What was London like in the middle ages?

Answer 1

In the Middle Ages, cities ranged widely in size. While large cities such as Constantinople or Cordoba might have had populations that reached a million at times, the smallest cities were hardly the size of modern towns, and some might even have been so small there populations were less than a thousand when conditions were hard. Nevertheless, there are generalizations that can be made.

First of all, in most places the defining feature of a city was the presence of a cathedral. This implied that there was probably an abbey or monastery, and there was a bishops palace. The abbey or monastery very likely included a library, monks who copied books, a school, and possibly a hospital.

Most cities had inns, some of which were hostels associated with the local monastery, which were open for pilgrims and other travellers.

Like towns (but not villages) cities had permanent market places. These had permanent shops and temporary stalls where all sorts of merchants plied their trade.

Housing ranged from fine houses for wealthy people, to lodging rooms for those who were poor. The people of the Middle Ages had wealthy neighborhoods and poor neighborhoods, which seems perhaps an odd thing to say, but was a change from times in ancient Rome. Ancient houses were built around atriums, and urban houses often had no windows looking out on the street, which allowed them to be surrounded by apartments and shops on the street side, whose residents paid rent to the person own in the house. In the Middle Ages, the house had no atrium, and had street windows, so wealthy people liked to build their houses close to each other, keeping apart from the poorer folk.

One of the things about the Middle Ages people don't think about much is that cooking was done over open fires, and this was very hard to do for ordinary people in an urban environment. The open fires had to be on ground floors for safety reasons, and the smoke was vented through louvers or vents at the top level of the roof. It was impossible for people living in lodging houses to do their own cooking, and there is some evidence that only about one person in ten had their own kitchens in cities. The result was that most people bought prepared food for their meals.

The open fires had other implications in architecture, and this dictated building design to a great degree. The fire, with its hearth on the ground floor and vents at the roof, implied that the building have one very large heated room with a very high ceiling. Other rooms looked onto this at various levels and got what heat they had from it, or were detached and had no heat. This made it virtually impossible for poor people to have a heated apartment, even of a single room. Later in the Middle Ages, after the chimney was invented in the 11th or 12th century, it became possible to have heated rooms, but their introduction was very slow, and the house without the great hall was a defining feature of Tudor architecture, a Renaissance style.

There were many different kinds of work. Trades and crafts that had high quality standards also had guilds associated with them. A child had to be an apprentice through long years to become a journeyman at a craft, and a journeyman had to produce a masterpiece acceptable to the guild to become a full guild member. The guilds regulated the trade in their own areas of interest, so if a person was a cordwainer (maker of expensive shoes and other fine leather products), or a fine baker, he was a guild member and had to conform to guild standards. People who worked at simple jobs, doing labor, had no protection from guilds, and often had to struggle to get by. In between were people who might or might not be guild members, depending on the conditions in the individual city, and these people included those who had skills, but whose clients were not wealthy; among them were people who prepared inexpensive food, potters, weavers, and so on.

Serfs and villeins who ran off the manor usually settled in cities because there was work there. The story is that if they could remain undiscovered for a year, they were free. My guess is that things were a bit more complicated than that. On the manor, the serf was guaranteed a job, a home, and protection from crime, war, and famine. In the city, there were no guarantees, and the price of freedom was the risk it entailed. A serf who repented running off might return during that year, perhaps with a feeling of defeat; but a serf who remained away for a year had presumably found work, and the lord of his manor was free of his obligations to the serf at the same time the serf was free from the lord.

People who were not members of guilds, had no marketable skills, were runaways, and such, were likely to turn to crime. Also, the manorial system had provisions for dealing with crime built into it, whereby people who were accused of crimes were the responsibility of their neighbors until they could be tried, and they were tried by people who knew them. In cities, the legal system could not function in this way, and it became very impersonal. Prisons were built because neighbors could not take responsibility for accused criminals, and the judicial system was comparatively uncaring. Punishments were modified in ways that became less a matter of compensation for victims and more a matter of intention to deter by example.

There were cultural activities ranging from theater to games. The games of medieval Europe included jousting, as we all learn from popular history, but they also include such things as football. In a city, football was typically played in an open area, such as a large square, with sides of varying numbers of people. It is said to have been remarkably rowdy with less respect for passers by than one might like. I have read of problems developing because someone decided to use the main door to a church as one of the goals, to which the priests objected.

People in cities always had to worry about sanitation. One thing misunderstood about the Middle Ages was the medieval people liked to be very clean. They had soap makers' guilds, and they had public bath houses in towns and even larger villages. The bath houses had schedules including days when the water was hot. In larger municipalities, they might always have had hot water. Rich people did not go to bath houses, but others did. They bathed in wooden tubs, and there is medieval artwork showing men and women bathing together. In fact, I have seen artwork in which a couple faced each other in the same tub, with the tubs lined up in a long row, long planks laid down across the middles of the tubs to form a table, on which a banquet was laid out. They wore their jewelry and nothing else. I have read the Church was a bit concerned by the nudity, but liked the idea of cleanliness being next to godliness, and so was puzzled about what to do.

But the problem of a water supply was important, and this was addressed in cities. In London, for example, a public works project begun in 1247 produced a conduit bringing spring water into the city. I am not sure what the access to this water was, but I believe it had to be paid for, because it seems poorer people continued to take drinking water from the Thames, and continued occasionally to get sick from it.

Many cities had walls, and others had large castles in them. Many had bustling ports. Some had industries associated with them, such as textiles, and some were known for their educational facilities.

Cities with universities were particularly troublesome. Clerics had benefit of clergy which meant that they could only be tried in Church courts. The legal definition of cleric was anyone who could read. Students, of course, could read, and therefore could not be tried by civil authorities. Where there were large populations of students, there was also a large amount of rowdiness, but in university cities, this got to the point of licentiousness. Paris was known for having problems with students who committed crimes and went unpunished.

Answer 2

At the beginning of the Middle Ages, London was very nearly deserted. It went through a series of change, growing slowly, until it had a population of about 15,000 to 20,000 at the time of William the Conqueror. It continued to grow fast, and had over 100,000 people when the Black Death hit, and it lost about a third of its population.

London was a center for trade and manufacturing, and was technically the seat of the government, though in practice much of that was done at Westminster. It was also the largest city in Britain.

In many ways, it was not very different from many medieval cities. It was cleaner than modern people might imagine, and we have records of people paying fines for doing such things as leaving garbage in the streets. It had a reasonably good water infrastructure, originally consisting of springs, but with conduits being added starting in 1247.

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Answer 3

The Middle Ages were not times known for city planning. Nevertheless it did exist, at least at a rudimentary level.

Medieval city planning focussed largely on the question of how the city was to be defended. Questions that were important included whether the city should have walls, and if so, where should they be? Or what points of entry were important, and how should they be managed?

Other questions had to do with such things as water infrastructure. The water system in London was first addressed as an issue in the 13th century.

Planning of such things as port facilities was often done by trade guilds, and mercantile leagues.

Answer 4

life in the middle ages was disgusting, every you went alot of aga (poo) and don't make me mention the hygiene.