An interesting feature on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme today discussed a new online web project, Locating London www.locatinglondon.org
Image via Wikipedia
It ”allows you to search a wide body of digital resources relating to early modern and eighteenth-century London, and to map the results on to a fully GIS compliant version of John Rocque‘s 1746 map.”
The site uses several datasets to allow you to build up a picture of what life may have been like within an area of London at a particular time. Choose a dataset and then use a series of powerful filters to control the search eg. women killed in a particular street in a particular year.
The datasets employed are:
Old Bailey
Old Bailey Proceedings
London Lives
Coroners’ Records
Criminal Justice
Hospital and Guild
Poor Relief
London Lives Additional Datasets
Fire Insurance
Four Shillings in the Pound Tax
London and Westminster Directory
PCC Wills
St. Botolph Aldgate Parish Registers
Westminster Historical Database (ratebooks)
Westminster Historical Database (votes)
Centre for Metropolitan History
Hearth Tax
Plague Deaths
Museum of London Archaeology
Glass
Clay Pipes
Other
Population and Area Data
As well as Rocque’s map, the more accurate Ordnance Survey 1st Edition Map of London 1863-80 has also been employed for geo-referencing purposes.
Rocque is now mainly remembered for his map of London. He began work on this in 1737 and it was published in 24 printed sheets in 1747. It was by far the most detailed map of London published up to that time, and remains an important historical resource.
The map of London and his other maps brought him an appointment as cartographer to the Prince of Wales in 1751. A fire in 1750 destroyed his premises and stock, but by 1753 he was employing ten draughtsmen, and The Small British Atlas: Being a New set of Maps of all the Counties of England and Wales appeared. There was a second edition in 1762.
He also surveyed and published maps of Middlesex, Oxford, Barks, & Buckinghamshire in 1760.
This is a fascinating site especially if you have a London connection, and is free to access.
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