please empty your brain below
Watling Street looks to be on the correct alignment to head between London bridge, where the Romans crossed the Thames, and the Edgware Road.

dg writes: Original name 'Athelyng strate', not Watling Street.

Ian | 07.07.21 - 7:50 a.m. | #

My guess is that the Cordwainer is stretching and twisting fibres into a strong cord to stitch a boot or harness. If the fibres are not kept under tension, as it looks like they are over his knee and held under his foot, it all unravels.

RosemaryT | 07.07.21 - 7:51 a.m. | #

I guessed that he was actually stitching the boot in his lap, pulling the two crossing threads tight in opposite directions.

Sarah | Homepage | 07.07.21 - 8:31 a.m. | #

Again a gem of a post DG. These wards of London are fountains of knowledge for me. I have been to many of the sites, but will return armed with these new facts.

Michael | 07.07.21 - 8:42 a.m. | #

I used to work in Queen Victoria Street just near to the Mithras Temple remains and can hardly recognise the area now. Many a time I’ve been in the Williamson’s Tavern and the Watling. Lunch in Mansi’s or the Speedy Snack Bar and a browse in Glaisher’s Record Shop in Bow Lane. Glad to see that area looks about the same. Thanks for reminding me DG.

Dave B | 07.07.21 - 8:45 a.m. | #

Fascinating write up, Cordwainer is my new favourite City Ward.

Kevin | 07.07.21 - 9:14 a.m. | #

That Bloomberg building is spectacularly hideous, and even more spectacularly disrespectful to the elegant construction it looms over. Like some kind of collage nightmare. In short, don't trust the City to object to anything even blatantly objectionable.

Dominic H | 07.07.21 - 9:28 a.m. | #

By coincidence, last week I was explaining to my grand-daughter the use of the indefinite article 'a' or 'an', and the rule is to use 'an' before a word beginning with a vowel or vowel sound. So I was surprised to see the rule being disregarded in your blog. When I clicked on your nearby link to Groveland Court I see that it too has broken the rule, twice actually.
I have noticed that there has been a dearth of pedantic comments recently, so I wonder if you are editing them out. I will no doubt know soon.
But thank you anyway for the blog.

dg writes: your rule may be outdated.

Dave | 07.07.21 - 9:46 a.m. | #

As I cannot access DG's new audio offerings I had a look at his post today and was pleased that the written
text (Cordwainers) was still being published. Keep it up DG and you will not have lost a past very regular READER. ( not a listener).

Pierre | 07.07.21 - 11:10 a.m. | #

I too think the cordwainer is doing double thread stitching, as can often be seen being done by Master Saddler Suzie on Repair Shop.
I wonder if that used to be called cord waining.

Joho | Homepage | 07.07.21 - 11:33 a.m. | #

Here's a print showing a shoemaker in a similar pose, with the one difference that a self-respecting cordwainer of those days might have objected strongly to being called a cobbler.

Joachim | 07.07.21 - 3:47 p.m. | #

During my gap year in the early 1970s, I worked in a shop in Bucklersbury. This was long before 1 Poultry, and the covered passage it is now. Anyone remember Chuffs Model Train Peddlers?

ChrisL | 07.07.21 - 5:11 p.m. | #

The restaurant at the top of 1 Poultry isn't really that exclusive. It's the Coq d'Argent, part of the D & D chain. Not cheap, cheap, but within the price range of many readers, I'm sure. It's a lovely view!
Not sure they'll do it this summer, but the Evening Standard run a promotion with D & D twice a year, with a good value menu.

MikeK | 07.07.21 - 5:22 p.m. | #

Ooooh! Just checked the menu at the Coq d'Argent! It has gone up a lot!! And no fixed price menu at the moment. Perhaps a lot of London restaurants will be the same now!
Hope the Evening Standard offer will return sometime!!

MikeK | 07.07.21 - 5:36 p.m. | #

It's tempting to think that the chap is waining his cords, but - says Wikipedia - the word means 'a worker in cordwain or cordovan, the leather historically produced in Moorish Córdoba'.

Peter | 07.07.21 - 9:30 p.m. | #











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