X-Nico

33 unusual facts about Great Fire of London


Aldersgate

The gate was damaged in the Great Fire of London in 1666 but was repaired and remained until 1761.

Annus mirabilis

In fact, the year was beset by great calamity for England (including the Great Fire of London), but Dryden chose to interpret the absence of greater disaster as miraculous intervention by God, as "666" is the Number of the Beast and the year 1666 was expected by some to be particularly disastrous.

Arnold de Jode

He worked in the Netherlands and in Spain, and was in England in 1666, the year of the great fire in London, and in 1667.

Balthasar's Odyssey

Before the dawn of the apocalyptic 'Year of the Beast' in 1666, Balthasar Embriaco, a Levantine merchant, sets out on an adventure that will take him across the breadth of the civilised world from Constantinople, through the Mediterranean, to London, shortly before the Great Fire.

Bradninch

The town was largely destroyed in a fire in 1666 (the same year as the Great Fire of London).

Building code

After the Great Fire of London in 1666, which had been able to spread so rapidly through the densely built timber housing of the city, the Rebuilding of London Act was passed in the same year as the first significant building regulation.

Cheapside Hoard

A small red intaglio stone seal bears the arms of William Howard, 1st Viscount Stafford, dating the burial of the hoard between his ennoblement in November 1640 and the Great Fire of London in September 1666, which destroyed the buildings above.

Hamburger Feuerkasse

The London fire of 1666 also played a role in the ineffectiveness of the fire contracts of Hamburg.

Healing Through Fire

Ben Ward said of the album: "It's not a concept album at all, but we are using the theme of the Great Plague of London and the Great Fire that followed for a lot of lyrical and musical influence. It's definitely the strongest material we have written".

History of insurance

Property insurance as we know it today can be traced to the Great Fire of London, which in 1666 devoured more than 13,000 houses.

Hugh Wyndham

After the Great Fire of London in 1666, Sir Hugh Wyndham, along with his brother Sir Wadham Wyndham, served as a judge at the Fire Court set up in 1667 to hear cases relating to property destroyed in the fire.

Jan Wyck

It also seems likely that they were in London at the time of the Great Fire of London, as his father created one of the last sketches of Old St Paul's Cathedral in its ruined state before it was knocked down to create the new St Paul's Cathedral, as well as night scenes of the fire itself.

John Dunstaple

He died on Christmas Eve 1453, as recorded in his epitaph, which was in the church of St Stephen Walbrook in London (until it was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666).

Lawrence Sheriff

However no trace remains: the church and all its monuments were destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666.

Laystall

The siting of laystalls was a contentious issue during the rebuilding of London after the fire of 1666, due to the noise and nuisance they created.

Nightmare Creatures

When they decided to use these creatures as an army of conquest, one of their number, Samuel Pepys, set their headquarters on fire, resulting in the First Great Fire of London.

Nostradamus

Nostradamus has been credited, for the most part in hindsight, with predicting numerous events in world history, from the Great Fire of London, and the rise of Napoleon and Adolf Hitler, to the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center.

Old Kentish Sign Language

Pepys was dining with his friend Sir George Downing on November 9, 1666, when the deaf servant had a conversation in sign language with his master, which included news of the Great Fire of London.

Paon de Roet

The tomb, along with the tombs of many others, including John of Gaunt and Blanche of Lancaster's, were completely destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666.

Pembroke Dock

The oil-fuelled fire that followed raged for 18 days and was recorded as the largest UK conflagration since the Great Fire of London.

Pietro di Giacomo Cataneo

His plan for an 'ideal city' is said to have influenced Richard Newcourt's proposal for the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire, as well as the design of cities such as Philadelphia and Savannah.

Property insurance

Property insurance can be traced to the Great Fire of London, which in 1666 devoured more than 13,000 houses.

Second Anglo-Dutch War

The Dutch success made a major psychological impact throughout England, with London feeling especially vulnerable just a year after the Great Fire (which was generally interpreted in the Dutch Republic as divine retribution for Holmes's Bonfire).

Terschelling

The town was burnt to the ground by the English on this occasion which would become known as "Holmes's Bonfire" after the English admiral Holmes, the Great Fire of London in the very same year was considered by some to have been God's retribution.

The Maiden Queen

The play, commonly known by its more distinctive subtitle, was acted by the King's Company at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane (which had escaped the Great Fire of London the year before).

Worshipful Company of Armourers and Brasiers

The Hall was one of the very few to escape destruction in the Great Fire of London in 1666.

Worshipful Company of Barbers

The Hall (other than the anatomy theatre) survived the Great Fire, but was destroyed by enemy bombing in the London Blitz.

Worshipful Company of Clothworkers

From the later Middle Ages, cloth production gradually moved away from London, a situation exacerbated by the Great Fire of London and the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries.

Worshipful Company of Coopers

This hall was destroyed by the Great Fire of London in 1666 but subsequently rebuilt on the same site.

Worshipful Company of Glaziers and Painters of Glass

The original Glaziers Hall was burnt down during the Great Fire of London in 1666.

Worshipful Company of Grocers

The Grocers' first hall in Old Jewry was destroyed by the Great Fire of 1666 and replaced by a new building within the old walls, paid for largely by the Company members.

Worshipful Company of Tylers and Bricklayers

However, after the Great Fire of London, the King decreed that brick or stone, instead of timber, should be used in the building of homes.

Worshipful Company of Upholders

The Livery and Liverymen are actively involved in many organisations and charities in the City of London including Castle Baynard Ward Club, as the site of the Company's Hall until the Great Fire in 1666 is in the Ward.


Henry Yevele

His monument was extant in John Stow's time (the late 16th century), but was probably destroyed by the Great Fire of London.

Squares in London

Another is that some older squares were irregularly shaped to begin with, or lost their original layout due to the city's many transformations, not least following the Great Fire of London and The Blitz.