Current locations: The Cotton Genesis is currently in the British Library (Cotton MS Otho b vi f26v), London, UK; Vertue’s original watercolors of the fragments remain in the Society of Antiquaries of London (Prints & Drawings Collected Before 1750 [196h] fols. 72-73), London, UK; the Codex Vaticanus is in the Vatican Library (1209), Vatican City; the portrait of Cotton is in a private collection.
18. Plate 1.67: Engravings of a Portrait of Robert Cotton with Genesis Fragments (2 of 3) Plates 1.66-1.68 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduce a c. 1626 portrait of Robert Cotton and fragments of the Cotton Genesis manuscript. The portrait shown on Plate 1.66 is now attributed to Cornelius Johnson. Plates 1.67-1.68 depict twenty-one fragments from eighteen folio pages of the Cotton Genesis collated with transcriptions from the Codex Vaticanus. Two additional pages from the Cotton Genesis are also depicted on the portrait. Engravings by George Vertue after the original portrait and his own watercolors of the Cotton Genesis fragments. 372 x 245 mm, 384 x 255 mm, and 387 x 259 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1744. Current locations: The Cotton Genesis is currently in the British Library (Cotton MS Otho b vi f26v), London, UK; Vertue’s original watercolors of the fragments remain in the Society of Antiquaries of London (Prints & Drawings Collected Before 1750 [196h] fols. 72-73), London, UK; the Codex Vaticanus is in the Vatican Library (1209), Vatican City; the portrait of Cotton is in a private collection.
19. Plate 1.68: Engravings of a Portrait of Robert Cotton with Genesis Fragments (3 of 3) Plates 1.66-1.68 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduce a c. 1626 portrait of Robert Cotton and fragments of the Cotton Genesis manuscript. The portrait shown on Plate 1.66 is now attributed to Cornelius Johnson. Plates 1.67-1.68 depict twenty-one fragments from eighteen folio pages of the Cotton Genesis collated with transcriptions from the Codex Vaticanus. Two additional pages from the Cotton Genesis are also depicted on the portrait. Engravings by George Vertue after the original portrait and his own watercolors of the Cotton Genesis fragments. 372 x 245 mm, 384 x 255 mm, and 387 x 259 mm. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1744. Current locations: The Cotton Genesis is currently in the British Library (Cotton MS Otho b vi f26v), London, UK; Vertue’s original watercolors of the fragments remain in the Society of Antiquaries of London (Prints & Drawings Collected Before 1750 [196h] fols. 72-73), London, UK; the Codex Vaticanus is in the Vatican Library (1209), Vatican City; the portrait of Cotton is in a private collection.
20. Plate 1.69: Engraving of a Standard of Weights and Measures, 1497 Plate 1.69 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduces Henry VII’s 1497 Standard of Weights and Measures based on an original parchment that was pasted on an oak table formerly in the Treasury of the King’s Exchequer at Westminster and in the collection of Edward Harley, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Mortimer. Engraving by George Vertue after his own drawing. 613 x 453 mm (bifolium). Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1746. Current Location: Untraced.
21. Plate 1.70: Engraving of the Court of Wards and Liveries Plate 1.70 of Vetusta Monumenta reproduces an anonymous, undated painting in oil—probably from the early seventeenth century, but possibly a copy of a sixteenth-century original—of William Cecil, Lord Burghley, presiding over the Court of Wards and Liveries. The Court was set up by Henry VIII in 1540 and dissolved by an Act of Parliament in 1660. The painting was in the collection of Charles Lennox, Duke of Richmond. Engraving by George Vertue after his own drawing. 474 x 454 mm (bifolium). Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1747. Current location: Goodwood House, near Chichester, West Sussex, UK.

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Plate 1.63: Plan of the Tower Liberties, 1597 Plate: A depiction of a copy of William Hayward (sometimes also spelled Haiward) and John Gascoyne’s 1597 survey of the Tower Liberties, engraved by George Vertue (1684-1756)—likely after his own drawings—in 1742 (Keay 2001, 3). On 21 May 1741, the minutes record that Vertue “brought from His Grace the Duke of Montagu a curious illuminated drawing on a Large Imperial Sheet of paper of the Tower libertys” (SAL Minutes IV.72; Keay 2001, 1). It was ordered that a drawing of that drawing be taken, and Vertue presented the requested drawing on 3 September 1741, at which point, the Society ordered it to be engraved (SAL Minutes IV.85). Vertue delivered the completed engraving a year later (SAL Minutes IV.130).

