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Aldwych
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aldwych is a place and road in the City of Westminster in London. The road is a crescent, connecting to The Strand on the west side, and Fleet Street on the east. At its centre it meets the Kingsway. It is the site of The London School of Economics, Bush House, the Aldwych and Duchess theatres, the Waldorf Hotel, the Indian high commission and nearby in the Strand is the now-disused Aldwych tube station.
A statue of 19th century prime minister Gladstone, installed in 1905, is situated here, near St. Clement Danes church.
The name derives from the Old English eald and wic meaning 'old settlement', the name later being transferred to the street and district. It was recorded as Aldewich in 1211. In the 7th century an Anglo-Saxon village and trading centre named Lundenwic ("London settlement") was established approximately one mile to the west of Londinium (named Lundenburh or "London Fort" by the Saxons) in what is now Aldwych, probably using the mouth of the River Fleet as a trading ship and fishing boat harbour. It was 'rediscovered' in the 1980's after extensive excavations were reinterpreted as of an urban character by archaeologists Alan Vince and Martin Biddle working independently. Recent excavations in the Covent Garden area have uncovered the extensive Anglo-Saxon settlement. The excavations show that the settlement covered about 600,000 square metres, stretching from the present-day National Gallery site in the west to Aldwych in the east. As the focus of the city was moved back to within the old Roman walls, the older settlement of Lundenwic gained the name of ealdwic: "old settlement". [1]
On February 18, 1996 an improvised high explosive device detonated prematurely on a Number 171 bus travelling along Aldwych, killing Edward O'Brien, the IRA operative transporting the device and injuring eight others.
- ^ Hobley B, Lundenwic and Lundenburh: two cities rediscovered, AHDS Archaeology, University of York (PDF)
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