The Great Fire of London 1666

 Saturday, 1st September 1666 was an ordinary day at the end of a long, hot and dry summer. It was also the day before London would be consumed in flames.

The area known as Monument consisted of narrow streets and it was mostly housing...

  In the 1600s a meat market existed close to what we now call Monument. Meat offal was called Pudding, which is where the famous name of Pudding Lane gets its name from. It was most definitely not named after a desert!

It was one of many small streets in a city where 100,000 people were living in very close proximity to each other...

  At something like 1am in the morning on Sunday, 2nd September there is nobody in the street.  A stray spark from the embers of a fire at Thomas Farriner's bakery ignites some twigs in the firehouse. Unnoticed, it starts to take hold.

Within minutes, it had moved from the bakehouse to other parts of the building, and to other buildings...

  The “jettying technique” of housing construction meant that houses and buildings were literally abutting each other, and that they were very close together.

With the tops of houses packed so tightly, the fire could easily jump across from building to building, roof to roof...

    The old buildings of poor areas that abutted richer areas had old, dry and rotten timbers. The authorities knew this, and they had tried to force people to build with brick, but progress had been slow.  The wattle and daub technique for building walls was fine, but if it was of poor quality air gaps would help fire to spread...

  Perhaps an hour or 90 minutes after finding out about the fire, it has entirely engulfed the bakery, and neighbouring buildings. The first warning for many Londoners was the sound of church bells ringing. The church of St Magnus the Martyr, a short distance from Pudding Lane, was one of the first to “sound the alarm”...

  Embers are being carried on the wind to Fish Street Hill. They ignite hay in the yard of the Star Inn pub, which was set alight...

  Still the early hours of the morning, and the fire is moving down Fish Street Hill towards warehouses by the river Thames, where many of London’s poor probably slept. Many warehouses were packed with flammable products – including hay, paper and barrels of tar...

  At around 5am in the morning, most people close to the fire were scrambling to save themselves and their belongings in any way they could. Many churches and cathedrals were likely being crammed with belongings, as people desperately sought refuge...

The City of London has published a      

Walk in association with the Museum of London and Worshipful Company of Firefighters.

The London Fire Brigade did not exist at the time of the Great Fire of 1666. This insightful piece provides a good overview.

This video on YouTube provides a bird's eye view of what 17th century London probably looked like before The Great Fire...

This extract from the diary of Samuel Pepys from 2nd September 1666 brings the events of the Great Fire vividly to life...

Adrian Tinniswood is a historian, teacher and writer and he joins historian Dan Snow to discuss the Great Fire of London. 

This podcast from The Londonist provides some great insights into the Great Fire and Monument...

What would it have been like to have been caught up in the Great Fire? This piece from The Conversation provides a perspective...

This piece by the Museum of London provides  images of objects from their collection that tell the story of the Great Fire...

This piece by the BBC describes key aspects of how life in London changed following the Great Fire of 1666...

 The Monument commemorates the Great Fire of London 1666. This piece provides an overview of its history (you can climb its 311 steps and get a fantastic view of London).

The Great Fire brought tragedy to London, but also opportunities. Fellows of the Royal Society and other natural philosophers influenced the rebuilding process.

To mark the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire, a scale model of the City was created on two barges and set alight... 

To mark the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire, the Museum of London created a  virtual experience in the Minecraft computer game...