Object: A copy of William Hayward (sometimes also spelled Haiward) and John Gascoyne’s 1597 survey of the Tower of London, which was undertaken in 1597 at the behest of Sir John Peyton (1544-1630). As Anna Keay explains, the original survey has been missing for more than two centuries, and “[t]he survey of 1597 exists today in four main copies made in the space of forty years,” roughly during the first half of the eighteenth century (Keay 2001, 1). Two copies are in the archives of the Society of Antiquaries: Vertue’s engraving and the unsigned drawing on which it appears to be based. Two additional copies are in the Public Record Office. One copy in the Public Record Office was based on a now-missing copy prepared by Clement Lemprière in 1741; Keay speculates that Vertue likely prepared a drawing of the copy brought from the collection of John Montagu, the second Duke of Montagu (1690-1749) and consulted, in the process, the now-missing Lemprière copy of the survey (3). Vertue’s engravings for Vetusta Monumenta include several other facsimiles of medieval and early modern documents, some of which are based on copies rather than originals (cf. Plates 1.28-1.33).

Transcription:

A True and Exact Draught of the TOWER LIBERTIES, survey’d in the Year 1597 by Gulielmus Haiward and J. Gascoyne.

Top, Left: Queen Elizabeth’s Coat of Arms: HON SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE / SEMPER EADEM [Shame be to him who thinks evil of it / Always the same]

Lower Inset Banner, Left: The DESCRIPTION of the TOWER of LONDON with all the Buildings & the Remains of y^e Royal Palace; and the Outermost Limits thereof together with all such Places adjoyning as do confine and abound the said Liberties, made by the Direction of S.^r John Peyton K.^t

Top, Right: A Note of the Boundaries of y^e Liberties of y^e Tower as appears in the Leet, Anno 27 Hen. VIII. / The Liberties of the TOWER beginning at the Water Gate next the Ram’s Head in Petty Wales, doth extend straight North to the end of Tower Street, and direct North to the Mud Wall call’d Pikes Garden on this side the Croutched Fryers & so straight East to the Wall of London with y^e Nine Gardens above the Postern and the Broken Tower right unto the midst of Hog Lane, and so straight broad South to the Stone Corner, and so on to the Thames, and according to the former Abutting a green Line is drawn about the said Liberties.

Below, Right: The Several Towers.
A. The Middle Tower.
B. The Tower at the Gate.
C. The Bell Tower.
D. Beauchamp Tower.
E. Devilin Tower.
F. Flint Tower.
G. Bowyar Tower.
H. Brick Tower.
I. Martin Tower.
K. Constable Tower.
L. Broad Arrow Tower.
M. Salt Tower.
N. Well Tower.
O. The Tower leading to the Iron Gate.
P. The Tower above y^e Iron Gate.
Q. The Cradle Tower.
R. The Lanthorn Tower.
S. The Hall Tower.
T. The Bloody Tower.
V. S.^t Thomas’s Tower.
W. Cæsar’s, or White Tower.
X. Cole Harbour.
Y. Wardroab Tower.

Bottom, Right: Boundaries of the Liberties.
AB. The House at y^e Water Gate, call’d y^e Ram’s Head.
AC. The Place where y^e Mud Wall was, call’d Pikes Garden
AD. The City Wall at the NE. of the Nine Gardens.
AE. The Place where the Broken Tower was.
AF. Hog Lane End.
AG. The House call’d the Stone corner House.
AH. The End of Tower Street.
AI. The Stairs without the East End of y^e Tower.

