The Public Markets of London Before and After the Great Fire of 1666

Transition periods such as England experienced during the seventeenth century are particularly efficacious for the study of the development of design concepts as the controversy which is generated during times of great socioeconomic change heightens the contrast between the old and new, and more clearly reveals the relationship between the physical and the social and economic environments. The purpose of the study is to examine the rebuilt city in terms of the changing forces which shaped it. The scope is a detailed examination of one particular aspect of the post-fire reconstruction period -- the public market system. The study begins with the origins and the physical structure of the public markets and their relationship to the medieval kinship structures which served as the basis of the social and economic systems. Conflicts first began to arise as the expansion of merchant trading strained the insular feudal system and altered both the economic activities and the social relationships of its citizens. In each stage the development of the public market system, both the physical organization of the markets and the socio-economic forces which dominated their formation are examine in depth