Public-domain ebook
by Wroth, Warwick William; Wroth, Arthur Edgar
Language: en3,831 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: History - British·History - Early Modern (c. 1450-1750)
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #71511.
The book is a scholarly survey of London’s eighteenth‑century pleasure gardens, compiled by Warwick W. Wroth with assistance from his brother Arthur. In the opening pages the author explains that he has gathered scattered notices from parish histories, newspapers, prints and songs into a single volume, aiming to improve on earlier accounts by arranging the material more clearly and chronologically. The work covers sixty‑four gardens, from the modest springs of Islington and Sadler’s Wells to the grand spectacles of Vauxhall and Ranelagh, and includes detailed notes, illustrations and references to contemporary sources such as Wilkinson, Pinks and Nelson. The introductory essay traces the evolution of these venues, from free‑admission rambling spots noted by Samuel Pepys to the regulated, ticketed resorts of the 1730s, providing the context for the extensive listings that follow.
Written in a measured, nineteenth‑century academic voice, the text combines factual narration with occasional anecdotal colour, reflecting the period’s penchant for exhaustive documentation. Its style will appeal to readers who enjoy meticulous historical research, especially those interested in urban leisure, Georgian social life, or the development of public entertainment spaces. Scholars of London history, cultural geographers, and enthusiasts of early modern recreation will find the detailed descriptions, period illustrations and extensive footnotes a valuable resource for exploring the city’s vibrant garden culture.
The opening · free to read
The information available in the writings of such laborious topographers as Wilkinson, Pinks, and Nelson is, of course, indispensable, and has not been here neglected; yet even in the treatment of old material there seemed room for improvement, at least in the matter of lucidity of arrangement and chronological definiteness. For, if the older histories of the London parishes have a fault, it is, perhaps, that, owing to their authors’ anxiety to omit nothing, they often read more like materials for history than history itself. Thus, we find advertisements and newspaper paragraphs set forth at inordinate length and introduced without being properly assimilated with the context, and the reader is often left to find his own way through a mass of confusing and trivial detail.
The principal sources of information consulted are named in the notes and in a section at the end of each notice, and, wherever practicable, a list has been added of the most interesting views of the various gardens. The Introduction contains a brief sketch of some of the main characteristics of the pleasure resorts described in the volume, and it is only necessary here to add that even our long list of sixty-four gardens does not by any means exhaust the outdoor resources of the eighteenth-century Londoner, who had also his Fairs, and his Parks, and his arenas for rough sport, like Hockley-in-the-Hole. But these subjects have already found their chroniclers.
In preparing this work for press I have had the assistance of my brother, Mr. Arthur E. Wroth, who has, moreover, made a substantial contribution to the volume by furnishing the accounts of Sadler’s Wells, White Conduit House, Bagnigge Wells, and Hampstead Wells, and by compiling ten shorter notices. For the remaining fifty notices, for the Introduction, and the revision of the whole I am myself responsible.
Although the book has not been hastily prepared, and has been written for pleasure, I cannot hope that it is free from errors. I trust, however, that the shortcomings of a work which often breaks new ground and which deals with many miscellaneous topics will not be harshly judged.
WARWICK WROTH.
LONDON, September, 1896.
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