On the Image:

The Upper Left Quadrant:
Lord Lumley’s House, sometime belonging to Croutched Fryers
The New Brick Wall
Pikes Garden
The Nine Gardens
Tower Hill
The Posts of the Scaffold
The Cage
Barkin Church
The Houses betwixt the Church Yard and the Hill are S.^t Katherines Rents
Tower Street
Labels: AC, AD, AB AH, E, F, D

The Upper Right Quadrant:
At this place stood sometime a broken Tower, which is now built as the rest of the Wall
The Cities Ditch
The Waye from Aldgate
Merchant Taylors Alms Houses
Hog Lane
The place where the Cross stood
East Smith Field
Postern Gate
Mount
East Smith Field
The place where the Pound stood
The Cage
The Barns to keep the Carts from S. Ditch
Labels: AE, AF, AG, G, H, I, K

The Bottom Left Quadrant:
Thames Street
Petty Wales
The Bulwark Gate
The Lyon’s Tower
The Lyons Gate
The TOWER of LONDON
The Lieutenant’s Lodgings
THE WHARFE
RIVER THAMES
SCALA PERTICARUM
Labels: AB, A, B, C, T, S, V

The Bottom Right Quadrant:
Jewel House
The Hall decay’d
The Queens Lodgings
The Queens Gallery
The Privy Garden
The Iron Gate
The way to the Flemish Church
S.^t Katherines
Labels: X, W, Y, L, M, R, Q, N, O, P, AI

Preparatory Drawings: Click here to see the Preparatory Drawings for Plate 1.63.

Commentary by Kelsey Jackson Williams: “Liberties” were geographical areas within the city of London which lay outside the jurisdiction of the city itself. In 1530 there were no less than nineteen, predominantly scattered along the western and eastern edges of the old city, and many of these survived the Reformation, with new ones growing up on the south side of the Thames (House 2006, 22). Both embedded within the wider city and set apart from it by their autonomous powers and privileges, liberties had a poor reputation amongst sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Londoners, being viewed as places of moral as well as jurisdictional transgression. Modern scholarship, having too uncritically accepted such claims earlier in the twentieth century, now views them with skepticism and is beginning to recover the complex legal and social record of the liberties (see especially Kozusko 2006, House 2006, and McSheffrey 2018). To most non-specialists, however, liberties are best known from a later period when the Liberties of the Mint and the Savoy, amongst others, offered refuge to debtors, a practice made famous in numerous contemporary and historical novels of the eighteenth century (Stirk 2001).

Prominent amongst the post-Reformation liberties were those of the Tower of London, exempt from urban control by virtue of their position as part of the Crown Lands. Here, as elsewhere, these anomalous areas proved to be loci for contention and unrest, and on 29 June 1595 a thousand-strong crowd gathered at Tower Hill, leading to a riot which left four persons injured and led to the subsequent execution of five apprentices (Deiter 2008, 93-94).

In its wake, the Privy Council began investigations into the precise boundaries of the Tower Liberties, but it was only with the appointment of the officer and administrator Sir John Peyton (1544-1630) as Lieutenant of the Tower in June 1597 that significant progress was made (Evans 2004). Peyton prepared a series of reports on the boundaries in 1597 and 1598 as part of which he commissioned the draughtsmen William Hayward and John Gascoyne to prepare the present plan (Deiter 2008, 83; Keay 2001, 9-11). Of the two, Hayward was already an established cartographer, having produced a “description” and map of the Norfolk marshes as early as 1591 alongside a number of other projects over the following decade (Skempton et al. 2002, 308-09).

The survey produced by Hayward and Gascoyne reflects the priorities of Peyton and his superiors. A vertical series of cartouches on the right hand side emphasize the legal and physical structure of the liberties, quoting a historical record of their boundaries from the twenty-seventh year of the reign of Henry VIII and identifying both the specific locations of the boundary points themselves and the several towers which defined the visual appearance of the Elizabethan Tower of London. Mapping the boundaries given in the Henrician document onto 1597 London proved, however, to be a less than straightforward task. The “Mud Wall call’d Pikes Garden” of 1535/36 had been replaced with a “New Brick Wall,” the “Broken Tower” of the earlier description was entirely absent, and similar changes could be seen across the landscape of the area.

Despite these changes, the immediate vicinity of the Tower remained noticeably undeveloped in 1597. To the northwest can be seen Tower Hill, with the “Posts of the Scaffold” clearly marked, while to the northeast East Smithfield was wasteland crisscrossed with several paths and distinguished only by “The place where the Cross stood.” To the west, a more populated area was dominated by Petty Wales running north to south and Thames and Tower Streets intersecting with it on an east-west axis. These were overshadowed by the eleventh-century church of All Hallows-by-the-Tower, here referred to as “Barkin Church” in allusions to its by-name of “All Hallows Barking.” The concern with legal and geographical boundaries is again indicated by the note that “The Houses betwixt the Church Yard and the Hill are S.t Katherines Rents.” To the east can be seen a further row of houses, just on the boundary of the Liberties, and the beginning of Hog Lane, while the southern section of the draught is dominated by the Tower Wharf and the Thames, populated by boatmen and river craft.

