Smithfield, London : Historical writing

Travel writing

This website includes the complete texts of books describing journeys around Britain, written between the twelfth and nineteenth centuries. Selecting one of the links below will take you to the first reference to Smithfield within the selected text. This will not always be a description of a visit: travellers often mention places other than where they are, for example as a basis for comparison.

Traveller Section No. of Refs.
Daniel Defoe Letter 5 (London), Part 2: The City 2
Daniel Defoe Letter 1, Part 1: Through Essex to Colchester 1
Daniel Defoe Letter 5 (London), Part 3: The Court and Westminster 1

This website includes two large libraries, of historical travel writing and of entries from nineteenth century gazetteers describing places. We have text from these sources available for these places near your location:

Place Mentioned in Travel Writing Mentioned in Historical Gazetteer
Clerkenwell 2 2
Saffron Hill 1 2
Charter House 0 1
Aldersgate 3 1
Glasshouse Yard 0 2
Furnivals Inn 1 2
Newgate 2 0
Cripplegate 3 0
Grays Inn 3 2
Finsbury 1 2
Lincolns Inn 1 2
Moorfields 9 1
Inner Temple 1 1
St Luke 0 3
Holborn 12 5
Grays Inn Road 0 2
Middle Temple 1 2
Duchy of Lancaster 0 1
Bishopsgate 3 1
Covent Garden 3 1

Names from historical writing

The following appear as names for Smithfield. Follow the links for what the author actually said:

Name Author Source
SMITHFIELD GBHGIS Great Britain Historical GIS Project (, ).
WEST SMITHFIELD Daniel Defoe A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies (London: JM Dent and Co, 1927).

NB: These variant names come from our collections of historical travel writing and descriptive gazetteers:

  • The above links take you to the first reference to this particular version of the name within a book of travel writing, or to the relevant gazetteer entry.
  • Some names may derive from research by antiquarian writers such as William Camden and Thomas Pennant into the Roman, Saxon and medieval names of places. Their claims are not always supported by modern place-name researchers.
  • References by travel writers to the place using its "normal" name are not included. Descriptive gazetteer entries are included only if the name does not appear anywhere else.