St Mary-le-Bow

One of London’s most famous churches, St Mary-le-Bow has a fascinating history spanning many centuries. Familiar to many from a certain nursery rhyme and tales of Dick Whittington, as well as the long-prevailing adage that only those born within the sound of its bells can be regarded as ‘Cockneys’ (i.e. true Londoners), the church thrives today as the City of London’s much-loved parish church.

The church of St Mary-le-Bow has nothing to do with the district of Bow in East London but is located in Cheapside, EC2, within the ancient Ward of Cordwainer, named after the professional shoemakers who lived and worked here historically. Cheapside is one of London’s oldest thoroughfares and gets its name from the Anglo-Saxon word ‘ceap’, meaning to purchase or barter. In medieval times the street would have been lined with warehouses, stalls and small shops. Even today many of the turnings off Cheapside bear the names of products once sold nearby – Bread Street, Friday Street (where they sold fish on a Friday), Wood Street, Milk Street, Honey Lane and Poultry. In the medieval period, ‘high days and Holy Days’ would see the enactment of jousting tournaments outside the church, often viewed by royalty.

 

Although excavation work suggests there was an earlier Saxon building on this site, the first documented church here was founded in 1080 by Lanfranc who was brought to England from Normandy by William the Conqueror to take up the post of Archbishop of Canterbury. Despite being right in the centre of London, the church remained in the diocese of Canterbury until 1850 and is still the City headquarters of the Archbishop. Lanfranc also built St Paul’s Cathedral and the Tower of London. Like those, this building is of Caen stone from Normandy. Given that William’s intention was to dominate London and cower its citizens through the construction of immense buildings, the locals of Cheapside would conceivably have disliked this new St Mary-le-Bow, seeing it as an object of oppression.

 At one time there were no fewer than thirteen ‘St Mary’ churches within the City of London, so each church had a second name – or nickname – to distinguish between them. The name of le-Bow may derive from the round arches, unusual at the time, in the Norman crypt. The crypt, which has survived the ravages of time, extends almost the length of the whole church, although a portion of it is now bricked up. Roman bricks have been found in the masonry.

 In 1091 the roof of Lanfranc’s church blew off in London’s earliest reported tornado,  causing several deaths. The tower was totally rebuilt in 1521, but then in 1666 the ravages of the Great Fire meant the entire edifice had to be demolished. Having been appointed as the King's Surveyor of Works in 1669, Sir Christopher Wren was commissioned to rebuild the fifty-one city churches consumed by the blaze. The Rebuilding of London Act of 1670 provided the necessary funds, mainly from raising the tax on coal imported into the city. Other than St Paul's Cathedral, St Mary-le-Bow was considered the most important church in the city, and so headed up the list of those to be reconstructed.

 The church that stands today (the exterior at least) was built in 1679-80 by Sir Christopher Wren. It is made of Portland stone with a wooden interior. It turned out to be the most expensive of his City churches, costing a total of £15,400 to build, half of it spent on the impressive steeple (only that of St Bride’s is taller) which stands 66 feet high. Wren’s design was based on pictures he had seen of the Basilica of Maxentius in Rome. Much admired for its beauty and harmony, Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary: “I up to see Sir W. Pen … and there with him to see St Mary-le-Bow Church; which is very fine”. Diarist and courtier John Evelyn praised Wren’s work as “a new manner introduced into England”. The church’s large square tower is topped by a square bell-tower with a balustrade and pinnacles. Above that is a circle of columns, topped by a top stage 12 colonnettes and then an obelisk with a weather-vane.

The vane is in the shape of a nearly 9-foot long copper dragon (symbol of the City). An extract from Wren’s account book mentions the sculptor who produced the original wooden model: “To Edward Pierce, mason, for carving of a wooden dragon for a modell for ye Vane of copper upon ye top of ye Steeple, and for cutting a relive in board to be proffered up to discern the right bigness, the summe of £4”. We also know that a further £38 was paid for the dragon to be coppered. The finished article was hoisted into place in 1679.

Sadly, the Blitz bombing of 1941 reduced St Mary-le-Bow to a shell, although the 17^th century tower miraculously survived. During the war, the BBC World Service broadcast a recording of the Bow Bells (made in 1926) as a symbol of hope to the occupied people of Europe. 

St Mary-le-Bow was rebuilt and consecrated in 1964. All the stained glass dates from the 1960s. It has no churchyard, this having been replaced in recent times by a large paved courtyard. The rood cross is from Oberammergau in German, gifted after the war as a symbol of reconciliation.

Almost as famous as the church itself are its ‘Bow Bells’, immortalised in the nursery rhyme ‘Oranges and Lemons’:

                                         “When will you pay me? say the bells of Old Bailey.                                                                                           When I grow rich, say the bells of Shoreditch.                                                                                            When will that be? say the bells of Stepney.                                                                                                  I do not know says the Great Bell of Bow.”

The original Bow Bell was a night-time curfew bell. From at least 1363 the Common Council ordered it to be rung nightly at 9pm to signal the end of the working day for the City’s apprentices. This practice continued until 1876. In earlier centuries, the sound of the bells’ peal would have been heard as far out as Hackney marshes and even Waltham Forest! These days its reach is much less extensive. Following devastating war damage, the bell was recast in 1954.

Since 1950, St Mary’s has held Grade I-listed status. Despite the wartime damage to the interior, the church’s external appearance is much as it was in the 17^th century and the 11^th century crypt remains. It is the parish church for the City’s business district and so offers services on weekdays rather than the traditional Sundays.

 

 

 

References: 

London’s Churches by Christopher Hibbert (1988)

An Encyclopedia of London by William Kent (3^rd ed. 1970)

Website: https://www.stmarylebow.org.uk/history/