The Tower itself is depicted in considerable detail with the Lieutenant’s Lodgings, the Jewel House, the Queen’s Lodgings, the Queen’s Gallery, the Privy Garden, and other landmarks clearly marked. Three pyramids of shot can be seen in the courtyard to the northeast of the White Tower, attesting to its continued use as an arsenal, and a small garden is depicted by the Lieutenant’s Lodgings. Some indication is also given of Peyton’s concern, attested elsewhere, regarding the ruinous fabric of many of the Tower’s buildings through the note “decay’d” subjoined to the roofless great hall which had been erected by Henry III (Thurley 1995, 41).

Taken as a whole, this map of the Tower Liberties provides important evidence not only for the physical appearance of this corner of Elizabethan London, but also for its position at a nexus of political and legal concerns which had recently reached boiling point with the riots of 1595.

Although gradually declining in importance from the eighteenth century onwards, the liberty survived and its bounds were still triennially perambulated as late as the 1870s in a theatrical ceremony which involved the chaplain of St. Peter's ceremonially repeating "cursed be he who removeth his neighbour's landmark" (Thornbury n.d., 2.96). Its jurisdictional status was finally abolished by a decree of 30 April 1894 following on from the Liberties Act 1850 (London Gazette 1894, 2769-2770).

Works Cited:

Deiter, Kristen. 2008. The Tower of London in English Renaissance Drama: Icon of Opposition. New York and London: Routledge.

Evans, Helen M. E. 2004 “Peyton, Sir John (1544-1630).” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Keay, Anna. 2001. The Elizabethan Tower of London: The Haiward and Gascoyne Plan of 1597. London: London Topographical Society with Historic Royal Palaces.

Kozusko, Matt. 2006. "Taking Liberties." Early Theatre 9: 37-60.

London Gazette. 1665-present. https://www.thegazette.co.uk/

McSheffrey, Shannon. 2018. “Liberties of London: Social Networks, Sexual Disorder, and Independent Jurisdiction in the Late Medieval English Metropolis.” In Crossing Borders: Boundaries and Margins in Medieval and Early Modern Britain: Essays in Honour of Cynthia J. Neville, edited by Sara Butler and K. J. Kesselring, 216-36. Leiden: Brill.

Skempton, A. W., M.M. Chrimes, R.C. Cox, P.S.M. Cross-Rudkin, and E.C. Ruddock, eds. 2002. A Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers in Great Britain and Ireland, Volume 1: 1500-1830. London: Thomas Telford.

Stirk, Nigel. 2001. “Fugitive Meanings: The Literary Construction of a London Debtors' Sanctuary in the Eighteenth Century.” Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies 24: 175-188.

Thornbury, Walter. n.d. Old and New London: Its History, its People, and its Places. 6 vols. London: Cassell & Company Limited.

Thurley, Simon. 1995. “Royal Lodgings at the Tower of London, 1216-1327.” Architectural History 38: 36-57.
Maps and Plans in Vetusta Monumenta
By Elizabeth Baigent

Eighteenth-century England saw a flowering of mapmaking, mostly involving private individuals: commissioners, surveyors, makers, publishers, colourists, sellers, and users. The state survey body, Ordnance Survey, which began its main work at the end of the eighteenth century, came to dominate topographical mapping in the nineteenth, and its approach and style, themselves developed from earlier private mapping, set the tone for private mapping thenceforward. The survey board fostered standardization of style and scale; complete coverage of the land area; the use of modern scientific equipment and techniques; and the production of maps as a general resource, to be on hand to meet a variety of purposes as the need arose.

