History of Barts Fair
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Site history |Dev.Bartsfair.city
+Courant articles
The Fair
- The Fair. See +Barts Fair history for reference materials
The Priory Church and Hospital
- +St Bartholomew the Great and +Barts Hospital and Barts 900
The Fairground
- Cloth Fair and Smithfield - see +Cloth Fair and alleys +Smithfield history
- See Barts Fairground places
- +Barts Fair places
- Google MyMap
- +Bartholomew Fairground maps - from LoL
The City’s presentation about the Fair says:
“Bartholomew Fair was originally a cloth fair. Originally chartered as a three-day event, it would last a full two weeks in the 17th century. With a change in the calendar, the fair commenced on 3 September from 1753. A trading event for cloth and other goods as well as a pleasure fair, the event drew crowds from all classes of English society.
“It was customary for the Lord Mayor of London to open the fair on St Bartholomew’s Eve. The Mayor would stop at Newgate Prison to accept a cup of sack (fortified white wine) from the governor. The Merchant Taylors Guild processed to Cloth Fair to test the measures for cloth, using their standard silver yard, until 1854. The annual fair grew to become the chief cloth sale in the kingdom. By 1641, the fair had achieved international importance. It had outgrown the former location along Cloth Fair, and around the Priory graveyard to now cover four parishes: Christ Church, Great and Little St Bartholomew’s and St Sepulchre’s. The fair featured sideshows, prize-fighters, musicians, wire-walkers, acrobats, puppets, freaks and feasts”.