The City: the Great Fire, the Money and the Legends: audio walk in London

From the site of the bakery where the fire of 1666 began to the financial heart of London: a young Frenchman, a watchmaker's son, who confessed to what he hadn't done, the column that blamed the Catholics, the Exchange that burned twice, the woman in black at the Bank, a Roman temple beneath an office and the stone nobody can explain.

1.59 km · ≈ 53 min · 12 stops · ES / EN

The City: the Great Fire, the Money and the Legends

What this walk is about

You start by Pudding Lane, where a young Frenchman, a watchmaker's son, confessed to starting the Great Fire and was hanged even though not even his judges believed him, and then stand before the Monument, which is exactly as tall as the distance to that bakery and which spent a century and a half accusing the Catholics in writing. On Lombard Street you look for Gresham's grasshopper and the legend that turned him into a foundling; at the Royal Exchange, the statue that survived one fire and not the next, with bells that played as it burned; outside the Bank of England, the clerk who forged a bill and the sister in mourning whom the City turned into a ghost. You look down the street beneath which a temple of Mithras appeared in 1954, reach the London Stone that nobody could explain even in 1598, and finish with Dick Whittington: the real mayor, buried three times, and the cat that was already being called a lie in 1605.

Start
The man who confessed to starting the fire
Finish
Whittington's cat was already fiction in 1605
Who it is for
A walk for anyone curious about mystery and legends and curiosity about the financial City.
Languages
Spanish and British English
Underfoot
The walk has slopes or changes in level. The route notes mention stairs or steps on the walk or its approaches.
Themes
Kings, Parliaments and PlotsFire, Plague and EpidemicsLegends and Ghosts with a Date

The route, stop by stop

An outline of the walk. The full stories are in the app.

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  1. 1

    The man who confessed to starting the fire

  2. 2

    202 feet and an unwanted urn

  3. 3

    The column that told a lie

  4. 4

    The grasshopper and the boy who never existed

  5. 5

    Two fires and a statue

  6. 6

    The forged bill of exchange

  7. 7

    The Bank's lady in black

  8. 8

    The god beneath Walbrook

  9. 9

    The stone nobody can explain

  10. 10

    Jack Cade strikes the stone

  11. 11

    Buried three times

  12. 12

    Whittington's cat was already fiction in 1605

Walking directions are based on mapped pedestrian routes. Check local access and signs; the route is not an accessibility guarantee. Times are approximate.

London, before you go

London makes more sense an area at a time than as one vast walk. Neighbourhoods change pace within a few streets; the sky may change while you find the next one.

More walks nearby

Good to know

Nyhavn canal, Copenhagen
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