By contrast, in the eighteenth century there was more variety of style and scale; many maps were of individual places which appear as islands on the sheet; techniques and instrumentation were generally simple; and maps were produced for particular purposes rather than being a general resource. But while the eighteenth-century reading public did not have rigid expectations of the way maps should look, they increasingly expected to see them to help them visualize the point that the text was making and to provide geographical context for it. England was a characterised by a high degree of what has been termed “cartoliteracy” and “map consciousness,” that is, many middle- and upper-class English men and women could read maps and expected to see and use them in a variety of different contexts in their daily lives. These included managing their estates, finding their way when travelling, absorbing news and information in periodicals such as the Gentleman’s Magazine, locating places that they read about in their Bibles, decorating their walls, or attending to their geography lessons. Even children used them in educational play, assembling “dissected puzzles” (jig-saw puzzles) of maps. While some of these eighteenth-century maps, such as estate maps, were manuscript, there being no wide demand for maps of one family’s land, many of the others were engraved and printed. Printed maps appeared both within other publications, such as periodicals or books of views and plans, and as stand-alone items which were decorative objects from the start or became so when the information they depicted was superseded. The inclusion of engraved maps in printed volumes was matched by a similar increase in other types of printed images – prospects, views, building plans, portraits, botanical illustrations, and many others – as the relative cost of producing them went down and the expectations of the reading and viewing public rose.

Against this background we can consider the rather eclectic selection of maps and plans in Vetusta Monumenta. The first thing to say is that it is unsurprising to find them, and not just for the general reasons outlined above. Antiquarians used a variety of visual means, including maps, to record and disseminate information about their findings. A common impulse – pride in one’s locality – underlay the production of both county topographical maps and accounts of the county’s antiquities. Moreover, a sense that a map could capture not only the present topographical facts of a place but also something of its character and distinctiveness led to the inclusion of many topographical maps of threatened relics of the past. Perhaps the best example of this comes from over the border in Scotland. Here William Roy (FRS, FSA) led the great mid-eighteenth-century military mapping project which formed the prototype for Ordnance Survey. The map’s purpose was deadly serious: the 1745 Jacobite uprising, which had only just been suppressed, had shown the military advantage gained by those who knew the terrain. With this purpose uppermost in his mind, Roy excluded from his maps many features unrelated to military tactics and strategic planning; nonetheless he included numerous Roman and later antiquarian remains, such that his map gives a sense of Scotland’s distinctive history as well as its landscape.

We can now consider the individual maps and plans in Vetusta Monumenta in the order in which the plates appear, discussing not so much their content which is dealt with in their individual commentaries, but with their appearance, the cartographic strategies chosen for the task in hand, the work that that they do, and how they compare with other maps and plans that their viewers would be familiar with.

William Stukeley’s 1721 map of Verulamium (Plate 1.8) mixes attention to detail and precision in the antiquarian elements, which are the point of the map, with impressionistic and purely decorative elements in the surrounding parts. His use of two different scales (one for the detailed plan of the wall and a smaller one for the general map) suggests attention to accuracy in survey and measurement, while his orientation of the map with east approximately at the top produces a map which sits well on the page. These elements, plus his scale bars and compass rose, attest to his competence in surveying and mapping, and thus lend credibility to his antiquarian claims. Outside the antiquarian elements his aim is not so much accuracy as attractiveness. The broken column and capital by the cartouche reflect the common inclusion of classical ruins in landscape painting from the seventeenth century, but they are particularly appropriate here given the subject matter of the map. The trees lining the roads are indicative rather than accurate: given the representative strategy Stukeley chooses for them, he cannot include them on both sides without obscuring the road. Similarly, the hatching in the fields may suggest their undulating relief, but is just as likely to be simply occupying some white space, while the hill at centre bottom – named, but of a shape alien to the Hertfordshire landscape – shows Stukeley attending accurately to place names but not invariably to the visual depiction of landscape features.

