The city of London, as reported by Simeon of Durham, was inwalled by Helen, the mother of Constantine the Great, about the year of our Lord . The City having been destroyed and burnt by the Danes in , was repaired and restored by King Alfred, in . About the year , the Londoners being besieged by the Danes, shut up their gates, and defended their King Ethelred within their walls. Fitzstephen, who wrote in the reign of King Henry the , speaking of the Walls of the City, says:

The Wall is high and great, well toured on the north side, with due distances between the toures; on the south side also the Citie was walled and toured, but the fishfull river of Thames, with his ebbing and flowing, hath long since subverted them.

The Wall was formerly continued, from the remains described on the Plate, through the Tower to the Thames; vestiges whereof are still to be discovered: and that part of the Tower which is on the west side of the line of the Wall, is in the parish of Allhallows Barking, in the City of London, and is referred to by Lord Coke in his Institutes, where he says:

The ancient wall of London extendeth through the Tower; all that part on the west is within the city and parish of All Saints, Barking. Therefore, Weston, the principal, and Sir Gervas Elweys, the accessary in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury, committed in the Tower, on the west of the City Wall, were tried in the City of London;

The late learned Dr. Woodward, of the Gresham professors, had an opportunity, in the year , of making several discoveries as to the manner and matter of building the ancient Walls of London, owing to the circumstance of certain foundations being dug for new houses near Bishopsgate; an account of which he afterwards published. On this occasion, the Wall was broke up, and part of the materials applied to the raising of the new buildings. The foundations of the Wall, on this spot, lay feet below the present surface of the ground; and from that almost up to feet in height, it was composed of free-stone, with single layers of broad tiles interposed, each layer at feet distance. To this height the workmanship was after the Roman manner, and there was the remains of the ancient Wall, supposed to be that completed or built by Constantine the Great. In this it was very observable, that the mortar was (as usual in the Roman works) so very firm and hard, that the stone itself as easily brake and gave way.

It was thus far from the foundation upwards, feet in thickness, and yet so vast a strength and bulk had not been able to secure it from being beat down, and nearly levelled with the ground.

The broad tiles, mentioned above, were all of Roman make. The Romans used commonly sorts of tiles, viz. Tegulæ bipedales & sesquipedales, i.e. feet tiles and tiles a foot and a half. Those of this Wall were of the latter sort. Each of them was in English measures, foot and a half in thickness, inches / in breadth, and inches / in length.

The old Wall having been demolished as above, was afterwards repaired again, and carried up the thickness of the former underneath, to or feet in height, or if higher, there was no more of that work then standing. All this was apparently additional, and of a make later than the other part underneath. It was composed chiefly of ragstone; only in the sides were interposed a few bricks uncertainly, and without any regular method. On the outside the stone was squared, and wrought into layers of inches in thickness. Between these were alternately interposed courses of brick, of the same form with those inside. These were very large and of the modern shape, but inches in length and in breadth, and and a half in thickness. There was not of the abovemen- tioned tiles in all this part; nor was the mortar here near so hard as that lower down.

As the ground within the City, by rubbish and the ruin of houses, was successively raised and heightened from age to age, it was requisite the Wall without should rise likewise in proportion; and by reason thereof in course of time, upon the before-mentioned additional work, it was found needful to build the after Wall. This was made of brick, of the statutable size, and the model now in use, and topped battlement-ways, with copings of stone. This latter was feet in thickness, and in height; and was without doubt the same that was built in the mayoralty of Ralph Jocelyn. Bishopsgate itself was built years afterwards (), in the way it appeared until pulled down. And the

The gate eastward through the City Wall, was that which adjoined the fragment we have delineated in the Plate, viz. the Postern Gate next the Tower. This, according to Stowe, fell down in , and was never again built of stone, but its place supplied by a sort of humble lath and plaster erection, through which was an entry or passage. The former gate, he adds, from the remains of it standing in his time, appeared to have been a fair arched gate, partly built of Kentish stone, and of Caen stone from Normandy. The cause of this gate's going to ruin, he states, was the impolicy of William Longchamp, Bishop of Ely, Chancellor of England, in , who caused a part of the City Wall,

to wit, from the said gate

towards the river Thames to the White Tower

, to be broken down for enlarging of the said Tower; which he then compassed far wide about with a wall, embattled, and which is now the outward wall of the Tower: this loosed and weakened the foundations of the gate, which

200

years after fell down, as mentioned.

This postern gate is now all taken down, and in the room thereof a few posts are set to keep off carts and coaches; there being only a narrow passage left for foot passengers there.—This wall here was about

six

or

seven

feet in breadth, and cemented together with irregular pieces of stone like rock.

The following is his description of the exact piece of Wall here drawn:—

There is a yard hard by called George Alley, built on each side with dwelling houses, and is a passage to

Tower Hill

, through the wall that was beat down since the

first

Fire of London. This passage through the Wall, sometime since remained in the fashion of an arch, through which carts might pass; but now also the arch is demolished, and all that piece of Wall taken away. Here

one

may take a view of the inside of the breadth of

London Wall:

it appears like a natural rock, with the stones so cemented into the work, that nothing but the greatest violence can separate them. On the west side, about

fourteen

or

fifteen

feet high, are seen several old Roman bricks put into the work, between the stones.

[*] In a record which I have seen, says Strype, and affirmed also by John Rouse, and after him by Ralph Hollingshed, I find thus written: 'Anno MCCCCLXXVII. by the diligence of Ralph Joceline, Maior of London, the wall about London was new made betwixt Aldgate and Cripplegate. He caused the Moorefields to be searched for clay and brick, to be made and burnt there. He caused chalk also to be brought out of Kent, and in the same Moorefields to be burnt into lime, only for the furtherance of that work.'