London: A Social History - Roy Porter

Roy Porter, noted and trained as a medical historian, turned his attention to the social development of London, and we are the richer for it. Porter is a Londoner, and has a passion for the city.

Porter gives brief description to Londinium (mentioning among other things that it was abandoned 'to the dogs' by the Romans in the fifth century). This chapter, entitled ‘Formation to Reformation’, is painfully brief. It is true that the ...
...than for the later, post-Tudor times; particularly as he is doing a social history (rather than an archaeological survey, or other such history), he can be forgiven some of the lack in this section. However, there is much more that could be added to these times (three-quarters of the history of London, in fact), is one of the minor flaws in this otherwise wonderful book.

Porter begins his history in earnest about the year 1500 because, ... more

Roy Porter, noted and trained as a medical historian, turned his attention to the social development of London, and we are the richer for it. Porter is a Londoner, and has a passion for the city.

Porter gives brief description to Londinium (mentioning among other things that it was abandoned 'to the dogs' by the Romans in the fifth century). This chapter, entitled ‘Formation to Reformation’, is painfully brief. It is true that the documentary evidence tends to be less available for those period than for the later, post-Tudor times; particularly as he is doing a social history (rather than an archaeological survey, or other such history), he can be forgiven some of the lack in this section. However, there is much more that could be added to these times (three-quarters of the history of London, in fact), is one of the minor flaws in this otherwise wonderful book.

Porter begins his history in earnest about the year 1500 because, as he states, ‘while the Romano-British city and its medieval successor have left extensive archaeological remains and chronicles, ...we have no full visual record from before the Tudor age.' Even the Doomsday Book of 1086 omitted London. During this early history, London assumed its dual nature of being both self-governed as well under royal rule. Lord Mayors have had varying authority and responsibility, and have (in some ways parallel to the office of the Speaker of the House of Commons) had to bear the burden of popular and royal animosity separately, or for the most unfortunate, simultaneously. This was also the period during which guilds and manufacturing locations in specific parts of London grew; many attachments remain to this day, through architecture, street and district names, and sometimes by continuation of the same sorts of businesses.

During the Tudor and Stuart ages, London became a full-fledge European capital, complete with civic life, entertainment industry, crime and police forces, and a host of urban problems. Homelessness, for example, is not a twentieth-century phenomenon. Porter quotes from the 1570 book ‘Description of England’ by William Harrison,who wrote that there ‘might be above ten thousand beggars’ in London. Burial records, such as those at St. Botolph Aldgate, have hundreds of entries from this time period describing vagrants found dead in the streets, many of whose names were never known. The legal records of the times show that vagrancy increased twelve-fold between 1560 (when there were sixty-nine cases) and 1624 (when there were 815 cases); however, the overall job market meant that percentage-wise, this was not as a dramatic an increase as the raw numbers might suggest. What this also shows is that London’s attraction of people far beyond the city had begun to grow significantly.

Porter examines eras in terms of the history of culture, of commerce and industry, and of population and social changes. The nineteenth century (in which there was practically no urban planning, as any current map will inform you) is described as 'Bumbledom', particularly in the field of London politics. The Victorian Age is most likely Porter’s greatest interest, as five of the seventeen chapters in this text deal with this time period.

Porter describes the expansion of London as a 'fungus-like growth' in the late 19th/early 20th centuries; he concludes his analysis with chapters on 'Swinging London' and 'Thatcher's London'. Porter leaves us with a question: 'London was always a muddle that worked. Will it remain that way?'

Porter is, however, frank in his conviction that London has had it's hour upon the stage:
'London is not the eternal city.... Between the two Elizabeths, between 1570 and 1986 to be more precise, it was to become the world's greatest city.'

Porter saw the abolition of the Greater London Council (GLC) by Margaret Thatcher as a benchmark to the demise of London as a great city (I happen to disagree; will he change his opinion in light of the newer form of government in London?) Porter's current pessimism about London is very apparent from the first page of the introduction; however, this does not keep him from doing a sterling job with his subject throughout the text.

Porter acknowledges that there are countless volumes on the history of London; he points to works small and great that precede his text, but makes the observation that most histories of London concentrate either on buildings or events. The grand, 42-volume ‘Survey of London’, begun by the LCC and continued to the present, documents architecture and architects; other books focus on events and happenings, such as the coronations, beheadings, etc.

‘I have tried to make the city itself my hero, focusing on the interaction of its people, its economy and its physical fabric. I have, in other words, tried to explore urbanisation, the evolution of the metropolis itself.’

Porter’s pessimism is rather slight; he acknowledges at different points in the text the eclectic and diverse forms of government London has had, and yet it has continued to grow and flourish. With regard to the early Victorian era in London, Porter writes, ‘Paradox of paradoxes: this diverse and complex sprawl, which above all demanded effective government, had an administrative system lacking rhyme or reason.’ Even given this, the Victorian era showed the greatest growth in the shortest time in London ever.

London is a muddle that continues to work.

Porter himself has become a bit of a London celebrity in terms of writing: Stephen Inwood, in his more recent ‘History of London’ had Roy Porter write a foreword, and Porter’s work is itself now a solid part of the tradition of histories of London.
 

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