Like Stukeley’s plan, the second map in Vetusta Monumenta, Francis Drake’s Plan of the Roman Roads in Yorkshire (Plate 1.47), takes up the theme of Roman remains. Drake’s map, though, is at a far smaller scale than Stukeley’s and can best be understood in the context of the flowering of British, particularly English, county mapping in the eighteenth century. As Pete Wilson’s commentary on Plate 1.47 suggests, it is likely that Drake based his map on John Warburton’s Map of The County of York (1720), one of several eighteenth-century maps of Yorkshire which illustrate how growing pride in the county translated into an urge to own a map of it to decorate one’s walls or place in one’s library. Penelope Corfield has described how English county towns flourished in the eighteenth century as economic, administrative, social, cultural, and scholarly centres, and Rosemary Sweet traces the rise of county antiquarianism which explored and celebrated each county’s long and distinctive past. Canny cartographers took advantage of these trends by enlisting the county gentry as subscribers to their projects to produce county maps, and as purchasers of the resultant maps. Collectively there was a patriotic element to this county mapping. Recognising that the country as a whole was unevenly served by county maps and holding that such maps were crucial to the nation’s future, as well as a testimonial to its past, the London-based Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufacture and Commerce set out to encourage the production of county maps. In 1759 it introduced bounties, premiums, and prizes to encourage the accurate survey and production of printed county maps at a scale of one inch to one mile (approximately 1:63,000). From 1761 to 1809 just thirteen awards were made, but the cartographic stimulus was far wider, and the accuracy and scale prescribed by the society set the benchmark for mapping for decades to come. The one inch to the mile Ordnance Survey topographical maps, for example, followed the precedent established by county mapping.

Eventually all counties in England were covered by county maps, and Yorkshire caught the attention of some of the finest cartographers of the eighteenth century, including John Rocque, Thomas Kitchen, Emmanuel Bowen, and Thomas Jefferys. Warburton’s and Drake’s maps predate these men’s maps, and they predate the standardization promoted by the Society of Arts. Since Yorkshire was England’s largest county by some margin, many county mappers produced different maps for each of its three ridings. This strategy allowed larger scale (more detailed) coverage. Warburton instead tackled the whole county and his map needed seven sheets to accommodate it, even though its scale of 2 and a half miles to the inch (approximately 1:160,000) was smaller (less detailed) than the one inch to the mile which became standard. Drake’s map, though lacking a scale bar, was at a still smaller scale of about 1:420,000 or more than six miles to the inch and this, combined with his placement of the top of the map not quite at north, allowed him to fit the whole county on one sheet. Though small, the scale was large enough for his purpose which was fairly strictly confined to Roman roads, sites, and names, with other information included largely to help readers situate ancient features with respect to contemporary ones. In fact some apparently fixed contemporary features would have looked different in Roman times – the shape of Spurn Head at the mouth of the Humber, for example, is constantly changing with tidal, wind, and wave action – but this was not known at the time and was not Drake’s concern. A characteristic of many eighteenth-century county maps was a cartouche with elegant classical features such as putti, columns, Roman armour, and figures in classical drapery. These cartouches allowed the cartographer to flaunt his erudition, and to flatter that of his readers. Stukeley followed this convention with a broken column and capital nicely echoing the decline of the Roman city of Verulamium which his map depicted (see above). Ironically given the subject matter of Drake’s map, he includes neither a classical cartouche nor marginalia with classical motifs. All we have, apart from the rather austerely presented subject matter, is a brief dedication and a set of rather improbable looking sailing vessels. Such decorative elements, often added by the engraver and not the cartographer, were often used to fill otherwise white space. Contemporary readers did not see such fancifulness as detrimental to the credibility of the depiction of the map’s subject, though the mix of fancy and accuracy can be challenging for modern readers.

The next map to appear is “A True and Exact Draught of the Tower [of London] Liberties” (Plate 1.63). This elegant piece of work is one of four eighteenth-century versions of the now lost original plan of 1597, being an engraving of 1742 probably by George Vertue after an anonymous pen and ink drawing, probably not Vertue’s own (Keay 2001, 3), of William Hayward’s (or Haiward’s) and J. Gascoyne’s 1597 plan. The Society of Antiquaries’ engraving is, then, at some remove from the original. Such copying of maps was not unusual, particularly when the original was as important as this one: another version, a copy of a now lost eighteenth-century copy of the original, may be seen in the National Archives. The original was so important because it was “the only measured visual source” to set out the appearance of the tower before alterations in the seventeenth century (Keay 2001, vi). Keay points to an even earlier visual source, a fifteenth-century illuminated manuscript, but the key difference is that the Elizabethan survey is a measured visual source. The disappearance of the original plan is regrettable, though not unusual, but a useful feature of the copies is that they all give the survey date (1597), making it clear that they are copies. Such survey dates and indications of copying are particularly useful for interpreting maps. It was so expensive to make maps that “new” maps were often thinly disguised old ones, and the publication date of printed maps can sometimes give an optimistic view of the currency of the information they show. This was a serious problem in rapidly growing towns where reality might substantially part company with what was depicted on a map. Here the survey date anchors the work, and helpfully fixes both the features extant in 1597 and those which had disappeared by that time, for example, the “broken” tower in the Nine Gardens site which is described as having been reduced to the height of the rest of the wall by 1597.

