AND ITS

ENVIRONS

DESCRIBED.

CONTAINING

An Account of whatever is most remarkable
for GRANDEUR, ELEGANCE, CURIOSITY
or USE,

In the CITY and in the COUNTRY
Twenty Miles round it.

COMPREHENDING ALSO

Whatever is moft material in the History and An-
tiquities of this great Metropolis.

Decorated and illuftrated with a great Number of
Views in Perspective, engraved from original
Drawings, taken on purpose for this Work.
Together with a PLAN of LONDON,
A Map of the ENVIRONS, and feveral other
ufeful CUTS.

VOL. IV.

LONDON:

Printed by R. and J. DODSLEY in Pall-Mall.

M DCC LXI.

AND ITS

ENVIRONS

DESCRIBED, &c.

LON

ONDON, the metropolis of Great Britain, and one of the largest and richest cities upon earth, is of fuch antiquity that it is impoffible to give any certain account of its origin. It probably existed in the time of the ancient Britons, before the art of writing was brought into England, and when there were no other monuments of ancient facts, than what were found in the fongs of the bards, which were preferved only by memory.

It would be ridiculous therefore to lay

any ftrefs on the fabulous tales of Geffry of Monmouth, who pretends that it was founded by Brutus, the fecond nephew of the famous Æneas, and called Trinovantum, or New Troy, and that it was at length walled by King Lud, when it obtained the name of Caer Lud, ot VOL. IV. B Lue's

Lud's Town. Upon which fuppofitions fome of our later hiftorians have had the weakness to compute, that it had its origin 1107 years before the birth of Chrift; 600 years before the fall of the Affyrian empire by the death of Belshazzar, and 350 before the building of Rome.

But to leave these fabulous tales. Camden fuppofes that this city derived the name of London from the British words Llbwn a wood, and Dinas a town; by which etymology of the word, London fignifies a town in a wood: this exactly. agrees with the manner in which the Britons formed their towns, by building them in the midst of woods, and fencing them with trees cut down: but left this derivation should not please, the same learned writer gives another, from the British word Lhong, a ship, and Dinas a city, and then the word London will fignify a city or harbour for fhips: and indeed it has been fuppofed by many learned authors, that before Cæfar's time London was the ancient emporium or mart of the British trade with the Phoenicians, Greeks and Gauls.

London had however no buildings either of brick or ftone, till it was inhabited by the Romans; for the dwellings of the Britons were only huts formed of