Maps of Old London — Background and Themes

From Picture to Plan: Shifting Modes of Representation

The atlas moves from Wyngaerde's panoramic view to Agas's woodcut, then to Hoefnagel, Norden, Faithorne, Ogilby, and Rocque. Each map embodies a different approach to depicting urban space. Wyngaerde offers a skyline of recognizable buildings; Agas presents a bird's-eye plan with streets and landmarks; later maps like Ogilby's employ a detailed key system. Mitton's selection highlights how cartographers gradually standardized symbols—the 'broad black line' for the city wall, chains for the line of freedom, dotted lines for parish boundaries. The progression is not merely chronological but conceptual: from artistic impression to measured survey, from singular viewpoint to systematic grid.

The Language of the Key: Ogilby's Systematic Notation

Ogilby's 1677 map, reproduced here, includes an elaborate key that enumerates '25 Wards, 122 Parishes and Liberties, and therein 189 Streets, 153 Lanes, 522 Alleys, 458 Courts, and 210 Yards bearing Name.' The key explains a visual code: churches are 'double Hatch'd,' streets left white, gardens 'faintly Prick'd.' Where space is tight, letters and figures refer to alphabetical tables. This system reflects a growing need to organize a dense, rebuilt city after the Great Fire. Mitton adds that Ogilby's London contained 479 courts, 472 alleys, and 172 yards—spaces formed by 'running narrow lanes between the backs of houses and swallowing up the gardens.' The key becomes a tool for navigating not just the map but the physical fabric of the city.

Recurring Details: Alleys, Courts, and the Texture of Streets

Throughout the excerpts, small urban features recur: alleys, courts, yards, and inns. Mitton quotes a description of how these spaces evolved from former gardens, creating a dense network of passages. The maps themselves label such places with small letters repeated up to 99 times across the sheet. This attention to minor thoroughfares reveals a city shaped by incremental development rather than grand planning. The atlas preserves these details, allowing readers to trace how London's street pattern thickened over time. Even the list of parishes—from St. James Clerkenwell to St. Katherine Cree-Church—conveys a mosaic of jurisdictions that governed daily life.

Movement Between Maps: Comparing Pre- and Post-Fire London

Mitton explicitly includes Faithorne's map of London 'as it was before the Great Fire' alongside Ogilby's post-Fire survey, enabling direct comparison. This pairing is the atlas's central structural device: two maps of similar scale but different dates, showing how the city was rebuilt. The editor notes that Faithorne's map had not been reproduced before, making it a rare resource. By placing them side by side, the volume invites readers to observe changes in street layout, the disappearance of certain alleys, and the emergence of new courts. The atlas thus functions as a tool for historical reconstruction, not merely a collection of curiosities.

Mitton's atlas is best approached as a comparative workbook. Readers are encouraged to move back and forth between maps, noting how the same location appears under different cartographic conventions. The editor's note and the Ogilby key provide essential guidance for interpreting symbols and abbreviations. Because the excerpts are incomplete, the full scope of each map's detail remains to be explored in the original plates. This volume rewards patient study of its visual and textual layers, offering a concrete sense of London's evolving geography.

Leafing through Mitton’s atlas, I recalled an evening tracing my own street’s vanished course on a ward map—those passageways erased, yet lingering in names. It felt like overhearing a forgotten argument. That same intimacy surfaced once in The Bullitt Mission to Russia Testimony before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, of William C. Bullitt — Key Ideas to Explore—not scenery, but testimony layering a fragile present over an unspoken past.