“Draught” was one of the several names, including “plot” or “plat,” which were used for large-scale and fairly large-scale maps before the terminology had settled. Indeed, the commissioner of the original Elizabethan map referred to a “plotte” (Keay 2001, 10–11). The title declares it to be “true and exact,” a claim often made for maps which were nothing of the sort. Here, however, the claim seems plausible. The draught’s apparent authority is supported by the royal coat of arms (probably original to the 1597 plan), by the status of Sir John Peyton, lieutenant of the Tower, who commissioned the drawing (and who had military experience in the Netherlands, where he might well have gained familiarity with local high quality military maps), and by the high quality of Vertue’s engraving. One of the cartographers, Hayward, was an experienced land surveyor. The map was drawn to help resolve a dispute over jurisdiction which, like disputes about land ownership and profitable rights over land, was a common reason for the production of maps. Although such maps by themselves had no legal force, the air of authority that they imparted could lend weight to the argument of their commissioners.

As with the other maps described here, the depictions which are central to its purpose (the boundaries of the liberties) are given fully and commendably accurately, while some of the other information is indicative only: the trees and river vessels occupy space decoratively, and the buildings are in part schematic except where they have a function in fixing the disputed boundary. Similarly, while the ground plan is surveyed and measured, being the important consideration, the elevations of buildings are not, but are drawn freehand. To the left of the sheet we see the compass rose with north to the top. It is not clear if the compass rose is original or added by Vertue: it features on the copy from which Vertue made his engraving and in a different place on another copy (Robert Whitehand’s of January 1712/13), but at all events it seems likely that the original was orientated to the north – not something which was completely standard by 1597 but which works well visually with the Thames anchoring the representation at the bottom of the page and the information about the liberties ranged on the other three sides. At bottom left are a scale bar and dividers with “scala perticarum” indicating the scale in perches (1 perch = 5 and a half feet). The scale is about 1:800, so very large, and all the copies are drawn to the same scale which is, then, probably the scale of the original (Keay 2001, 5 and 7, note 34). The scale bar and dividers feature on all extant copies and so were probably there on the original. The impression of care and accuracy in the production of this map carries over into its text which was original to the 1597 plan: the Antiquaries’ minute book describes the “Alphabetical references” on the original plan (Keay 2001, 7n30). When Anna Keay describes the information on the map as “crammed in”, she intends only to praise its abundance (2001, 8). In fact the map is well laid out, and the result is aesthetically pleasing as well as informative, something which perhaps added to the reasons why so many copies of it were made.

By the time that Vertue produced his engraving, a firm connection had been established between the Tower of London and map making. Map, plans, models for military use had probably been stored at the Tower from the late seventeenth century and, from at least 1717 and possibly earlier, a map Drawing Room was established there. Here maps and models were produced for military use, and later Ordnance Survey maps were drawn and draftsmen trained. The men trained and employed there are closely related to the 1597 plan’s history. Robert Whitehand, whose 1712/13 copy is mentioned above, Clement Lemprière, author of a now lost copy of 1741, and Joseph Heath, whose 1752 copy of Lemprière’s version is extant, were all employed at the Tower Drawing Room, and Whitehand’s copy bears a bold red Board of Ordnance stamp (Marshall 1980; Hodson 1991; Down 2020; Keay 2001, 4, and plate 2). The thorough training of these men and their colleagues and the high standard of work coming out of the Tower gives confidence in the quality of their copies, and of Vertue’s engraving, which is remarkably similar to them. It also suggests that the draughtsmen’s professional appraisal judged the 1597 plan to be worth copying, for its high quality as well as its local connection.

Plates 2.1-2.2 show John Evelyn’s and Christopher Wren’s schemes for rebuilding London after the Great Fire. As they considered the ruined city, many of those who had a vision for its recovery thought that rebuilding would best take place with the aid of maps. If the higgledy-piggledy nature of the pre-fire plots and streets and the irregular shapes of ancient churches were to be replaced by elegant geometric vistas and strictly proportioned façades, rebuilding plans and processes needed to be controlled, and the route to discipline was via objects independent of the land or buildings themselves, namely maps, plans, and/or models. Charles II well understood this, charging those responsible for the rebuilding of St Paul’s Cathedral to build “according to the design and model,” which was to “remain as a perpetuall and unchangeable rule and direction for the conduct of the whole Work” (commission charge of 1673, qtd. in “The Wren Office Drawings”). While models were used only for exceptional buildings, notably St Paul’s Cathedral, since they were very expensive to produce, a rash of mapping broke out, and cheap engraved paper plans jostled with one another for the attention of the public and those in authority. Evelyn’s and Wren’s plans for the new city, featured in Plates 2.1-2.2, are the most famous; Valentine Knight’s, not included here, is the most infamous. His loose grid plan was complemented by a canal to allow for new docks near the River Thames, the profits from which would go to the crown. Charles II, angered by the suggestion that he was looking to profit from what seemed to be a providentially ordained calamity, had Knight briefly imprisoned for his maladroit proposal. Evelyn’s and Wren’s plans are more orthodox, though in the end no unified scheme was realised, since the crown lacked the means to buy out landowners, and post-fire standardisation was largely confined to building materials and façade design. The Great Fire maps and models show the power of graphic media over narrative when it comes to visualising building schemes – though this success could prove dangerous. Not only was Knight imprisoned because his map made his cunning plan for royal profiteering all too clear, Wren got into trouble when his model and plans for St Paul’s cathedral showed viewers quite how far his new church departed from expectations of a safely Protestant building and followed Catholic baroque exemplars.

Plates 2.15–2.16 are based on redrawings of much earlier plans from the Eadwine Psalter. They show that mapping could flourish before the establishment of conventions that we now think of as integral to it. One such convention is the drawing of maps to scale such that one unit on paper strictly corresponds to one unit on the ground. All the maps above are scalar, even if, like Drake’s, they do not declare their scale. The medieval plans here appear not to have any elements drawn to strict scale. Scale mapping probably arrived in England in the sixteenth century but did not become the norm until much later. Being non-scalar does not make maps faulty. We are all used to maps, such as those for the London and other underground railway systems, which are topological rather than scalar, that is, they accurately depict the sequence and connectedness of stations but not the distance between them: that is not their concern. The plans of Canterbury reproduced here are similarly non-scalar and show the buildings and water courses in (approximately accurate) relation to one another, but neither size of feature nor distance from other features is rendered accurately. We do not know the exact purpose for which the plans were drawn, but we should start from the assumption that they were designed in a way which fulfilled their function for contemporaries, even if it is now opaque to us.

Further Reading:

Delano-Smith, Catherine, and Roger J.P. Kain. 1999. English Maps: A History. London: British Library.

Harley, J. Brian. 1963. “The Society of Arts and the Surveys of English Counties 1759-1809.” Journal of the Royal Society of Arts 112: 43-46,119-25, 269-75, 538-43.

Works Cited:

Corfield, Penelope. 2023. “British History: Town Life.” Blog post. Penelope J. Corfield. Accessed January 3, 2024. https://www.penelopejcorfield.com/british-history/town-life/.

Down, Emma. 2020. "Maps in the Drawing Room." Blog post. National Archives Blog. Accessed January 9, 2023. https://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/maps-in-the-drawing-room/#note-48953-2.

Hodson, Yolande. 1991. Map Making in the Tower of London: Ordnance Survey’s Early Years: An Exhibition to Celebrate the Bicentenary of Ordnance Survey. Southampton: Ordnance Survey.

Keay, Anna. 2001. The Elizabethan Tower of London: The Haiward and Gascoyne Plan of 1597. London: London Topographical Society with Historic Royal Palaces.

Marshall, Douglas W. 1980. "Military Maps of the Eighteenth Century and the Tower of London Drawing Room." Imago Mundi 32: 21–44.

Reddaway, Thomas Fiddian. 1940. The Rebuilding of London after the Great Fire. London: Jonathan Cape, 1940.

Sweet, Rosemary. 2004. Antiquaries: The Discovery of the Past in Eighteenth-Century Britain. London: Hambledon and London.

"The Wren Office Drawings: 1673: Designs for the Great Model." Accessed January 3, 2024. https://www.stpauls.co.uk/1-designs-for-great-model-1673.